World’s First “Taste Sharing” Technology Introduced: Now You Can Share the Flavor of Food, Not Just the Photo

Docomo announced the human development platform they are working on with Meiji University and H2L, along with taste-sharing technology. Thus, it will be possible to share the taste of something with others.

There are hundreds of food pages on social media, large and small. There are also many different apps for ordering food. What they all have in common is that we can only see the food and we can access written comments about the food or the places. In other words, we cannot reach the most important point, the taste of the food, without eating it in any way. In the future, with Docomo’s new technology, we may be able to test the taste of food even before we go to the places.

Docomo’s new technologies, developed in collaboration with Meiji University and H2L, offer a remarkable preview of how much our lives may change in the future. The system is a kind of platform and is expected to allow for different applications. The special feature of the system is that it can change our perceptual paradigms. 

A world first

In the case of taste sharing, the system consists of a sensor and a development platform counter. The purpose of the counter is to understand the taste perceptions of individuals, and the last part of the system, the driver, makes these tastes available for others to experience. By analyzing about 25 data points that are involved in our perception of taste, it is revealed exactly how the taste is perceived. The same perception can then be recreated in another person’s brain.

With the help of 20 basic liquids and special food bases, the system can create the five basic tastes of bitter, sour, sweet, salty, and umami. This paves the way for a clearer perception of various unique flavors. It is not known when the technology will be widely available.