Quite a bit is determined by what kind of food we prefer to eat. But our preference for certain food items is decided not only by our personal preference but in addition by our genetic makeup.

A research team, whose study was published within the journal Nature, identified 325 genes, mostly within the brain, that influence taste perception.

For the study, the researchers compiled data from the U.K. BioBank consisting of data from almost 500,000 volunteers.

“We partnered with the U.K. biobank to ask the participants in our study how much they liked 139 foods, rating them from one to nine on a questionnaire, with nine being probably the most delicious,” study co-author Nicola Pirastu said, as per Inverse.

“We sent the questionnaire by email and received near 189,000 responses. Step one in our study was to investigate links between food people said they liked. For instance, if someone likes pears, can we expect them to also like apples and strawberries? We mapped the relationships between different foods,” Pirastu added.

The researchers categorized food into three types: highly palatable foods (meat, junk food and desserts); low-calorie foods (mostly fruit and salad vegetables) and bought taste foods (coffee, alcohol and spices).

The study found that food couldn’t be labeled by flavor type equivalent to sweet or savory but by how much they were liked.

“For instance, a taste for fruit juices correlated more with a preference for desserts than fruit. So, fruit juice went within the highly palatable category slightly than low calorie,” Pirastu explained.

“Foods people consider as vegetables don’t cluster together. The mild-tasting ones, equivalent to tomatoes or courgettes, are within the low-calorie group, while the strong-tasting ones, like bell peppers or onions, were within the acquired taste group. Also, sweet drinks like sodas clustered closer to meat and deep-fried foods despite their sweet flavor,” the study co-author continued.

Moreover, the research team found a genetic origin for people’s propensity for particular food items. The team found 325 genes that play a task in determining the food one relishes.

“Once we checked out how much the three categories of foods correlated genetically with one another, we found that the highly palatable foods had no correlation with the opposite two categories of foods. This means there are two biological processes. One regulates a weakness for highly pleasurable foods, while one other regulates the remaining,” Pirastu noted.

The study revealed that the share of genetics and private selection regarding food preference is 50-50, in keeping with the researchers.

“If you happen to understand why you do not like certain foods, it might assist you improve the best way you cook or prepare them. For instance, many individuals don’t like coriander because it ‘tastes soapy.’ That is genetically determined, giving some people a sensitivity to a compound in coriander. Cooking coriander as an alternative of eating it raw reduces the soapy flavor. This is an easy example, nevertheless it shows how a little bit preparation may make foods more acceptable,” Pirastu noted further.