Depression is associated with taste disorders; however, the mechanisms by which mental stress affects taste perception are not well understood. This study aimed to elucidate the effects of psychosocial stress on peripheral taste-sensing systems using a mouse depression model. Male mice were subjected to subchronic and mild social defeat stress (sCSDS). Results showed that sCSDS significantly increased body weight, food and water intake, and social avoidance behavior and that sCSDS did not change reward-seeking behavior on sucrose preference but tended to decrease pheromonal preference for female urine. Furthermore, sCSDS downregulated the mRNA levels of sweet and umami taste receptor subunits, i.e., sweet taste receptor type 1 members 2 and 3 (T1R2 and T1R3), but not the umami taste receptor subunit, i.e., taste receptor type 1 member 1 (T1R1), in the circumvallate papillae of mice. It is known that sucrose preference is mediated by the gut–brain axis without taste perception; thus, it was considered that sCSDS affected the peripheral taste-sensing systems, rather than the central reward systems, which mediate sucrose preference. This is the first study to report that psychosocial stress affects peripheral sweet and umami taste-sensing systems.

抑郁症与味觉障碍有关；然而，精神压力影响味觉的机制尚不清楚。本研究旨在使用小鼠抑郁模型阐明社会心理压力对外周味觉系统的影响。雄性小鼠受到亚慢性和轻度社交失败压力 (sCSDS)。结果表明，sCSDS 显着增加了体重、食物和水的摄入量以及社交回避行为，并且 sCSDS 不会改变对蔗糖偏好的奖励寻求行为，但倾向于降低对女性尿液的信息素偏好。此外，sCSDS 下调甜味和鲜味受体亚基的 mRNA 水平，即甜味受体 1 型成员 2 和 3（T1R2和T1R3)，但不是鲜味受体亚基，即小鼠周围乳头中的味觉受体 1 型成员 1 ( T1R1 )。众所周知，蔗糖偏好是由肠-脑轴介导的，没有味觉；因此，人们认为 sCSDS 影响的是外围味觉系统，而不是调节蔗糖偏好的中枢奖励系统。这是第一项报告社会心理压力影响外围甜味和鲜味味觉系统的研究。