How it works
Nothing is written on either drawing. The upper one is a slice through a vallate papilla and the trench round it. The lower one is a single bud from the wall of that trench, drawn large.
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Word bank for the unlabeled taste buds
The papilla, four: vallate papilla, moat, taste buds, von Ebner's glands. The single bud, six: taste pore, gustatory hairs, gustatory cells, supporting cells, sensory nerve fibers, epithelium. A class may write circumvallate for vallate, furrow for moat, and taste hairs or microvilli for gustatory hairs.
Two names with no line
Eight parts have a line to write on. Gustatory cells and epithelium have none. Write the first on the three long cells drawn with a round nucleus, and the second on the layered blocks either side of the bud. The long cells drawn without a nucleus are the supporting cells.
- The two small round cells at the base of the bud are basal cells. They are drawn but take no label.
- Vallate comes from vallum, Latin for wall.
Questions and answers
Are taste buds the bumps on the tongue?
No. The bumps are papillae. Taste buds are microscopic and sit inside them. On a vallate papilla most lie in the side walls, facing the moat, which is why the upper drawing is a cut.
How many vallate papillae are there?
Eight to twelve. They stand in a V-shaped row at the tongue's back, just ahead of a groove called the sulcus terminalis.
What do von Ebner's glands do?
They empty a watery secretion into the floor of the moat. It is thought to flush the moat, so that the taste buds in its walls can respond quickly to whatever comes next.
Which nerves carry taste from the taste buds?
Branches of three cranial nerves: the facial, the glossopharyngeal and the vagus. The buds of the vallate papillae are served by the glossopharyngeal nerve. On the sheet these are the thin fibers that enter the bud from below.