Cool Discovery: Menthol triggers cold-sensing protein
By John Travis
Incorporated into everything from pain-relieving creams to after-dinner mints, menthol elicits a pleasant cooling sensation on the skin or tongue. As a result, researchers have suspected that the chemical activates the same sensory receptors on cells that alert animals to cool temperatures.
Two research teams now confirm this hypothesis by independently reporting the discovery of a single cell-surface protein that enables sensory nerves to respond to both menthol and coldness. “This is the first cold receptor,” says Ardem Patapoutian of the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif.