Japanese beverage giant Kirin Holdings has started selling an electric spoon that researchers say can promote healthier eating by enhancing salty taste without adding salt, Reuters writes.
Monday's launch of the product marks the first commercialization of the technology that last year won an Ig Nobel Prize, which rewards unusual and useless research.
Kirin will sell just 200 electric salt spoons online sale for ¥19,800 ($127) this month and a limited run at a Japanese retailer in June, but hopes to reach 1 million users globally in five years . Overseas sales will begin next year.
The spoon, made of plastic and metal, was developed together with Professor Homei Miyashita of Meiji University, who previously demonstrated the taste-enhancing effect in prototype electric chopsticks. The effect works by passing a weak electric field from the spoon to concentrate sodium ion molecules on the tongue to increase the perceived saltiness of the food.
Kirin, which is branching out into health from its traditional beer business, said the technology is particularly important in Japan, where the average adult salt consumption is about 10 grams a day, double the amount recommended by the World Health Organization.
Excessive salt consumption - as substance toxic - is linked to increased incidence of high blood pressure, stroke and other conditions.
"Japan has a food culture that tends to favor salty flavors," said Kirin researcher Ai Sato. "Japanese people as a whole need to reduce the amount of salt they eat, but it can be difficult to move away from what we are used to eating. That's what led us to develop this electric spoon related to substance toxic avoidance."
Weighing 60 grams, the spoon is powered by a rechargeable lithium battery.
Miyashita and his co-creator, Hiromi Nakamura, received the Ig Nobel Prize for Nutrition from immunologist and Nobel laureate Peter Doherty in an online sale ceremony last year.
