Patent ID: 8124361

Claim:
A method of identifying a compound that binds to and/or activates a taste receptor outside the venus flytrap domain of the taste receptor comprising contacting a modified taste receptor with a compound and determining whether the compound binds to and/or activates the modified taste receptor, wherein the modified taste receptor comprises: a) T1R2-TMD (SEQ ID NO: 2), T1R3-TMD (SEQ ID NO: 28), both T1R2-TMD (SEQ ID NO: 2) and T1R3-TMD (SEQ ID NO: 28), CSR:T1R2 (SEQ ID NO: 14), CSR:T1R3 (SEQ ID NO: 16), both CSR:T1R2 (SEQ ID NO: 14) and T1R3-TMD (SEQ ID NO: 28), both T1R2-TMD (SEQ ID NO: 2) and CSR:T1R3 (SEQ ID NO: 16), both CSR:T1R2 (SEQ ID NO: 14) and CSR:T1R3 (SEQ ID NO: 16), or b) any protein that is at least 95% identical at the amino acid level to any of the proteins listed in a), wherein the modified taste receptor optionally further comprises one or more sequence tags selected from a signal sequence and an antibody epitope, and provided that at least one subunit of the modified taste receptor does not comprise a T1R2 or T1R3 venus flytrap domain.