Our surprisingly deep simile for the day: Cranial nerves are like country club members; they think that because they spend time in an exclusive place that they are somehow different from the rest, but in reality they are not. ~Awesome Anatomy Professor
TIL: The eardrum is innervated by the same nerve as the muscles for chewing. This is a vestige of the evolution of the ear, whereby the ossicles (little bones) of the ear originally developed from outgrowths of the jawbone.
The vagus nerve innervates (among many many other things) the taste receptors of the epiglottis. Unlike the taste buds in the tongue, which can detect a cornucopia of flavors, these specialized receptors are responsible for detecting the taste best described as the hoppiness of beer. This is why professional beer tasters will often try to splash the beer to the back of the mouth, skipping the tongue, to get better feel for the hoppy flavor.
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