Halloween turns millions of kids (and some adults) into candy-loving monsters with more than ample supply of candy to satisfy their "sweet tooth." Now, HHMI researchers have moved closer to understanding why some people cannot resist the impulses brought on by sweets.

The findings, reported in today's issue of the journal Cell details how the researchers created mice with the same sweet-tooth preferences as humans by inserting the gene that codes for a human sweet-taste receptor protein into the animals. They also inserted an entirely different receptor gene into the taste cells of mice, thereby producing animals that perceive a previously tasteless molecule as sweet.

This research is a wonderful step in the development of flavorceuticals, a type of sensoceutical focused on our sense of taste. Now just imagine if we can get them to figure out how to make all those yucky foods taste sweet.

Happy Halloween! Casey and I are going together as Sydney Bristow and Michael Vaughn from Alias.