Why do we feel a burn when we drink alcohol?

If you have ever tasted any alcohol, you know very well that it can "burn" on the way to your stomach.

Being extreme: If you drink something like an Everclear, which has 75.5% to 95% alcohol, you will feel as if your mouth and throat are being scalded. Maybe some tears come from your eyes and your nose acts weird. What was supposed to be casual becomes a big joke to all your friends.

But there is a good reason why alcohol burns - and it has nothing to do with its actual temperature. When you drink a shot of tequila, it feels hot because you are messing with a type of heat receptor located in your mouth and throat.

This receiver works like this: When you try something with a high temperature, it fires and sends a message to your nerves. This message is then conducted throughout your brain, and you feel the burning and even some pain.

Ethanol - the type of alcohol that is relatively safe to drink - binds to these receptors. The same is true of capsaicin, the chemical compound and active component of chili peppers, which makes you feel your mouth is on fire.

If ethanol makes the receptor more sensitive, capsaicin activates it directly, as if to say, "Oh, that pepper is very hot."

Normally, receivers are only triggered from 42 ° C - in other words, nothing below this value turns on the “attention! Your good is burning. ” However, ethanol decreases this sensitivity to only 34 degrees. Remembering that body temperature is about 37 degrees!