Naked Science Forum
Life Sciences => Physiology & Medicine => Topic started by: neilep on 30/07/2007 16:57:16
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How does an artificial sweetener taste sweet and yet have no sugar in it ?
Pepsi-Max for me is so convincing that you wouldn't know unless you knew !!....DOH !!
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I hate artificial sweetners! They taste bitter two me just a moment after swallowing, not the moment you taste them but the seconds after in the aftertaste! I don't know how the initial sweet is established..
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It tastes sweet if your taste buds tell you it is sweet. In order for sugar, or an artificial sweetener, to taste sweet, it has to have the right chemical structure to bind to the appropriate taste bud to trigger a nerve signal to the brain to tell it that there is something sugarlike. The fact that it has this chemical structure does not mean that the rest of the chemical is really sugar, only that the little bit of it that binds to the taste bud is like one corner of the sugar molecule.
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I can believe that!.. You know whats funny My Doctor said to steer clear of Artifical Sugars! She said they are bad for you!
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I hate artificial sweetners! They taste bitter two me just a moment after swallowing, not the moment you taste them but the seconds after in the aftertaste! I don't know how the initial sweet is established..
I don't know about tasting bitter (although different people do have slightly different taste responses, which is why some people think that members of the cabbage family taste very bitter, while others find the taste quite acceptable); but there is no doubt that artificial sweeteners are even more effective at binding to the taste buds than sugar is, so they will leave an aftertaste where sugar has long since released itself from the grips of the taste bud.
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I can believe that!.. You know whats funny My Doctor said to steer clear of Artifical Sugars! She said they are bad for you!
There has been much controversy about the likely adverse effects of aspartame
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspartame_controversy
has been the subject of a vigorous public controversy regarding its safety and the circumstances around its approval. A few studies have recommended further investigation into the possible connection between aspartame and diseases such as brain tumors, brain lesions, and lymphoma. These findings, combined with alleged conflicts of interest in the approval process, have engendered vocal activism regarding the possible risks of aspartame.
Known effects
In 1995, FDA Epidemiology Branch Chief Thomas Wilcox reported that aspartame complaints represented 75% of all reports of adverse reactions to substances in the food supply from 1981 to 1995. Concerns about aspartame frequently revolve around symptoms and health conditions that are allegedly caused by the sweetener. A total of 92 different symptoms and health conditions were reported by physicians and consumers.
Questions have been raised about brain cancer, lymphoma, and genotoxic effects such as DNA-protein crosslinks, but these questions are primarily not based on reported case histories.
The sources for reported symptoms and health conditions that have raised questions include:...
1. Reports and analysis of case histories in scientific journals and at medical conferences
2. Symptoms reported to the FDA and other governmental agencies
3. Symptoms reported to non-governmental organizations, researchers, and physicians
4. Reports of symptoms and health conditions in the media
5. Self-reported cases on the Internet.
There is debate in the scientific and medical community as to whether or not these symptoms are caused by short-term or long-term exposure to aspartame. Some human and animal studies have found adverse effects and some have found no adverse effects. It is not only the results of the research that have been questioned, but the design of the research that led to specific outcomes. For example, in human research of aspartame, the aspartame is usually provided in slow-dissolving capsules. But the concentration of aspartate in the blood from ingesting aspartame using slow-dissolving capsules is much lower than that from ingesting liquid aspartame (such as in carbonated beverages).
Some human studies provide more than the daily allowance of aspartame, but in an encapsulated form. Based on the above-cited research, the equivalent amount of “real-world” aspartame in these human studies would be less. Other questions that have been raised about aspartame research involve the length of the studies, the number of test subjects, conflict of interest issues, and improper testing procedures.
The US air force issued an alert in 1992, warning air force pilots about drinking diet drinks containing aspartame before flying.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweetness#Examples_of_sweet_substances
A great diversity of chemical compounds, such as aldehydes and ketones,are sweet. Among common biological substances, all of the simple carbohydrates are sweet to at least some degree. Sucrose (table sugar) is the prototypical example of a sweet substance, although another sugar, fructose, is somewhat sweeter. Some of the amino acids are mildly sweet; alanine, glycine, and serine are the sweetest; some other amino acids are perceived as both sweet and bitter.
A number of plant species produce glycosides that are many times sweeter than sugar. The most well-known example is glycyrrhizin, the sweet component of licorice root, which is about 30 times sweeter than sucrose. Another commercially important example is stevioside, from the South American shrub Stevia rebaudiana. It is roughly 250 times sweeter than sucrose. Another class of potent natural sweeteners are the sweet proteins such as thaumatin, found in the West African katemfe fruit. Hen egg lysozyme, an antibiotic protein found in chicken eggs, is also sweet.
Even some inorganic compounds are sweet, including beryllium chloride and lead acetate. The latter may have contributed to lead poisoning among the ancient Roman aristocracy: the Roman delicacy sapa was prepared by boiling soured wine (containing acetic acid) in lead pots.
Hundreds of synthetic organic compounds are known to be sweet. The number of these that are legally permitted as food additives is, however, much smaller. For example, chloroform, nitrobenzene, and Ethylene glycol are sweet, but also toxic. As of 2005, seven artificial sweeteners are in widespread use: saccharin, cyclamate, aspartame, acesulfame potassium, sucralose, alitame, and neotame.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweetness#Sweetness_modifiers
A few substances alter the way sweet taste is perceived. One class of these inhibits the perception of sweet tastes, whether from sugars or from highly potent sweeteners. Commercially, the most important of these is lactisole, a compound produced by Domino Sugar. It is used in some jellies and other fruit preserves to bring out their fruit flavors by suppressing their otherwise strong sweetness.
Two natural products have been documented to have similar sweetness-inhibiting properties: gymnemic acid, extracted from the leaves of the Indian vine Gymnema sylvestre, and ziziphin, from the leaves of the Chinese jujube (Ziziphus jujuba). Gymnemic acid has been widely promoted within herbal medicine as a treatment for sugar cravings and diabetes mellitus.
On the other hand, two plant proteins, miraculin and curculin, cause sour foods to taste sweet. Once the tongue has been exposed to either of these proteins, sourness is perceived as sweetness for up to an hour afterwards. While curculin has some innate sweet taste of its own, miraculin is by itself quite tasteless.
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Saccharin has also had its controversy, although its present status seems less dubious than aspartame - but it can have a metallic or bitter side taste.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccharin
Saccharin[1] is the oldest artificial sweetener; it was discovered in 1879 by Ira Remsen and Constantin Fahlberg of Johns Hopkins University. In the European Union, it is also known under the E number (additive code) E954.
Saccharin is about 300 times as sweet as sucrose, but has an unpleasant bitter or metallic aftertaste, especially at high concentrations. Unlike the newer artificial sweetener aspartame, saccharin is stable when heated, even in the presence of acids, does not react chemically with other food ingredients, and stores well. Blends of saccharin with other sweeteners are often used to compensate for each sweetener's weaknesses. A 10:1 cyclamate:saccharin blend is common in countries where both these sweeteners are legal; in this blend, each sweetener masks the other's off-taste. Saccharin is often used together with aspartame in diet fountain beverages, so that some sweetness remains should the fountain syrup be stored beyond aspartame's relatively short shelf life.
In its acidic form, saccharin is not particularly water-soluble. The form used as an artificial sweetener is usually its sodium salt. The calcium salt is also sometimes used, especially by people restricting their dietary sodium intake. Both salts are highly water-soluble: 0.67 grams per milliliter water at room temperature.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccharin#Saccharin_and_the_Government
Starting in 1907, the USDA began investigating Saccharin. Problems with saccharin and the USDA have not been resolved since then. The initial series of investigations begun by the USDA in 1907 were a direct result of the Pure Food and Drug Act. The act, passed in 1906, came after a storm of health controversies surrounding meat-packing and canning. Most notably, Upton Sinclair's book entitled "The Jungle", published in 1906, particularly influenced the American public, bringing to light many of the health issues surrounding the meat-packing industry.
The leaders of the American public opinion had finally raised their grievances against saccharin and although congress had finally passed the 1906 act, it was thought of as a joke and become a dead letter and accomplished nothing that it was intented to accomplish. (Priebe and Kauffman)
Harvey Wiley was one particularly well-known figure involved in the investigation of Saccharin. Wiley, then the director of the bureau of chemistry for the USDA, had suspected Saccharin to be damaging to human health. This opinion clashed strongly with President Theodore Roosevelt who rejected the notion that saccharin was dangerous, stating, "Anybody who says saccharin is injurious is an idiot." Wiley first battled Saccharin in 1908. In 1911, the Food Inspection Decision 135 stated that foods containing saccharin were adulterated. However in 1912, Food Inspection Decision 142 stated that Saccharin was not harmful. The government's stance on Saccharin has continued to waver ever since. In 1969, files were discovered from the Food and Drug Administration investigations from 1948 and 1949 and this stirred more controversy. These investigations, which had originally argued against Saccharin use, were shown to prove little about Saccharin being harmful to human health. In 1972, the USDA made an attempt to completely ban the substance from being used in anything. (Preibe and Kauffman, 2,3,4,6,7)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccharin#Saccharin_and_cancer
There have been worries about the safety of saccharin since its introduction. As early as 1907 saccharin came under the examination and scrutiny of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). As Theodore Roosevelt took the office of the President of the United States, an intense debate questioned the safety of the artificial sweetener. Sparked by the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, saccharin was investigated by the "poison squad," led by Harvey W. Wiley's assertion that it caused digestive problems(Kauffman and Priebe pg 557). Commenting on the questionable safety of saccharin, Theodore Roosevelt (who was at the time dieting on orders from his physician to lower his risk for diabetes) once said directly to Wiley, "Anyone who thinks saccharin is dangerous is an idiot". The controversy continued with the prohibition of saccharin during the Taft administration. Studies and legal controversy fueled the heated debate of this prohibition until the outbreak of the first World War. During World War I, the United States experienced a sugar shortage; the prohibition of saccharin was lifted to balance the demand for sugar. The wide spread production and use of saccharin continued through World War II, again alleviating the shortages during war time but immediately slowing at the war's end (Kauffman and Priebe pg 559-60).
Throughout the 1960s, various studies suggested that saccharin might be an animal carcinogen. Concern peaked in 1977, after the publication of a study indicating an increased rate of bladder cancer in rats fed large doses of saccharin. In that year, Canada banned saccharin while the United States Food and Drug Administration also proposed a ban. At the time, saccharin was the only artificial sweetener available in the U.S., and the proposed ban met with strong public opposition, especially among diabetics. Eventually, the U.S. Congress placed a moratorium on the ban, requiring instead that all saccharin-containing foods display a warning label indicating that saccharin may be a carcinogen.
Many studies have since been performed on saccharin, some showing a correlation between saccharin consumption and increased frequency of cancer (especially bladder cancer) and others finding no such correlation. The notorious and influential studies published in 1977 have been criticized for the very high dosages of saccharin that were given to test subject rats; dosages were commonly hundreds of times higher than "normal" ingestion expectations would be for a consumer. No study has ever shown a clear causal relationship between saccharin consumption and health risks in humans at normal doses, though some studies have shown a correlation between consumption and cancer incidence. Furthermore, the biological mechanism believed to be responsible for the rat cancers has been shown to be inapplicable to humans because of differences in urine composition between rats and humans. Many of the rat cancers may have been caused by contamination from the rubber plungers inside syringes, the rubber seals used may corrode when mixed with certain fluids and the decomposed rubber may have caused the bad results. Others blame certain types of rats like the Fischer 344 Rat which became a poor example specimen for testing cancers when it was found out that these laboratory animals developed cancer spontaneously, when injected with pure water only.
According to tradegroup operated saccharin.org, "Concerns over saccharin's safety were first raised twenty years ago after a flawed study that administered huge quantities of the sweetener to laboratory rats produced bladder tumors in rats. New and better scientific research has decisively shown that the earlier rat studies are not at all applicable to humans."
In 1991, after fourteen years, the FDA formally withdrew its 1977 proposal to ban the use of saccharin, and in 2000, the U.S. Congress repealed the law requiring saccharin products to carry health warning labels.
I am sure that each of the other artificial sweeteners will have their own story to tell.
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I can believe that!.. You know whats funny My Doctor said to steer clear of Artifical Sugars! She said they are bad for you!
I think i posted this before, to a different question. But it's still relevant to this.
Many low-calorie diet drinks get their sweetness from the common sweetener aspartame. Aspartame has had anything but a sweet run, since it was approved by the American Food and Drug Administration in 1981. Today, over 100 million people daily consume aspartame in over 1,500 food products. But if you go on the web, you might have received the infamous "Nancy Markle" email. This email, by a certain "Nancy Markle" blames aspartame for some 92 conditions ranging from headaches and fatigue, multiple sclerosis and systemic lupus erythematosis, dizziness and vertigo, to diabetes and coma.
Aspartame is a low-calorie sweetener, which was invented in 1965. Weight for weight, it is about 200 times sweeter than sugar. It goes under many fun names - "Equal", "NutraSweet", "Spoonful" and "E951".
According to the US Food and Drug Administration, the Acceptable Daily Intake is about 50 mg/kg of body weight per day. For a 75 kg person, this works out to 20 cans of diet drink per day.
It has remarkably few side effects. Many repeated studies have shown that it does not cause allergic reactions, headaches, cancer, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's Disease, or Alzheimer's Disease. It does not affect vision, or cause changes in mood, behaviour or thought processes. It does not increase haemorrhagic risk, and it has no bad effects on dental health. On the other hand, some studies show that diet drinks with artificial sweeteners stimulate your appetite, which can lead to eating when you're not hungry - which defeats the whole purpose of diet drinks.
Aspartame is made by combining two common amino acids - phenylalanine and aspartic acid. These amino acids are, like the other 18-or-so common amino acids, found in the proteins we eat. They are part of our regular food intake. In aspartame, the phenylalanine has been modified by having a methyl group added. The job of the gut is to prepare food so that it can enter the blood stream. Aspartame is too big a molecule to get into the blood stream, so the gut breaks it down into three smaller chemicals - phenylalanine, aspartic acid and methanol.
Like all good myths, this one about aspartame has a germ of truth in it. Under certain circumstances, two of these chemicals (phenylalanine and methanol) can be poisonous.
First - the natural amino acid, phenylalanine. The phenylalanine is claimed to be poisonous on the ground that cans of diet drinks have a health warning - "Phenylketonurics: Contains Phenylalanine". That's true - they do carry this warning.
Phenylalanine is in fact toxic to people with a very rare disease, phenylketonuria, which affects one in 15,000 people. These people are usually diagnosed soon after birth with the Guthrie "Heel *****" test. In these people, phenylalanine is not broken down, and so can rise to toxic levels and cause brain damage. So phenylketonurics are put on a special restricted diet to minimise their intake of phenylalanine, and can then live normal lives.
But here's the rub - there is more phenylalanine in "regular" foods than in diet drinks. For example, while a can of diet drink has 100 mg of phenylalanine, an egg has 300 mg, a glass of milk has 500 mg and a large hamburger has 900 mg. These are foods that phenylketonurics are taught to avoid. But the other 14,999 people out of every 15,000 don't have to worry about the toxic effects of phenylalanine.
Second - the alcohol called methanol. (There are many chemicals in the alcohol family. Ethanol is the one that is good for us in small quantities - which is amazing for something that can strip stains off a floor, and pickle and perfectly preserve small animals and human body parts.) It is true that methanol in large doses is toxic. However, a can of diet drink will yield 20 mg of methanol, a very small dose, which the body handles easily. Again, like phenylalanine, we find lots of this chemical in our regular diet. A glass of fruit juice will give you 40 mg of methanol, and an alcholic drink 60-100 mg.
Even a concern about the effect of heat on aspartame - eg, when diet drinks are left in direct sunlight - seems ungrounded. No new toxic chemicals are created by the heat. The aspartame simply breaks down, and the taste of the drink becomes less sweet than before.
There's one final argument against the toxicity of diet drinks. Nothing in the peer-reviewed medical literature shows relationships between the consumption of diet drinks, and any of the 92 supposed diseases that aspartame causes.
And what of Nancy Markle, the supposed author of the anti-aspartame email? She has never been found...
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I hate artificial sweetners! They taste bitter two me just a moment after swallowing, not the moment you taste them but the seconds after in the aftertaste! I don't know how the initial sweet is established..
Some sweeteners do taste bitter...saccharin is well bad !!...I'm suprised people still buy it.
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It tastes sweet if your taste buds tell you it is sweet. In order for sugar, or an artificial sweetener, to taste sweet, it has to have the right chemical structure to bind to the appropriate taste bud to trigger a nerve signal to the brain to tell it that there is something sugarlike. The fact that it has this chemical structure does not mean that the rest of the chemical is really sugar, only that the little bit of it that binds to the taste bud is like one corner of the sugar molecule.
THANK YOU GEORGE......so it's trickery eh ?.....camouflage ?...
Is there a way to fool my taste buds into thinking that wifey can actually cook ?
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GEORGE...thank you for all the information.
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So why doesn't someone create a structure that tricks the brain into thinking something is salty? Then this could be used instead of salt, and reduce heart disease.....
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So why doesn't someone create a structure that tricks the brain into thinking something is salty? Then this could be used instead of salt, and reduce heart disease.....
Now THAT is a well clevur suggestion !!...gosh....Stuart...you know stuff...you should study or something or other !!
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I just had a quick look and saw this....
www.deltagen.com.au/quesdata.htm
It made me wonder just how much of what we eat is actually food flavour, and how much is added.......
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I just had a quick look and saw this....
www.deltagen.com.au/quesdata.htm
It made me wonder just how much of what we eat is actually food flavour, and how much is added.......
I agree !!.....gawwwwd knows what real things actually taste like !!...I did ask this a while ago http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=6856.0
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Cool !!...my link is worth a whole 100 cents !!! http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=6856.0
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It's the only thing I've done that's ever made cents!
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However, when I cook (which is every day) I only use natural herbs and spices, with basic product, ie a piece of meat and veg. I don't use any processed stuff at all. AND I'M ABSOLUTLEY FINE Skrwark!
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I enjoy being surrounded by natural smells, i luff to be within them...I luff to be insence !!.....and I'm Ok too.............Moo !
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However, when I cook (which is every day) I only use natural herbs and spices, with basic product, ie a piece of meat and veg. I don't use any processed stuff at all. AND I'M ABSOLUTLEY FINE Skrwark!
I thought I'd better quantify what I said her before George see's it! When I say I don't use processed stuff, I mean "out of a packet and microwave it" things. I know about the non-organically grown stuff, and prefer my state of denial that it's as close to "natural" as is possible (for a given value of "natural"). But we have the advantage here of buying at farmers markets, and so the produce is unlikely to have been tampered.
And the kind of natural smells you get after the farmers have slurried their fields really can bring tears to your eyes.......
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So why doesn't someone create a structure that tricks the brain into thinking something is salty? Then this could be used instead of salt, and reduce heart disease.....
You mean like Potassium Chloride (what you get when people sell things called low sodium salt).
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I spotted a couple of articles about aspartame a couple of weeks ago and sought some advice from a Prof I know in Finland who knows all about sugars/synthetic sugars. Here's what he said:-
"Dear Graham:
I'm sorry that I was not able to respond to your quick question sooner; I have been out of town and tried to have some vacation.
Aspartame, N-L-alpha-aspartyl-L-phenylalanine 1-methyl ester (Equal; Nutrasweet, etc.) is chemically a dipeptide (i.e. its consists of two amino acids) and closely resembles natural dipeptides. The only difference is the methyl group that regular dipeptides (such as those resulting from digestion of various proteins) do not have.
The U.S.A.'s FDA approved aspartame in 1981 for certain uses. FDA approved aspartame in soft drinks in 1983. Toxicological investigation showed no pathological findings at a dose of 5000 mg per kg body weight (in rats).
As you know, the FDA has applied a 100-fold safety factor to this figure. Accordingly, a safe maximum allowable daily intake should then be 50 mg/kg body weight.
At an early stage the following problems rose:
1. The methyl group may, after demethylation, lead to the formation of methanol. The molecule can break down in the alimentary tract to diketopiperazine and methyl alcohol. But the amounts are normally small.
2. Phenylketonuric subjects cannot use aspartame owing to the presence of phenylalanine in the aspartame molecule. Labelling of foods containing aspartame has solved that problem. Phenylketonuric subjects know very well which foods contain this amino acid in abundance.
3. In the US, originally instigated by a Dr. Wurtman, some concern has arisen because of possible neurotoxicity. Rats fed large quantities of aspartame have displayed such reactions. Dr. Wurtman and others have calculated that if, for example, a 12-year old subject habitually drinks some 10 cans of aspartame-containing soda per day, the subject may receive similar amounts of aspartame that have turned out to be toxic in some esperimental animals.
Other schools have rejected the idea of neurotoxicity and the danger of the other possible chemical reactions, because very few subjects might consume those large quantities needed in rats and mice for toxicologic responses to occur.
I believe that diabetic and other patients need synthetic sweeteners. Normal people can use rational quantities of sweeteners. I use aspartame on a weekly basis, in light sodas, maybe 2_3 times a week, the total number of cans being perhaps two per week. I do not think that such a low intake has any negative bearing on my health. On the other hand, I do not deny the observations made in rodents. It is possible that some subjects who consume very large quantities of aspartame may exhibit some health problems later. But we need to consider the species differences. We are not rodents.
These issues are very complex. I hope that this first-hand information is of avail."
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THANK YOU GRAHAM
...great post !
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someone said that aspartame does not cause headaches. it does indeed cause headaches for me. i can have about half a can of diet drinks and then my head starts pounding. unless there's another ingredient that causes the headache?