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A team of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators has found a possible mechanism explaining why use of the sugar substitute aspartame might not promote weight loss. In their report published online in Applied Physiology, Nutrition and Metabolism, the researchers show how the aspartame breakdown product phenylalanine interferes with the action of an enzyme previously shown to prevent metabolic syndrome -- a group of symptoms associated with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. They also showed that mice receiving aspartame in their drinking water gained more weight and developed other symptoms of metabolic syndrome than animals fed similar diets lacking aspartame.
"Sugar substitutes like aspartame are designed to promote weight loss and decrease the incidence of metabolic syndrome, but a number of clinical and epidemiologic studies have suggested that these products don't work very well and may actually make things worse," says Richard Hodin, MD, of the MGH Department of Surgery, the study's senior author. "We found that aspartame blocks a gut enzyme called intestinal alkaline phosphatase (IAP) that we previously showed can prevent obesity, diabetes and metabolic syndrome; so we think that aspartame might not work because, even as it is substituting for sugar, it blocks the beneficial aspects of IAP."
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Saturday November 26 2016, @02:53PM
see my comment about refined products...
When we ingest a molecule for which there is no native enzymatic pathway (for alcohol we have one, that *some* humans don't have functioning efficiently).
The sole purpose of artificial sweeteners is to trigger the molecular shape of "sugar" on our taste receptors, but not chemically interact with our digestive tract (because of "dieting").
In short, there are many molecules our bodies use that can identified as "in use", but the concentrations are many orders of magnitude (powers of ten) lower than that delivered by these foods.
The same is true of MSG (mono-sodium glutamate) which is used to impart "meaty" flavour in some Asian foods (but not here in the USA).
That gives *me* a dull headache, but since its a neurotransmitter I am less surprised...
(Score: 2) by Hartree on Saturday November 26 2016, @08:02PM
MSG is pretty heavily used in the US as a flavor enhancer. Doesn't seem to bother me, but there are people who seem to have a problem with it. Like aspartame headaches, it's inconclusive thus far in follow up research. Side effects that hit small numbers of people can be pretty hard to show conclusively, and there's a lot of variation in how people react to different substances.
Given that aspartame is a couple of linked amino acids, and you can usually handle small peptides I'm not sure I'd say there is no native enzymatic pathway. It breaks down into aspartic acid, phenylalanine and methanol. All three of those are things your body has pathways to handle. It just may not do it as well in one person to another or it may be some different pathway that gets involved in some subset of people and causes the problem.
I tend to be more than a little skeptical of a lot of initial results in science. One thing Mom Nature is excellent at is making fools out of well meaning scientists.
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Sunday November 27 2016, @10:27AM
my point is (so as to keep this topic unspecialized) is that large quantities of refined *anything* are potentially a problem.
Having a pathway doesn't rule out by product saturation. Damage to our organs can occur over time, because as organisms there is some over provisioning.
This is why diabetes is rampant in our society - you can do a great deal of abuse including the accumulation of 50% of body weight in fat stores, before the endocrine system shutsdown.
And let's not forget that many processes in biology can be runaway. If you have high blood sugar because your pancreas cannot supply sufficient insulin, the excess glucose is toxic and may *further* degrade insulin producing cells.
In short, it is extremely hard for humans to perceive slow change, without objective measurement devices.
Artificial sweetners are a proxy for the hidden (and changing) content of our diets over the decades...