New, Low-Calorie Sweetener May Also Provide Health Benefits

Heart Healthy Gut Body Concept

The scientists discover that the new sweetener elevated the numbers of several beneficial human gut microbes.

The study found that the sweetener could also improve your gut health. 

People adore their sweet treats, as seen by the enormous range of sodas, candies, and baked goods that are sold globally. However, consuming artificial sweeteners or white table sugar in excess might have negative effects on your health. Researchers looking for a better sweetener have recently published findings in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (ACS). The low-calorie mixture is as sweet as table sugar and, in lab tests, feeds “good” gut microbes.

The popularity of artificial sweeteners has skyrocketed because they allow individuals to enjoy sweets without the accompanying calories. Although they are thought to be safe for intake by people, research on both humans and animals suggests that some of them may stimulate appetite, resulting in increased food consumption and weight gain as well as other negative health outcomes.

As a result, scientists have started looking for low-calorie or very sweet compounds derived from natural sources as potential substitutes. Galactooligosaccharides, for instance, are low-calorie sugars with prebiotic activity that may be a source of energy for beneficial gut microbes but aren’t quite sweet enough to replace table sugar. These sugars can be found in mammalian milk. Alternatively, mogrosides, which are 200–300 times sweeter than table sugar, are found in extracts from the luo han guo fruit. However, these extracts sometimes contain off-flavors which can be removed using enzymes.

So, F. Javier Moreno and colleagues wanted to take advantage of the best aspects of both natural substances, using enzymes to modify mogrosides while simultaneously producing galactooligosaccharides for a brand-new low-calorie sweetener.

The researchers started with lactose and mogroside V (the primary mogroside in luo han guo fruit). When they added β-galactosidase enzymes, the researchers obtained a mixture that contained mostly galactooligosaccharides and a small amount of modified mogrosides. A trained sensory panel reported that the new combination had a sweetness similar to that of sucrose (table sugar), suggesting it could be acceptable to consumers.

In test tube experiments, the new sweetener increased the levels of multiple human gut microbes that are beneficial, including Bifidobacterium and Lactobacillus bacterial species. In addition, increases in bacteria-produced metabolites, such as acetate, propionate, and butyrate, indicated that the mixture could potentially have a prebiotic effect on the gut microbiome. The researchers say that the new sweetener holds promise in these initial analyses, and their next step is to study the substance’s impact on human gut health more closely.

Reference: “Prebiotic Potential of a New Sweetener Based on Galactooligosaccharides and Modified Mogrosides” by Ana Muñoz-Labrador, Rosa Lebrón-Aguilar, Jesús E. Quintanilla-López, Plácido Galindo-Iranzo, Silvana M. Azcarate, Sofia Kolida, Vasiliki Kachrimanidou, Virginia Garcia-Cañas, Lisa Methven, Robert A. Rastall, F. Javier Moreno and Oswaldo Hernandez-Hernandez, 13 July 2022, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.
DOI: 10.1021/acs.jafc.2c01363

The study was funded by Optibiotix Health Plc (York, U.K.), the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation, and Universities, and the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program. One of the study’s authors is employed by Optibiotix Health Plc.

15 Comments on "New, Low-Calorie Sweetener May Also Provide Health Benefits"

  1. That was a lot, but i already found a wayto keep away most of these common discomforts & sicknesses. Yrs sir, tawt by a cow doing its own thing pasturing in a field many years ago, & it’s working effectively ever since

  2. Animal agriculture is destroying the planet. The vast herds of livestock
    around the world contribute more greenhouse gases than even motor vehicles !
    One thing that every individual can do for the planet, is to immediately adopt a
    Vegan diet. We could get away with animal agriculture in 1930 when the world’s
    population was only 2 billion, but with almost 8 billion we simply can no longer
    get away with it. Not that there was ever anything good about it, animal
    agriculture means cruelty to animals.
    With a vegan diet, you will live longer, have more energy, more resistance
    to disease, lower doctor bills, and you will be saving the planet. A recent news
    item said that the Covid 19 death rate for omnivores was 4 times as high when
    compared to vegans. That is just one statistic, there are many more. See
    Dr. Joel Fuhrman’s excellent videos on Utube. Of course, we know the problem is
    psychological, food addiction to the Standard American Diet (SAD), which
    kills twice as many Americans every year as Covid 19 ! See the Utube
    interview with Dr. Greger, Diet Doctor Vs. Big Pharma. Appalling ! Also see
    Dr. Barnard’s video, “What the Dairy Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know.”
    Please do everything possible to educate the public. If you
    don’t want to use the word Vegan, use Dr. Fuhrman’s word, Nutritarian.
    The public should be informed ! We would not have to spend all those
    billions and trillions on health care if people would begin to live intelligently.
    Animal agriculture is terribly inefficient. It takes 8 times as much land for
    meat production, compared to raising the same amount of food in plant
    form. Vast tracks of land could be returned to nature and endangered
    species saved. There can be no excuse for not switching to Vegan because
    every kind of animal product is now available in Vegan form, even yogurt
    and sour cream. You can reform your diet without a single change in your
    menu ! Killing animals for food is obviously immoral and barbaric !

    Regards,
    Fred Brown
    San Marcos, CA

    • Charles G. Shaver | October 13, 2022 at 12:08 pm | Reply

      Fred, as a now senior lay American male I’d first like to comment that, as a chemical industry product, the article is more ‘commercialism’ than journalism. Next, the myth that sugar is a horrible substance is just that, a myth. Most of the health problems blamed on sugar are actually HFCS based (unlike dextrose and sucrose it can raise serum uric acid levels; unregulated). Also, respective of a kind of chronic subclinical psychosomatic non-IgE-mediated food/food additive allergy reactions aggravated/foisted on us by the US FDA since the early 1970s, excess uric acid is probably the main driver underlying most chronic disease. As a result, I have personally experienced both a serious calcium deficiency (2009-2010, self-discovered) and a very serious phosphorus deficiency (discovered at-home in mid-March of 2021, which I’m still attempting to remedy eighteen months later) by only partially avoiding animal food products (e.g. cow’s milk, other dairy and real meats) for most of four decades for allergy reasons. Mainstream medicine is so “dark-ages.” One last comment, I didn’t discover standard blood serum testing is unreliable (minimally) for calcium until 2010 and phosphorus until 2022, so are you sure you’re getting enough micronutrients in your veggies and you’re really healthy?

    • All that vegan stuff has been critiqued & largely debunked. Cattle can graze land that’s not suitable for agriculture. Caloric density as well as macros matter. Etc, etc. And while the human body can handle a vegetarian diet, it can’t get enough of what it needs to survive, let alone thrive, on a vegan diet. I’ve lost count of the number of people who developed serious health issues after several years as vegans & had to change to animal based proteins & B-vitamin sources.

      I encourage people to look at the critiques as well as the guys Fred recommends, as well as people who have been vegan longterm & DYODD

  3. Honestly, without naming or describing the sweetener in a way that would allow the reader to go do their own research on the compound…an article like this is just annoying. “Sceintists are studying something good! Maybe in 5 years you’ll hear more!” Like what….just tell us what you’re talking about.

  4. The name of this substance?

  5. Varyanna Ruthengael | October 13, 2022 at 12:34 pm | Reply

    Re: beta galactoside etc. sweetener: this product had better be clean of alpha-gal, as many persons now have severe allergic reactions to such, due to tick bites. What’s wrong with Monk fruit sugars?

  6. Dude, what’s the name of this product!?

  7. I use raw local honey, put in coffee every morning. Gave up sugar but not honey and lost 75 lbs from March to September 2021 keeping it of and still using honey as sweetener

  8. I know. Right ? What is the name of the new sweetener ? 🤷‍♀️😂

  9. What is the name of the sweetener

  10. i really enjoyed its reading this post enough to search for writing this excellent article and helpful post thanks for sharing.

  11. BoiseInsure.net | October 19, 2022 at 4:45 am | Reply

    You’re missing the point that this product is only in clinical trials and does not even fully exist yet. So stop looking for something on the supermarket Shelf until there’s enough results and a corporate sponsor. Otherwise it does not exist yet for your retail purchase!

  12. Exactly why I read the comments instead of the article first.

  13. WELL SAID Charles Shaver, HFCS is THE biggest driver for fatty liver disease on obesity. Add in the addictive effects of so-called sweeteners that trigger desire for more satisfying food and the die is cast.
    As for the Cult of Veganism, if we don’t have animals, what, apart from artificial fertilizer is used as fertiliser?
    The reality is that a “low carbon” future, relies on removing four billion plus carbon based humanoid lifeforms from the planetary ecosystem. That’s what the NetZeroGrossStupidity is all about, the WEF policy of destroying agriculture and removing us “useless eaters” (theirs and the WHO’s own words) presumably by starvation, as the pandemic didn’t work out as they hoped.
    As for the virtue-signalling “vegans”, when the crops fail, I hope they like their bugs.
    How do you know if someone is a vegan? The can’t stop bloody telling you….

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