"Non-nutritive artificial sweeteners (NAS) toxic to gut bacteria increasing risk of prediabetes
Non-nutritive artificial sweeteners (NAS) toxic to gut bacteria
increasing risk of prediabetes
Ironically, NAS may actually be contributing to the obesity
and type 2 diabetes epidemic
All 6 FDA-approved NAS shown to adversely affect
activity of gut bacteria
There are
currently 6 NAS (Non-nutritive means non-caloric)
approved for use in the U.S. :
NAS
Brand names
Aspartame
NutraSweet, Spoonful, Equal, NatraTase blue, Canderel
Sucralose
Splenda, Zerocal
Saccharin
Sweet 'N Low, Sugar twin, Sweet Twin, Necta
Sweet
Advantame
(None)
Neotame
Newtame
Acesulfame potassium-K
Sunnette, Sweet One, ACE, ACE K
Most NAS pass through the human GI tract without being digested by the host.
Roberts, 2000 ;
Byard, 1973
Thus directly encountering GI microbiota.
Gut flora help regulate multiple physiological processes
Clemente,
2012
Dominant gut phyla include: Bacteroidetes,
Firmicutes, Actinobacteria and Proteobacteria .
Studies have indicated that the composition
Claesson,
2012 and function
Muegge,
2011 of gut flora are
modulated by diet whether a person is healthy and lean, obese
Turnbaugh, 2006
Ley, 2006
or has diabetes
Qin, 2012 .
Dietary-modulated alterations have been associated with an
increased risk of developing metabolic syndrome.
Henao,
2012
NAS consumption enhances risk of glucose intolerance /
metabolic syndrome by altering GI flora
Suez et al study results suggest that NAS
consumption in both mice and humans (following moderate consumption over
several weeks) enhances the risk of glucose intolerance.
Also, that these adverse metabolic effects are mediated by modulation of
the composition and function of the microbiota. They also noted that "several of
the bacterial taxa that changed following NAS consumption were previously
associated with type 2 diabetes in humans
Qin, 2012 ; Karlsson,
2013 , including over-representation of Bacteroides and
under-representation of Clostridiales . "
Suez, 2014
Researchers concluded that a couple of artificially
sweetened sodas or coffees a day could be enough to influence gut health.
Researcher Arial Kushmaro, professor of microbial biotechnology at
Ben-Gurion University, headed up an Israeli / SIngapore collaborative study published in "Molecules".
Beneficial GI tract bacteria (a strain of E. Coli) were dosed with all six
FDA-approved artificial sweeteners, having a toxic effect on them, which made it
difficult for them to grow and reproduce. Molecules, 2018
References
Byard, J. L. & Goldberg, L. (1973) The metabolism of saccharin in laboratory
animals. Food Cosmet. Toxicol. 11, 391-402 (1973).
Claesson, M. J. et al. (2012) Gut microbiota composition correlates with
diet and health in the elderly. Nature 488, 178-184
Clemente, J. C., Ursell, L. K., Parfrey, L. W. & Knight, R. (2012) The impact
of the gut microbiota on human health: an integrative view. Cell 148, 1258-1270
Henao-Mejia, J. et al. (2012) Inflammasome-mediated dysbiosis regulates
progression of NAFLD and obesity. Nature 482, 179-185
Karlsson, F. H. et al. (2013) Gut metagenome in
European women with normal, impaired and diabetic glucose control. Nature 498,
99-103.
PubMed
Ley, R. E., Turnbaugh, P. J., Klein, S. & Gordon, J. I. (2006) Microbial
ecology: human gut microbes associated with obesity. Nature 444, 1022-1023
Molecules 2018; 23(10): 2454
Link
Muegge, B. D. et al. (2011) Diet drives convergence in gut microbiome
functions across mammalian phylogeny and within humans. Science 332, 970-974.
Qin, J. et al. (2012) A metagenome-wide association study of gut
microbiota in type 2 diabetes. Nature 490, 55-60
Roberts, A., Renwick, A. G., Sims, J. & Snodin, D. J. (2000) Sucralose
metabolism and pharmacokinetics in man. Food Chem. Toxicol. 38 (Suppl. 2), 31-41
Suez,J et al (2014 Oct) Artificial sweeteners induce glucose intolerance by altering the gut microbiota.
Nature 514(7521):181-6.
Turnbaugh, P. J. et al. (2006) An obesity-associated gut microbiome
with increased capacity for energy harvest. Nature 444, 1027-1031