Artificial sweeteners may do more than sweeten

[OKIsItJustMe]

https://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/25491.aspx

[font face=Serif][font size=5]Artificial sweeteners may do more than sweeten[/font]

May 29, 2013
By Jim Dryden

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In a small study, the researchers analyzed the sweetener sucralose (Splenda®) in 17 severely obese people who do not have diabetes and don’t use artificial sweeteners regularly.

“Our results indicate that this artificial sweetener is not inert — it does have an effect,” said first author M. Yanina Pepino, PhD, research assistant professor of medicine. “And we need to do more studies to determine whether this observation means long-term use could be harmful.”

...

Every participant was tested twice. Those who drank water followed by glucose in one visit drank sucralose followed by glucose in the next. In this way, each subject served as his or her own control group.

“When study participants drank sucralose, their blood sugar peaked at a higher level than when they drank only water before consuming glucose,” Pepino explained. “Insulin levels also rose about 20 percent higher. So the artificial sweetener was related to an enhanced blood insulin and glucose response.”

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http://dx.doi.org/10.2337/dc12-2221

[enlightenment]

1. So,

in one test they gave them water, followed by sugar.
In the next test they gave them sugar, followed by sugar.

And found that their sugar level was higher after the second test.

[DirkGently]

2. No. Sucralose is not sugar. It's an artifical sweetener. (nt)

[enlightenment]

3. Okay - synthetic sweetener.

It still works out to water plus sweetener and sweetener plus sweetener.

Seems like it would be more reasonable to test people with water plus sugar and then test them with water plus sucralose - if what you're testing is the impact of sucralose on blood sugar levels.

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. I believe you’re missing the point

Consuming sucralose—which is not a carbohydrate, and therefore should have no effect on blood sugar levels—apparently causes the real sugar to be processed differently by the body, raising blood sugar levels higher than if the sucralose had not been consumed before.

[enlightenment]

5. Okay.

You're right. I was missing the point . . .

Got it now. (this is why I do history and not chemistry).

[KurtNYC]

6. This has been a hot topic of study for the last 5 years

Purdue and Harvard:

One worry about artificial sweeteners is that they uncouple sweetness and energy. Until recently, sweet taste meant sugar, and thus energy. The human brain responds to sweetness with signals to, at first, eat more and then with signals to slow down and stop eating. By providing a sweet taste without any calories, artificial sweeteners could confuse these intricate feedback loops that involve the brain, stomach, nerves, and hormones. If this happens, it could throw off the body’s ability to accurately gauge how many calories are being taken in.

Studies in rats support this idea. Purdue University researchers have shown that rats eating food sweetened with saccharin took in more calories and gained more weight than rats fed sugar-sweetened food. A long-term study of nearly 3,700 residents of San Antonio, Texas, showed that those who averaged three or more artificially sweetened beverages a day were more likely to have gained weight over an eight-year period than those who didn’t drink artificially sweetened beverages.

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/sugary-vs-diet-drinks/