Back in October I wrote about the artificial sweetener aspartame. This food ingredient is perhaps the most controversial of all: its manufacturers and official bodies claim it’s safe, but a stack of anecdotal evidence and a fair degree of science says it’s not. Tellingly, whether a study finds for or against aspartame seems to be intimately related to, err, who paid for it. In one on-line review of the evidence finds that while 100 per cent of industry-funded studies conclude aspartame is safe, 92 per cent of independently funded research and reports identified aspartame as a potential cause of harmful effects.

In October’s post I explored some of chemistry of aspartame, and provided evidence also that this food component has the capacity to harm. I focused specifically of one of aspartame’s components – methanol – and it’s breakdown product formaldehyde (which, by the way is used to preserve dead bodies). In a review published this month in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, scientists in South Africa assessed the potential effects not just of methanol, but aspartame’s other constituents (phenylalanine and aspartic acid) on the brain. The review is long and detailed, and is supported by more than 50 scientific references. In their review of the effects of phenylalanine, the authors detail the ability of this chemical to disrupt the chemistry of the brain, including its potential to lower levels of key brain chemicals such as serotonin (which may adversely influence all sorts of things including mood, behaviour, sleep and appetite). The authors note that phenylalanine also has the potential to disrupt amino acid metabolism, nerve function and hormonal balance in the body. They go on to suggest that aspartame’s ability to destroy nerve cells and this damage may mimic or even cause Alzheimer’s disease.

When the authors of this review turn their attention to aspartic acid, they highlight this chemical’s ability to stimulate or ‘excite’ the nervous system.

In their analysis of the effect of methanol in the body, the authors describe the ability of this substance to create formaldehyde, along with the cancer-causing agent diketopiperazine and a ‘number of highly toxic derivatives’.

Here are the conclusions that come at the end of this review (I’ve added some detail in brackets here and there to aid clarity and understanding):

It was seen that aspartame disturbs amino acid metabolism, protein structure and metabolism, integrity of nucleic acids (which are the building blocks of DNA), neuronal function, endocrine (hormonal) balances and changes in the brain concentrations of catecholamines (brain chemicals such as noradrenaline and dopamine that can affect, among other thing, mood).

From all the adverse effects caused by this product, it is suggested that serious further testing and research be undertaken to eliminate any and all controversies surrounding this product.

Read this study in full (or even this short summary of it), and it’s difficult not to come away with the idea that aspartame has considerable potential for harm. The best thing, I think, is if this substance was banned from the diet. At the very least, I’d like to see the potential problems with aspartame to be widely known, so individuals can at least make a properly informed decision about whether to consume it or not. Here’s hoping that this latest review of aspartame gets the publicity it deserves.

References:

Humphries P, et al. Direct and indirect cellular effects of aspartame on the brain
European Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2008;62:451–462

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