
Engineered healthier sugar that tastes good - tacon
https://marker.medium.com/the-mad-scientists-who-engineered-healthier-sugar-that-actually-tastes-good-4e0951d718fe
======
Tomminn
I think part of the problem with an approach like this is it seems _sweetness
itself_ triggers a whole path of biochemical processes that are unhelpful [1].

[1]
[https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/biomedres/28/2/28_2_79/...](https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/biomedres/28/2/28_2_79/_article/-char/ja/)

~~~
MrBuddyCasino
"metabolic dysfunction, coupled with reduced central sensitivity to sweet
taste, occurs when an LCS is repeatedly consumed with, but not without, a
carbohydrate"

[https://www.genengnews.com/news/metabolism-and-glucose-
sensi...](https://www.genengnews.com/news/metabolism-and-glucose-sensitivity-
disrupted-when-low-cal-sweetener-consumed-with-added-carbs/)

~~~
petra
Thank you Mate, that's some life changing research.

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missosoup
Fun fact: there exists a chiral mirror of sugar called L-sucrose which tastes
and cooks exactly like sugar but is not bioavailable. It's the ultimate 0
calorie sugar. The only issue is it costs like 200 bucks a gram to produce.

~~~
scarejunba
My god, this is amazing. I don't even know why I didn't think something like
this may exist even though we all studied isomers in school. Are there other
flavouring agents that use non-bioavailable isomers that pass right through
us?

This is so fun to have learned about!

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sam36
It was done with cooking oil at one time. Problem is it gave most of the test
subjects diarrhea after eating a bag of potato chips that were fried in it. Of
course anyone that eats a bag of potato chips is at risk of that anyway...

~~~
scarejunba
God damn it. That happens to me with Xylitol and Maltitol. Guess I just have
to suck it up and not eat sweet stuff.

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fodmap
Are those sugar alcohols the only ones giving you trouble? Did you get tested
for Fructose malabsorption?

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scarejunba
Interesting, but that sounds like a thing I wouldn't want to treat! Less
fatness eh?

Yeah, they are the ones that give me trouble.

~~~
fodmap
I replied to your post because I started having similar troubles, went to the
doc and I tested positive in several issues, being the main one that I have
Fructose intolerance.

That was when I learned about FODMAP, and I learned about the work Monash
University is doing on that field:
[https://www.monashfodmap.com/](https://www.monashfodmap.com/)

Hope that helps, but better if you don't need them!

~~~
scarejunba
Very cool. Thank you for sharing!

~~~
fodmap
You're welcome!

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MisterTea
Sugar. It's so addictive that we're trying to figure out a way to engineer
healthier versions.

There's truth behind the phrase "sweet tooth". I indulged in a lot of cookies,
cakes and sweet and savory foods. My peak weight was 103kg/230lbs and my
height is 178cm or 5'10". I decided to make a big shift in my eating habits
few years back and cut out any foods with added sugar. It was not easy in the
sense that sugar really is addictive. I found myself buying a lot of fruit to
curtail the cravings. Felt like rehab. It took me almost two years to fully
discipline myself and lose weight.

Though every now and then I still splurge because I feel like I must in order
to keep the cravings at bay. My all time favorite is a baskin robbins peanut
butter and chocolate malted. Even talking about it is making my mouth water.
What a delicious dilemma sugar presents us humans.

~~~
stronglikedan
Former Baskin-Robinns Pralines & Cream addict checking in. I know they say all
sugar is the same, but I noticed a marked decrease in the addictive feelings
when I switched to unrefined sugar sources, such as fruit and honey.

~~~
vezycash
I don't know about honey but for fruits, the theory is raw versus processed.

Raw means lots of fibre which acts as a natural limiter.

More like coca leaves vs. cocaine.

A teaspoon of granulated sugar is the equivalent of a stick or more of sugar
cane. Everyone can eat 10 spoons of sugar daily no sweat.

Eat a stick of sugar cane and you won't do it any time soon.

~~~
MisterTea
For sure the flesh of the fruit acts as a sort of filler. Fruit is more a meal
vs confectionery. Whereas refined sugar can be poured on with reckless
abandon. The real takeaway is sugar is fine in moderation.

~~~
vezycash
>The real takeaway is sugar is fine in moderation

It's like saying cocaine is fine in moderation. Only few people can self
moderate addictive substances.

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holri
Better way would be to engineer yourself to not need sweet taste. This works
remarkable well, with some discipline.

~~~
stronglikedan
Considering most people won't do that, this may be the better way.

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Klonoar
I like testing this stuff as a hobby. Hands down the best (current)
alternative to sugar I've found is Lakanto.

They also have a maple syrup that tastes amazing. I don't find myself missing
sugar with it.

~~~
01100011
Yeah, monkfruit and erythritol seem like a good pair. I'd probably add a tad
of stevia too, but that's me. I find those three work pretty well as long as
you don't try to generate all of the sweetness from them. Using them 50:50
with sugar or dextrose seems like a good balance. I liked xylitol for a while,
but the cooling sensation and the gut bacteria effects turned me off.

~~~
Klonoar
I personally won't use xylitol in my house due to the risk of my dogs getting
it, though I understand others don't face that risk. :)

Yeah, the 50/50 approach with sugar can work - I just try to remove as much as
possible or eat fruit if I'm craving sugar.

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Fej
Is it true that there is a genetic disposition to altered taste of low-calorie
sweeteners? If it's real, I have it - most of them taste terrible to me, and
leave an unpleasant aftertaste on top of that.

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kevin_thibedeau
It would be nice if the trope of the "mad scientist" would die.

~~~
m463
But there's this certain behavior people develop when they get older, where
they worry less about what other people think and worry more about what really
makes them happy.

So you end up with Doc Brown types obsessing about their science project and
less about grooming their eyebrows and ear hair.

This also explains older men riding ridiculous recumbent bikes in strange bike
outfits.

and then these wonderful quirky inventors get interviewed...

~~~
foxyv
I used to think recumbent bikes were ridiculous until I rode one. They are
insanely fun! You look silly but there is a reason people still ride them
despite that =)

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Ericson2314
Even if sugar itself causes the fast majority of the harm, I wouldn't be
surprised if weaning oneself from the _subjective_ experience of sweetness had
some benefits. Have the studies on artificial sweeteners investigated it?

~~~
agentwiggles
Anecdotally, I've noticed that if I avoid all sweets (and especially soda) I
tend to have less of a sweet tooth. If I give myself leeway, and start taking
donuts and candy that show up at work, I feel like my resistance to sweets
drops precipitously and I'm much more likely to "just take one more."

~~~
ssijak
One junk chocolate cake piece can leave me with 1-2 days of constant cravings
for junk sweets. Where my mind constantly pops up thoughts of cookies and
cakes and wants me to buy them and I must exert will to resist.

But, if I don’t eat junk sweets for 10+ days my taste and body just adopts and
I don’t think about cookies at all. Even if I am at celebrations where people
eat a lot of junk cakes, I don’t have to use will at all to stay away from
them.

Processed sugar for me is more addictive for me than drugs.

Ordinary whole food carbs (I am a vegan so I eat a lot of unprocessed carbs)
do not have that effect at all for me, quite the opposite in fact.

~~~
agentwiggles
I consider sugar to be by far my worst addiction, I can moderate on alcohol
and pot with no issue, but with sugar I really need an all or nothing
approach.

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pg_bot
The FDA should re-evaluate their opinion on sodium cyclamate. The ban is
highly dubious as the study that lead to its ban was funded by the sugar lobby
and 130 other countries have deemed it safe for human consumption.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_cyclamate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_cyclamate)

~~~
jfengel
I tried cyclamate in Europe, and I thought it was disgusting.

I don't do diet sodas, but my mother remembered cyclamate very fondly from
before the US ban. So when offered, I tried it, and had to put it in the
context that the alternative my mother had was saccharin, which is even worse.
I don't doubt that cyclamate got railroaded by the sugar lobby and is probably
perfectly safe, but from my very limited experience I think the newer
alternatives are probably better. (I've tried Diet Coke recently, and if I
weren't paying attention I might not notice the difference.)

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EamonnMR
Aren't we already pretty much there with Sucralose and Xylitol?

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Broken_Hippo
Sucralose is way sweeter, doesn't have the same taste, and doesn't _really_
cook like sugar. Sure, it'll do OK (diluted with some starch) in your muffins
and it'll sweeten your coffee, but you aren't going to use that to caramelize
the top of anything either.

I'm not sure if I've ever commonly seen Xylitol for home use: Most commonly,
I've seen it in chewing gum and such things as it seems it is good for teeth.
It can cause gas and loose stools, though - a common issue with artificial
sweetners (Sorbitol causes both my spouse and I issues: We know when we've
eaten too much of the "wrong" candy by the foul smelling apartment air).

~~~
throw_away
Just a note: even small amounts of xylitol can be dangerous or even deadly to
dogs.

~~~
Broken_Hippo
I did not know that, nor do I have dogs - but might have one again in the
future. Thanks for the note.

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gexla
This seems like marketing hype. Lt's create some new food thing which allows
us to put some flash claim on the wrapper.

This seems to be aimed at a health concience crowd, maybe the sort of thing
which would be in special displays with overpriced products which people most
in need won't even look at. Would this invention make its way to products in
dollar stores? Walmart?

Cutting sugar in half likely won't help most people who are obese. They're
still going to be eating too much of the wrong food. Much of this food isn't
even sweet.

At least drinking the Koolaid might involve less sugar. ;)

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spodek
I got a healthy sugar that tastes good: fresh fruit.

I was a kid once, too young to know better, and liked sweet. Now nothing beats
fresh fruit. Even many vegetables are sweet. This stuff sounds like engineered
garbage and I will bet anyone that we will uncover serious health concerns
from it.

~~~
3131s
Agreed, and I'm more curious anyways about the numerous fruits that have this
same effect of increasing the perception of sweetness.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thaumatococcus_daniellii](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thaumatococcus_daniellii)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dioscoreophyllum_volkensii](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dioscoreophyllum_volkensii)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentadiplandra](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentadiplandra)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capparis_masaikai](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capparis_masaikai)

" _The fruit contains monellin, an intensely sweet protein with potential use
as a sugar replacement. For humans, monellin is 100,000 times sweeter than
sucrose on a molar basis and around 3,000 times on a weight basis._ "

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ptah
> His team also started out by giving them to potential clients, only to
> routinely hear it didn’t work. “Rarely is our ingredient properly used,”

it sounds like it needs some other ingredients. possibly it makes starch break
down to sugar quicker? like what saliva does to starch?

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tdburn
You could lessen the sugar even further by combining this with stevia to cover
the bitterness that can happen with Stevia. More choices for the win

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kaolti
There is no such thing as a free lunch.

~~~
mrspuratic
Some of these things are a free lunch for your gut microbiome.

Then there's a party in your ass, but you're not invited.

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giantg2
I have these insects that engineer a healthier sugar.

It's called honey. Due to the different balance of sugars in it you can use
less of it than regular sugar and still have it taste just as sweet. It also
contains potentially beneficial enzymes, pollen, antioxidants, and minerals.
There are a variety of flavors, including some very light ones that would not
impart much flavor, similar to sugar. The only downside can be can be cost.

~~~
marton78
As far as I know honey consists of mostly equal amounts of glucose and
fructose and thus has a similar nutritional value as HFCS, barring the
minerals maybe.

~~~
giantg2
Minerals, antioxidants, pollen, and enzymes are the potentially beneficial
parts of honey. I'm not sure about HFCS, but compared to regular table sugar
you can use less to achieve the same sweetness.

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surround
“Artificial sweetener” is often used misleadingly. Natural sweeteners, the
most common being sucralose, are not healthier. I had an unpleasant
realization from eating a low-calorie yogurt which advertised “no artificial
sweeteners!” only to read sucralose on its ingredients list. I’d guess that
>90% of protein bars/drinks contain sucralose (which is ironic because carbs
from sugar would be more useful to athletes than the emptiness of sucralose).

Instead of _artificial_ sweeteners, people have to avoid _low-calorie_
sweeteners in general. This is difficult - there are dozens of different low-
calories sweeteners besides sucralose. They are often low on the ingredients
list because a small amount packs a ton of sweetness (which is why they’re low
calorie. E.g. sucralose is 1000 times sweeter than sugar in the same amount).

To the point - low-calorie sweeteners _do not help with weight loss,_ and _do
not have any added health benefits._ [1] Mere _sweetness_ has a profound
effect on body functions.

I’m not sure whether DouxMatok would be classified as a low-calorie sweetener,
since it just extends the sweetness of real sugar. However, it definitely
creates the same problem - it emulates the sweet taste of sugar when there is
none (or less).

There is no shortcuts, no _magic pill_ for health. Eat a balanced diet, with
fruits and vegetables, and moderate consumption of sweets.

[1]
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6313893/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6313893/)

~~~
pochamago
CICO, if the zero calorie sweetener is the push that gets you under your daily
metabolic rate, then they will help you lose weight. Sweetness may have other
effects that are negative, but weight is just thermodynamics

~~~
otabdeveloper4
> ...but weight is just thermodynamics

Of course not. Your body is not a furnace; metabolism is very complex and not
just based on energy output of burning food.

