The Sucralose News: Scaremongering Or Serious?
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What’s the news on sucralose?
These past days the press has been abuzz with frightening tales:
- This Common Artificial Sweetener Can Break Down DNA, Scientists Warn
- Sucralose Damages DNA, Linked to Leaky Gut
- Chemical found in common sweetener damages DNA
- Chemical found in widely used sweetener breaks up DNA
- Chemical from Splenda breaks up DNA
How true and/or serious is this?
Firstly, let’s manage expectations. Pineapple juice also breaks down DNA, but is not generally considered a health risk. So let’s keep that in mind, while we look into the science.
Is sucralose as scary as pineapple juice, or is it something actually dangerous?
The new study (that sparked off these headlines)
The much-referenced study is publicly available to read in full—here it is:
You may notice that this doesn’t have quite the snappy punchiness of some of the headlines, but let’s break this down, if you’ll pardon the turn of phrase:
- Toxicological: pertaining to whether or not it has toxic qualities
- Pharmacokinetic: the science of asking, of chemicals in bodies, “where did it come from; where did it go; what could it do there; what can we know?”
- Sucralose-6-acetate: an impurity that can be found in sucralose. For perspective, the study found that the sucralose in Splenda contained “up to” 0.67% sucralose-6-acetate.
- Sucralose: a modified form of sucrose, that makes it hundreds of times sweeter, and non-caloric because the body cannot break it down so it’s treated as a dietary fiber and just passes through
- In vitro: things are happening in petri dishes, not in animals (human or otherwise), which would be called “in vivo”
- Screening assays: “we set up a very closed-parameters chemical test, to see what happens when we add this to this” ⇽ oversimplification, but this is the basic format of a screening assay
Great, now we understand the title, but what about the study?
Researchers looked primarily at the effects of sucralose-6-acetate and sucralose (together and separately) on epithelial cells (these are very simple cells that are easy to study; conveniently, they are also most of what makes up our intestinal walls). For this, they used a fancy way of replicating human intestinal walls, that’s actually quite fascinating but beyond the scope of today’s newsletter. Suffice it to say: it’s quite good, and/but has its limitations too. They also looked at some in vivo rat studies.
What they found was…
Based on samples from the rat feces (somehow this didn’t make it into the headlines), it appears that sucralose may be acetylated in the intestines. What that means is that we, if we are like the rats (definitely not a given, but a reasonable hypothesis), might convert up to 10% of sucralose into sucralose-6-acetate inside us. Iff we do, the next part of the findings become more serious.
Based on the in vitro simulations, both sucralose and sucralose-6-acetate reduced intestinal barrier integrity at least a little, but sucralose-6-acetate was the kicker when it came to most of the effects—at least, so we (reasonably!) suppose.
Basically, there’s a lot of supposition going on here but the suppositions are reasonable. That’s how science works; there’s usually little we can know for sure from a single study; it’s when more studies roll in that we start to get a more complete picture.
What was sucralose-6-acetate found to do? It increased the expression of genes associated with inflammation, oxidative stress, and cancer (granted those three things generally go together). So that’s a “this probably has this end result” supposition.
More concretely, and which most of the headlines latched onto, it was found (in vitro) to induce cytogenic damage, specifically, of the clastogenic variety (produces DNA strand breaks—so this is different than pineapple’s bromelain and DNA-helicase’s relatively harmless unzipping of genes).
The dose makes the poison
So, how much is too much and is that 0.67% something to worry about?
- Remembering the rat study, it may be more like 10% once our intestines have done their thing. Iff we’re like rats.
- But, even if it’s only 0.67%, this will still be above the “threshold of toxicological concern for genotoxicity”, of 0.15µg/person/day.
- On the other hand, the fact that these were in vitro studies is a serious limitation.
- Sometimes something is very dangerous in vitro, because it’s being put directly onto cells, whereas in vivo we may have mechanisms for dealing with that.
We won’t know for sure until we get in vivo studies in human subjects, and that may not happen any time soon, if ever, depending on the technical limitations and ethical considerations that sometimes preclude doing certain studies in humans.
Bottom line:
- The headlines are written to be scary, but aren’t wrong; their claims are fundamentally true
- What that means for us as actual humans may not be the same, however; we don’t know yet
- For now, it is probably reasonable to avoid sucralose just in case
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Do We Need Supplements, And Do They Work?
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Does our diet need a little help?
We asked you for your take on supplements, and got the above-illustrated, below-described set of results.
- The largest minority of respondents (a little over a third) voted for “I just take something very specific”
- The next most respondents voted for “I take so many supplements; every little helps!”
- Almost as many voted for “I just take a vitamin or two / a multivitamin”
- Fewest, about 8%, voted for “I get everything I need from my diet”
But what does the science say?
Food is less nutritious now than it used to be: True or False?
True or False depending on how you measure it.
An apple today and an apple from a hundred years ago are likely to contain the same amounts of micronutrients per apple, but a lower percentage of micronutrients per 100g of apple.
The reason for this is that apples (and many other food products; apples are just an arbitrary example) have been selectively bred (and in some cases, modified) for size, and because the soil mineral density has remained the same, the micronutrients per apple have not increased commensurate to the increase in carbohydrate weight and/or water weight. Thus, the resultant percentage will be lower, despite the quantity remaining the same.
We’re going to share some science on this, and/but would like to forewarn readers that the language of this paper is a bit biased, as it looks to “debunk” claims of nutritional values dropping while skimming over “yes, they really have dropped percentage-wise” in favor of “but look, the discrete mass values are still the same, so that’s just a mathematical illusion”.
The reality is, it’s no more a mathematical illusion than is the converse standpoint of saying the nutritional value is the same, despite the per-100g values dropping. After all, sometimes we eat an apple as-is; sometimes we buy a bag of frozen chopped fruit. That 500g bag of chopped fruit is going to contain less copper (for example) than one from decades past.
Here’s the paper, and you’ll see what we mean:
Supplements aren’t absorbed properly and thus are a waste of money: True or False?
True or False depending on the supplement (and your body, and the rest of your diet)
Many people are suffering from dietary deficiencies of vitamins and minerals, that could be easily correctable by supplementation:
However, as this study by Dr. Fang Fang Zhang shows, a lot of vitamin and mineral supplementation does not appear to have much of an effect on actual health outcomes, vis-à-vis specific diseases. She looks at:
- Cardiovascular disease
- Cancer
- Type 2 diabetes
- Osteoporosis
Her key take-aways from this study were:
- Randomised trial evidence does not support use of vitamin, mineral, and fish oil supplements to reduce the risk of non-communicable diseases
- People using supplements tend to be older, female, and have higher education, income, and healthier lifestyles than people who do not use them
- Use of supplements appreciably reduces the prevalence of inadequate intake for most nutrients but also increases the prevalence of excess intake for some nutrients
- Further research is needed to assess the long term effects of supplements on the health of the general population and in individuals with specific nutritional needs, including those from low and middle income countries
Read her damning report: Health effects of vitamin and mineral supplements
On the other hand…
This is almost entirely about blanket vitamin-and-mineral supplementation. With regard to fish oil supplementation, many commercial fish oil supplements break down in the stomach rather than the intestines, and don’t get absorbed well. Additionally, many people take them in forms that aren’t pleasant, and thus result in low adherence (i.e., they nominally take them, but in fact they just sit on the kitchen counter for a year).
One thing we can conclude from this is that it’s good to check the science for any given supplement before taking it, and know what it will and won’t help for. Our “Monday Research Review” editions of 10almonds do this a lot, although we tend to focus on herbal supplements rather than vitamins and minerals.
We can get everything we need from our diet: True or False?
Contingently True (but here be caveats)
In principle, if we eat the recommended guideline amounts of various macro- and micro-nutrients, we will indeed get all that we are generally considered to need. Obviously.
However, this may come with:
- Make sure to get enough protein… Without too much meat, and also without too much carbohydrate, such as from most plant sources of protein
- Make sure to get enough carbohydrates… But only the right kinds, and not too much, nor at the wrong time, and without eating things in the wrong order
- Make sure to get enough healthy fats… Without too much of the unhealthy fats that often exist in the same foods
- Make sure to get the right amount of vitamins and minerals… We hope you have your calculators out to get the delicate balance of calcium, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus, and vitamin D right.
That last one’s a real pain, by the way. Too much or too little of one or another and the whole set start causing problems, and several of them interact with several others, and/or compete for resources, and/or are needed for the others to do their job.
And, that’s hard enough to balance when you’re taking supplements with the mg/µg amount written on them, never mind when you’re juggling cabbages and sardines.
On the topic of those sardines, don’t forget to carefully balance your omega-3, -6, and -9, and even within omega-3, balancing ALA, EPA, and DHA, and we hope you’re juggling those HDL and LDL levels too.
So, when it comes to getting everything we need from our diet, for most of us (who aren’t living in food deserts and/or experiencing food poverty, or having a medical condition that restricts our diet), the biggest task is not “getting enough”, it’s “getting enough of the right things without simultaneously overdoing it on the others”.
With supplements, it’s a lot easier to control what we’re putting in our bodies.
And of course, unless our diet includes things that usually can’t be bought in supermarkets, we’re not going to get the benefits of taking, as a supplement, such things as:
Etc.
So, there definitely are supplements with strong science-backed benefits, that probably can’t be found on your plate!
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No-Frills, Evidence-Based Mindfulness
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What’s on your mind, really?
We hear a lot about “the evidence-based benefits of mindfulness”, but what actually are they? And what is the evidence? And, perhaps most importantly: how do we do it?
What are the benefits?
The benefits of mindfulness are many, and include:
- reducing stress
- reducing pain
- improving quality of life
- reducing fatigue
- providing relief from digestive disorders
- reducing symptoms of sleep disorders
- improving immune response
- providing support for caregivers
The evidence is also abundant, and includes:
- Effects of mindfulness exercises as stand-alone intervention on symptoms of anxiety and depression: Systematic review and meta-analysis
- Fusing character strengths and mindfulness interventions: Benefits for satisfaction and performance
- Evidence for the Role of Mindfulness in Cancer: Benefits and Techniques
- Effects of mindfulness-based stress reduction on anxiety symptoms: A systematic review and meta-analysis
- The benefits of meditation and mindfulness practices during times of crisis such as COVID-19
Sounds great… What actually is it, though?
Mindfulness is the state of being attentive to one’s mind. This is at its heart a meditative practice, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have to be sitting in the lotus position with candles—mindfulness can be built into any daily activity, or even no activity at all.
An exercise you can try right now:
Take a moment to notice everything you can hear. For this writer, that includes:
- The noise of my keystrokes as I type
- The ticking of the clock on the wall
- The gentle humming of my computer’s processor
- The higher-pitched noise of my computer’s monitor
- Birdsong outside
- Traffic further away
- My own breathing
- The sound of my eyelids as I blink
Whatever it is for you, notice how much you can notice that you had previously taken for granted.
You can repeat this exercise with other senses, by the way! For example:
- Notice five things you can see in your immediate environment that you’ve never noticed before. If you’re at home reading this, you probably think you’re very familiar with everything around you, but now see that mark on the wall you’d never noticed before, or a quirk of some electrical wiring, or the stitching on some furnishing, for example.
- Notice the textures of your clothes, or your face, or perhaps an object you’ve never paid attention to touching before. Your fingertips, unless you have some special reason this doesn’t apply to you, are far more sensitive than you probably give them credit for, and can notice the tiniest differentiation in textures, so take a moment to do that now.
- Mindful eating can be an especially healthful practice because it requires that we pay every attention to what we’re putting in our mouth, tasting, chewing, swallowing. No more thoughtlessly downing a box of cookies; every bite is now an experience. On the one hand, you’ll probably eat less at a sitting. On the other hand, what a sensory experience! It really reminds one that life is for living, not just for zipping through at a speed-run pace!
What about mindfulness as a meditative practice?
Well, those are meditative practices! But yes, mindfulness goes for more formal meditation too. For example:
Sit comfortably, with good posture, whatever that means to you. No need to get too caught up in the physical mechanics here—it’d take a whole article. For now, if you’re sitting and comfortable, that’s enough.
Notice your breathing. No need to try to control it—that’s not what this is about today. Just notice it. The in, the out, whether you breathe to your chest or abdomen, through your nose or mouth, don’t worry about doing it “right”, just notice what you are doing. Observe without judgement.
Notice your thoughts—no need to try to stop them. Notice noticing your thoughts, and again, observe without judgement. Notice your feelings; are you angry, hopeful, stressed, serene? There are no wrong answers here, and there’s nothing you should try to “correct”. Just observe. No judgement, only observe. Watch your thoughts, and watch your thoughts go.
Did you forget about your breathing while watching your thoughts? Don’t worry about that either if so, just notice that it happened. If you have any feelings about that, notice them too, and carry on observing.
We go through so much of our lives in “autopilot”, that it can be an amazing experience to sometimes just “be”—and be aware of being.
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Algorithms to Live By – by Brian Christian and Tom Griffiths
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As humans, we subconsciously use heuristics a lot to make many complex decisions based on “fuzzy logic”. For example:
Do we buy the cheap shoes that may last us a season, or the much more expensive ones that will last us for years? We’ll—without necessarily giving it much conscious thought—quickly weigh up:
- How much do we like each prospective pair of shoes?
- What else might we need to spend money on now/soon?
- How much money do we have right now?
- How much money do we expect to have in the future?
- Considering our lifestyle, how important is it to have good quality shoes?
How well we perform this rapid calculation may vary wildly, depending on many factors ranging from the quality of the advertising to how long ago we last ate.
And if we make the wrong decision, later we may have buyer’s (or non-buyer’s!) remorse. So, how can we do better?
Authors Brain Christian and Tom Griffiths have a manual for us!
This book covers many “kinds” of decision we often have to make in life, and how to optimize those decisions with the power of mathematics and computer science.
The problems (and solutions) run the gamut of…
- Optimal stopping (when to say “alright, that’s good enough”)
- Overcoming cognitive biases
- Scheduling quandaries
- Bayes’ Theorem
- Game Theory
- And when it’s more efficient to just leave things to chance!
…and many more (12 main areas of decision-making are covered).
For all it draws heavily from mathematics and computer science, the writing style is very easy-reading. It’s a “curl up in the armchair and read for pleasure” book, no matter how weighty and practical its content.
Bottom line: if you improve your ability to make the right decisions even marginally, this book will have been worth your while in the long run!
Order your copy of “Algorithms To Live By” from Amazon today!
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Spinach vs Kale – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing spinach to kale, we picked the spinach.
Why?
In terms of macros, spinach and kale are very similar. They are mostly water wrapped in fiber, with very small amounts of carbohydrates and protein and trace amounts of fat.
Spinach has a lot more vitamins and minerals—a wider variety, and in most cases, more of them.
Kale is notably higher in vitamin C, though. Everything else, spinach is higher or close to equal.
Spinach is especially notably a lot higher in B vitamins, as well as iron, calcium, magnesium, and zinc.
One downside to spinach, though, which is that it’s high in oxalates, which can increase the risk of kidney stones. If your kidneys are in good health and you eat spinach in moderation, this is not a problem for most people—but if your kidneys aren’t in good health (or you are, for whatever reason, consuming Popeye levels of spinach), you might consider switching to kale.
While spinach swept the board in most categories, kale remains a very good option too, and a diet diverse in many kinds of plants is usually best.
Want to learn more?
Spinach and kale are very both good sources of carotenoids; check out:
Enjoy!
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Farmed Fish vs Wild Caught
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It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small 😎
❝Is it good to eat farm raised fish?❞
We’ll answer this as a purely health-related question (and thus not considering economy, ecology, ethics, or taste).
It’s certainly not as good as wild-caught fish, for several reasons, some more serious than others:
Farmed fish can have quite a different nutritional profile to wild-caught fish, and also contain more contaminants, including heavy metals.
For example, farmed fish tend to have much higher fat content for the same amount of protein, but lower levels of minerals and other nutrients. Here are two side-by-side:
Wild-caught salmon | Farmed salmon
See also:
Quantitative analysis of the benefits and risks of consuming farmed and wild salmon
Additionally, because fish in fish farms tend to be very susceptible to diseases (because of the artificially cramped and overcrowded environment), fish farms tend to make heavy use of antibiotics, which can cause all sorts of problems down the line:
So definitely, “let the buyer beware”!
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Reinventing Your Life – by Dr. Jeffrey Young & Dr. Janet Klosko
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This book is quite unlike any other broadly-CBT-focused books we’ve reviewed before. How so, you may wonder?
Rather than focusing on automatic negative thoughts and cognitive distortions with a small-lens focus on an immediate problem, this one zooms out rather and tackles the cause rather than the symptom.
The authors outline eleven “lifetraps” that we can get stuck in:
- Abandonment
- Mistrust & abuse
- Vulnerability
- Dependence
- Emptional deprivation
- Social exclusion
- Defectiveness
- Failure
- Subjugation
- Unrelenting standards
- Entitlement
They then borrow from other areas of psychology, to examine where these things came from, and how they can be addressed, such that we can escape from them.
The style of the book is very reader-friendly pop-psychology, with illustrative (and perhaps apocryphal, but no less useful for it if so) case studies.
The authors then go on to give step-by-step instructions for dealing with each of the 11 lifetraps, per 6 unmet needs we probably had that got us into them, and per 3 likely ways we tried to cope with this using maladaptive coping mechanisms that got us into the lifetrap(s) we ended up in.
Bottom line: if you feel there’s something in your life that’s difficult to escape from (we cannot outrun ourselves, after all, and bring our problems with us), this book could well contain the key that you need to get out of that cycle.
Click here to check out “Reinventing Your Life” and break free from any lifetrap(s) of your own!
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