The Sweetener That Interferes With Hunger/Satiety Signals

Non-sugar sweeteners came under fire from the World Health Organization a couple of years ago:

The Problem With Sweeteners ← this is mostly about how they prompt cravings of increasingly sweeter foods/drinks, but there are other considerations discussed too

And sucralose (which is technically a sugar, but isn’t processed by the body as sugar, so it “doesn’t count” as such; the body treats it as a dietary fiber instead) got some bad press of its own:

The Sucralose News: Scaremongering Or Serious? ← the answer is both, by the way, but there’s nuance here, so do read the article!

And now, there’s more news about how sucralose specifically interferes with the brain’s hunger/satiety signals:

The study

A medium-sized (n=75) study of adults looked at the brain’s responses to, varyingly,

• Water
• Sucralose in water
• Sucrose in water (matched to be the same sweetness as the sucralose)

…using MRI, focusing on hunger-related regions like the hypothalamus.

Additionally, blood samples were taken to measure glucose, insulin, and satiety hormone (GLP-1) levels.

As for what they found:

• Sucralose kept hunger signals active in the brain for up to 35 minutes, unlike sucrose, which reduced hunger activity quickly.
• There was increased hypothalamic blood flow after sucralose intake, which meant heightened hunger signaling.
• Participants felt hungrier after consuming sucralose compared to sugar
• Sugar intake increased blood glucose (obviously), suppressing hunger, whereas sucralose had no such effect (again, reasonable, though it was worth checking, because if sucralose had an effect on insulin response, that would indirectly affect blood sugar levels one way or the other, depending on the effect on insulin levels—but that didn’t happen, so for now we may assume sucralose doesn’t affect insulin or insulin signalling).
• Women exhibited twice the hypothalamic response to sucralose compared to men, reinforcing sex-based differences in appetite control. Specifically, it was most likely hormonal differences that drove this, since the study’s participants were young adults (ages 18–35); it’s possible that if older adults had been included, untreated menopause could have changed these stats. But that latter’s just a hypothesis for now.
• Sucralose enhanced brain connectivity between the hypothalamus and motivation/reward-processing areas, potentially increasing cravings.

You can read the paper itself here:

Non-caloric sweetener effects on brain appetite regulation in individuals across varying body weights

The practical takeaway? Sucralose interferes with the brain’s “full” signals, keeping you hungrier for longer, which will (all else being equal) incline you to eat more than you would otherwise.

So, it might be worth skipping sucralose, unless you specifically want to increase how much you eat.

Want to learn more?

You might want to check out:

Carbonated Water: For Weight Loss, Satiety, Or Just Gas?

Take care!