OT: Aspartame

Aspartame is formed by a glutamate and an aspartate linked by a normal
peptide bond. The peptide bond will be broken in the digestive tract
by proteases and you will end up with glutamate and aspartate. These
two amino acid will be utilized by your body like other amino acids
from your food source. It could be converted to carbohydrates, then
from carbohydrates to formaldehyde or methanol in some bacteria or
yeasts. But I doubt you will be able to do that.

Aspartame is made by a aspartate linked to a phenylalanine via a
peptide bond. It will be broken down to asparate and phenylalanine in
your digestive tract. These two amino acids are utilized by your body
like other amino acids from food source. They could pontentially be
converted to carbohydrates and from carbohydrates to ethanol, methanol,
etc by yeasts or bacteria. But you do not have the neccesary enzymes
to make methanol or formaldehyde that pose any risk to your health. So
your friend is right.

fz said:

... you do not have the neccesary enzymes
to make methanol or formaldehyde that
pose any risk to your health. So your
friend is right.

I found a sober, but slightly alarming
discussion on a University of Cincinnati
website:

"That methyl group on the phenylalanine
can break off pretty easily, and at
temperatures as "low" as 86° F (= 30° C -
lower than body temperature or a summer
day), aspartame starts to disintegrate,
releasing methanol (which in larger
quantity causes blindness, etc. - it's
toxic). As the liver tries to deal with
the methanol using normal metabolic path-
ways, it ends up turning the methanol into
formaldehyde, which is a known carcinogen.
Interestingly, because of this and several
other concerns, originally there was
controversy over FDA approval of aspartame.
Even still, its safety is controversial.
More recently, some people have suggested
a possible link between aspartame
consumption and an increase in brain tumors
in this country."

"... Remember, because aspartame degrades
into methanol at warm temperatures, it
should not be used in anything hot or
anything that will be cooked (coffee
sweetener, cake mixes, cocoa, etc.), and
bottles of artificially-sweetened soft
drinks that have been sitting out in the
hot sun at the local gas station are
suspect."

http://biology.clc.uc.edu/courses/bio104/protein.htm

I've been putting Nutrasweet into hot tea
for years. My vision is declining, my
memory is declining and I even transpose
far more letters while typing. I had
chalked all this up to normal aging, but
now I wonder.

It is doubtful a single package of aspartamet would produce enough
metanol to cause health problems. But it is better to be conservative
if you are going to use it for years and if you suspect that it may be
causing problem, you should stop using it and switch to other
sweeteners. The problem is that there are claims of health risk for
each major one so I guess that you have to do without any artificial
sweeteners.

Man o' Tea said:

Anyone else hear that, after ingestion,
Aspartame breaks down into formaldehyde
and methanol? I had a grade-school
friend that worked for the firm behind
Aspartame. She assured me that it was
made of nothing more than natural amino
acids.

I think she is right, but I still think it is stuff best avoided
except in very small quantities. I have stopped using it as a sugar
substitute. I still get some in sugarless gum and in a brand of
protein powder that I use, but the amount is way small compare to how
I used to spread it on everything in place of sugar.

It was disrupting my sleep, and I noticed some headache pain that went
awy after I stopped. I think its effects will vary from one person to
another.

Well, I'm certainly going to avoid it
in hot tea.

Man o' Tea said:

Anyone else hear that, after ingestion,
Aspartame breaks down into formaldehyde
and methanol? I had a grade-school
friend that worked for the firm behind
Aspartame. She assured me that it was
made of nothing more than natural amino
acids.

Dude, what's up with you?

First a post regarding swimming in pollution of streams or something,
now this. Is this a midlife crisis or are you sick? We're here for
you. 🙂 For myself, my thyroid has shut down, sight in one eye is just
terrible, and my gums are so bad I'll probably lose some teeth before
I'm 50. Stuff happens. And I've tried loping, kicking, two-beat
crossover, streamlined TI ... nothing matters. Always swim about the
same speed. So stuff happens.

Eric

Quoted message said:

First a post regarding swimming in
pollution of streams or something,
now this.

Take a closer look at that one :-)