Chemical and Functional Properties of Food Saccharides

24
CONTENTS
© 2004 by CRC Press LLC
Natural and Synthetic
Nonsaccharide
Sweeteners
Michal Uher
24.1 Natural Sweet Compounds
24.1.1 Proteins
24.1.2 Terpenoids
24.1.3 Steroidal Saponins
24.1.4 Dihydroisocoumarins (1H-2-Benzopyran-1-ones)
24.1.5 Flavanoids
24.1.6 Other Natural Sweet Compounds
24.2 Synthetic Nonnutritive Sweeteners
References
24.1 NATURAL SWEET COMPOUNDS
A number of sweet natural organic compounds have been found. They belong to
families of proteins, terpenoids, steroids, dihydroisocoumarins, and flavanoids. Some
of them are being currently used in the human diet as sweetening or flavoring agents.
24.1.1 PROTEINS
Except for a limited number of sweet proteins, high-molecular-weight substances
do not stimulate taste cells. Up to this point, six sweet proteins have been known:
thaumatin, composed of 207 amino acid chains (~22 kDa) (24.1); its aluminium
salt, talin (24.2); monellin, with two 45 to 50 amino acid chains (~11 kDa) (24.3);
mabinlin, having two 33 and 72 amino acid chains, respectively (~12.4 kDa) (24.4);
pentadin, consisting of a 54 amino acid chain (~12 kDa) (24.5); and brazzein, with
the same number of amino acids in the chain but of ~6 kDa. (24.6) (Table 24.1).
Some proteins such as miraculin and curculin, although tasteless, are used as tastemodifiers.
All these proteins can be used as harmless low-calorie sweeteners and
are helpful in reducing the sugar intake. Table 24.1 lists selected physical and
functional properties of sweet proteins as well as their occurrence.