A new study has identified the sugar alcohol erythritol as a biomarker for increasing fat mass. In contrast to previous assumptions and research, erythritol can be metabolized by, and even produced in, the human body.
Erythritol occurs naturally in a variety of foods, such as pears and watermelons, but in recent years has increasingly become a common ingredient in low-calorie foods as a sugar replacement sweetener.
The study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences was conducted as a discovery-based analysis to identity metabolomic markers associated with weight gain and increase in fat mass in young adults during the transition to college life.
Researchers found that students who gained weight and abdominal fat over the course of the year had fifteenfold higher blood erythritol at the start of the year compared with their counterparts who were stable or lost weight and fat mass over the academic year.
As part of Cornell's EnHANCE project, an initiative of the Division of Nutritional Sciences that seeks to understand how the transition to college affects changes in diet, weight and metabolism, these findings advance knowledge on impacts to student health through the undergraduate years and beyond.
Each fall, more than 3 million high school graduates enroll in postsecondary education as first-time college freshmen, and this transition to a residential college environment is associated with weight gain.
"About 75 percent of this population experiences weight gain during the transition," said the author"With this in mind, it is important to identify biomarkers of risk that could guide its understanding and prevention."
According to the author, "With the finding of a previously unrecognized metabolism of glucose to erythritol and given the erythritol-weight gain association, further research is needed to understand whether and how this pathway contributes to weight-gain risk."
http://news.cornell.edu/stories/2017/05/researchers-id-biomarker-weight-gain-fat-mass-growth
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/05/02/1620079114
Common sweetener in low-cal foods also a marker for weight gain
- 1,597 views
- Added
Edited
Latest News
Metabolic rewiring promotes…
By newseditor
Posted 18 Apr
A drug to prevent flu-induc…
By newseditor
Posted 18 Apr
New origin of deep brain waves
By newseditor
Posted 17 Apr
Starving cells hijack prote…
By newseditor
Posted 17 Apr
Miniature battery-free epid…
By newseditor
Posted 17 Apr
Other Top Stories
Men more vulnerable to developing depression from long-term stress
Read more
Uncertainty can cause more stress than inevitable pain
Read more
Why some people crave salty food
Read more
Manic oscillations of circadian genes in a mouse model of bipolar d…
Read more
Spinal cord regeneration might actually be helped by glial scar tissue
Read more
Protocols
MemPrep, a new technology f…
By newseditor
Posted 08 Apr
A tangible method to assess…
By newseditor
Posted 08 Apr
Stem cell-derived vessels-o…
By newseditor
Posted 06 Apr
Single-cell biclustering fo…
By newseditor
Posted 01 Apr
Modular dual-color BiAD sen…
By newseditor
Posted 31 Mar
Publications
How does the microbiota con…
By newseditor
Posted 18 Apr
The integrated stress respo…
By newseditor
Posted 18 Apr
The immunobiology of herpes…
By newseditor
Posted 17 Apr
Circulating microbiome DNA…
By newseditor
Posted 17 Apr
Spindle oscillations in com…
By newseditor
Posted 17 Apr
Presentations
Hydrogels in Drug Delivery
By newseditor
Posted 12 Apr
Lipids
By newseditor
Posted 31 Dec
Cell biology of carbohydrat…
By newseditor
Posted 29 Nov
RNA interference (RNAi)
By newseditor
Posted 23 Oct
RNA structure and functions
By newseditor
Posted 19 Oct
Posters
A chemical biology/modular…
By newseditor
Posted 22 Aug
Single-molecule covalent ma…
By newseditor
Posted 04 Jul
ASCO-2020-HEALTH SERVICES R…
By newseditor
Posted 23 Mar
ASCO-2020-HEAD AND NECK CANCER
By newseditor
Posted 23 Mar
ASCO-2020-GENITOURINARY CAN…
By newseditor
Posted 23 Mar