Learn → Glossary → artificial sweetener

Sucralose(E955)

Level 4 — Significant concernsIn Winter's Dictionary3 sources

Sucralose is a artificial sweetener — Artificial sweetener six hundred times sweeter than sugar

Also: Splenda

What it does

Artificial sweetener six hundred times sweeter than sugar

Where you'll see it

baked goods, beverages, chewing gum, frozen dairy desserts, fruit juices, gelatins

What the research says

Early reports of thymus shrinkage in animals; chemical makeup includes chlorine [ultra-processed-people] Dana Small (Yale) showed mixing sucralose with sugar in human volunteers decreases insulin response in a pattern resembling type 2 diabetes. Sweet-taste-without-calories trains the body to expect sugar that never arrives, producing metabolic stress. A high-profile Nature paper (Suez et al.) demonstrated sucralose disrupts the gut microbiome in animals even at regulator-approved levels. Splenda (sucralose + maltodextrin) alters brain activity in rats in regions controlling food intake, obesity and energy regulation. [metabolical] Chlorinated non-nutritive sweetener. Triggers cephalic insulin response (oral glucose tolerance test in 17 morbidly obese adults showed insulin response 20% higher after diet sweetener vs seltzer). Alters intestinal microbiome composition, contributes to leaky gut, drives visceral fat accumulation independent of calories.

Benefits

Heat stable, does not provide calories or cause cavities

Regulatory status

  • US FDA: EAF
  • EU: approved
  • Notes: Early animal reports of thymus shrinkage; EU concluded safe at current use

Sources

  • Metabolical (Lustig) — Chapter 12: after the diet soda, the insulin response was 20 percent higher than with the seltzer control. The sweet taste alone can both stimulate appetite and insulin release
  • Ultra-Processed People (van Tulleken) — Chapter 13: UPF tastes odd: sucralose disrupts the gut microbiome, even at levels approved by regulatory agencies, and certainly at levels humans frequently eat
  • A Consumer's Dictionary of Food Additives (Winter): sucralose is promoted as Made from sugar, although its chemical makeup includes chlorine