Aspartame in diet sodas causes diabets and weight gain?!

I haven't looked quite that much into sucralose ... Just as far as the molecular structure. If I liked the stuff I might further investigate - this is an interesting concept. But to me it tastes horrible, so I stick with aspartame for soda and real sugar for baked goodies (in moderation).

Not in my experience. In my own diet, my blood sugar normalized and I lost 120 pounds while drinking aspartame sweetened drinks. You need to look at experiences like mine, someone who is on a calorie controlled diet with blood sugar issues, not studies that survey random people. Fat people drink more diet drinks by default on average than a normal weight person, so it's the other way around and not causative. Extra weight is also one of the most potent precursors to diabetes.

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Hold the phone. Aspartame is a PROTEIN?! Well HALLELUJAH brothers and sisters!

mathjulz wrote: »

catnyxx wrote: »

Diet Pepsi uses Sucralose which is a derivative of sugar (pretty sure). But is aspartame free now. I treat myself to roughly 2 diet pops a week, depending. I just started though lol.

Sucralose is made from a sugar molecule (sucrose, IIRC) that has one of its Carbon atoms replaced by a chlorine atom. Aspartame is a bipeptide, made from two amino acids (remember, those are the building blocks of proteins).

Of the two, aspartame has been around longer and so has been studied more extensively. There is no evidence that either is harmful in moderation. IMO, sucralose tastes awful, so I stick with aspartame.

Carlos_421 wrote: »

catnyxx wrote: »

CharlieBeansmomTracey wrote: »

catnyxx wrote: »

Diet Pepsi uses Sucralose which is a derivative of sugar (pretty sure). But is aspartame free now. I treat myself to roughly 2 diet pops a week, depending. I just started though lol.

not all of the diet pepsi, some have aspartame and others dont. some have a combo.The silver label is aspartame free

You're right. Cherry and regular diet Pepsi is aspartame free, it says it on the can. Thank you for clarifying!

I thought that was short lived and that they're back to aspartame?

Sadly, no, as far as I can tell. They have a "classic sweetener blend" of Diet Pepsi, which is aspartame, but the rest is still suckralose sucralose.

Overall good info just going to make a couple minor corrections to the points you made (and were made in relation to this). If I make a mistake someone feel free to correct me.

Sucralose is sucrose with three of its OH groups substitutes with chlorine (not just one). It is not a sugar alcohol but I don't really think you can call it a sugar anymore either and I don't think it is digestable due to the chloro substitutions. All sugars have the same formula CxH2xOx. Basically carbon plus water (hence the term carbohydrate). Since three OHs are replaced by Cls sucraloses formula is C12H19Cl3O8 so it doesn't fit the definition of a sugar.

Aspartame is comprised of two amino acids so it is a dipeptide (not bipeptide). One of the amino acids is the natural aspartic acid, the other is a phenylalanine where the carboxy terminus is modified with a methyl group to form a methyl ester. Unlike sucralose aspartame is fully digested, it is hydrolyzed into aspartic acid (aspartate), phenylalanine and methanol....all of which are found in common foods and drinks.

Both sucralose and aspartame are about 200 times sweeter than sucrose (table sugar) so as stated although aspartame is 4 calories per gram only about a tenth of a gram is needed to sweeten a drink.

EDIT: Whoops, necrothread.

Bry_Lander wrote: »

You find 2 extremes on MFP

- OMG, everything I eat and drink is going to kill me!
- You can eat anything on Earth in any quantity and nothing will hurt you, ever: it is all just a conspiracy against the food industry

Find your comfort zone somewhere in between...

Everything we all eat and drink.... Is going to kill us. Do you know someone who has lived forever? I sure don't.