Cup o'Joe-The High Fructose Corn Syrup controversy скачать в хорошем качестве

Cup o'Joe-The High Fructose Corn Syrup controversy

Should we really be taking dietary advice from an American President who treats visiting athletes at the White House with fast food meals and who has a button on his desk to signal for delivery of one of twelve Diet Cokes he drinks a day? Ordinary sugar, or “sucrose,” he says is healthier than high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), and in a quest to “Make America Healthy Again” he suggests that producers should switch from using HFCS as a sweetener in beverages to sucrose. Really? Sucrose is derived from sugar cane or sugar beets and is composed of a molecule of glucose joined to one of fructose meaning that sucrose can be described as a “disaccharide” being made up of the “monosaccharides” glucose and fructose in a 50:50 ratio. During digestion, the bond between glucose and fructose is broken and the two monosaccharides are independently absorbed into the blood stream. High fructose corn syrup, the sweetener under attack is somewhat of a misnomer because it implies that it contains a high percentage of fructose whereas in fact it is composed of 55% fructose and 45% glucose, a virtually insignificant difference from sucrose. Why “virtually?” Because fructose is metabolized differently from glucose. Whereas with the aid of insulin glucose is absorbed into cells where it becomes the body’s main source of energy, fructose requires no insulin for its metabolism. It is metabolized in the liver and can serve as a source of energy or be converted to glycogen, a polysaccharide stored in the liver that can be called upon for energy production as needed. Excess fructose is converted to fat which is the source of the argument that HFCS is responsible for obesity. However, that conversion to fat only happens when there is a huge excess of fructose relative to glucose, not at a 55% to 45% ratio. At this ratio, any difference in metabolism is insignificant. The reason that HFCS has become a popular replacement for sucrose is that it is cheaper and is more easily incorporated into foods and beverages. The reason that it is cheaper is because it is made from corn, a heavily subsidized crop in the U.S. Corn starch is a polymer consisting of glucose units that when treated with the enzyme alpha-amylase isolated from Bacillus bacteria breaks down into shorter chains called oligosaccharides. These in turn are further broken down into individual glucose molecules on treatment with another enzyme, glucoamylase from the fungus Aspergillus niger. Finally, glucose isomerase from Streptomyces bacteria converts some of the glucose into fructose to yield high fructose corn syrup. In terms of calories, there is no difference between sucrose and HFCS, both yield 4 calories per gram, and any difference in metabolism is negligible. It is not HFCS that has caused the obesity epidemic, it is the increased calorie intake, much of it from simple carbohydrates. Whether these come from sucrose or HFCS is irrelevant. Any suggestion that Americans are going to become healthier due to a switch from HFCS to sucrose is pure folly. The only advice that the proponents of the Make America Healthy Movement should be giving is to cut down on all soft drinks, be they sweetened with sugar, HFCS or artificial sweeteners.