How safe are fourth-generation sweeteners, such as the rare sugar allulose?<\/p>\n
First, there was<\/a> sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, the original industrial sweeteners. They were cheap, but they had lots of empty calories and contributed to diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, cavities, and metabolic syndrome. Then came the second-generation sweeteners, the artificial sweeteners in the colored pastel packets: NutraSweet, Splenda, and Sweet\u2019N Low. They have practically zero calories, but there have been reports of adverse effects, prompting caution. For example, artificial sweeteners were found<\/a> to induce glucose intolerance by altering the gut microbiome, thereby producing<\/a> \u201cthe counterintuitive effect of inducing metabolic derangements.\u201d (They also taste<\/a> kind of funny.) Enter the third-generation sweeteners: sugar alcohols, such as sorbitol, xylitol, and erythritol. They\u2019re low-calorie sweeteners; however, their laxative effects can create difficulties. That brings us to rare sugars like allulose, which are natural sweeteners with a sugar-like taste and low or zero calories.<\/p>\n For those who haven\u2019t heard of allulose, it\u2019s been through a bit of a rebranding\u2014kind of like the morphing of rapeseed oil into canola oil, which forced<\/a> a Canadian community to update its town slogan,<\/p>\n