PLANT PROTEIN SWEETENERS

PLANT PROTIEN SWEETENERS

Wide variety of sweetening agents or sweeteners used in pharmacy are basically carbohydrates like sucrose, glucose, honey etc or glycosides such as glycyrrhizins, sterioside or even synthetic i.e saccharine.

However the sweetening agents other than above chemical nature and still from natural sourse are really very rare.

But plants containing very potent protein sweeteners are reported in the last two decades.Thaumatin,Menelline and Miraculin are well known plant protein sweeteners.

Eg: THAUMATIN

BIOLOGICAL SOURCE:
It is a highly potent sweetener obtained from the fruits of the plant known as Thaumatococcus danielli.

FAMILY:
Marantaceae

GEOGRAPHICAL SOURCE:
This is found in Africa esp Ghana, ivory coast,sierra leone and togo.

MACROSCOPICAL CHARACTERS:
This bears reddish trigonal fruits with 2-3 seeds covered with fleshy aril.aril contain active constituents and are sweet in taste.

CHEMICAL CONSTITUENTS:
The aqueous extract is a mixture of two water soluble proteins thaumatin I and thaumatin II .These proteins are quite stable and their sweet taste is not lost by heating ,it is stable at ph 2.7 to 3.0.

Sweet taste of the thaumatin can detected even in concentration of 1/100000000 .Thaumatin is non-toxic and non-carcinogenic.it promotes the flavour even at very low concentration .

USES:
Thaumatin is used as sweetener in chewing gums and branch freshners.

MARKETED PRODUCTS:
Patended name –TALIN, available in USA and JAPAN.

Neutraceutical is defined as a substance which can be considered a food or its part which in addition to its normal nutritional value ,provides health benefits including prevention of disease or promotion of health.
IMPORTANT NEUTRACEUTICALS:
Preparation:Rejoov capsules –rhone-poulnec.Mumbai,