Ramazzini Institute, Bologna, Italy.
European Foundation Ruberti-Schileo, Treviso, Italy.
Expert Rev Anticancer Ther. 2024 Sep;24(9):793-802. doi: 10.1080/14737140.2024.2383675. Epub 2024 Jul 31.
Aspartame, invented in 1965 by GD-Searle, is an intense artificial sweetener taste approximately 200 times as sweet as sucrose and used as an additive in more than 6,000 products. Aspartame (APM) was submitted for pre-marketing safety evaluation in early 1980. The studies, performed by GD-Searle, produced controversial results.
Because of the great commercial diffusion of aspartame, in 1997 the Ramazzini Institute (RI) started a large experimental project on rodents to test the carcinogenic effects of aspartame following an experimental model with more sensitive characteristics, namely a large number of rat and mice, starting treatment from prenatal life, observation until spontaneous death. Overall, the project included studying 2270 rats and 852 mice. These studies have shown that aspartame is a carcinogenic agent in experimental animals, inducing a significant dose-related increased incidence of several types of malignant tumors and, among them, hematological neoplasia, and liver cancer.
The results of these studies on aspartame by the Ramazzini Institute opened a real front on the evaluation of artificial sweeteners and their possible health risks. Adequate long-term carcinogenicity bioassays on other diffuse artificial sweeteners such as acesulfame-k, sucralose, saccharin, including their blends, are likewise important for public health.
阿斯巴甜由 GD-Searle 于 1965 年发明，是一种强烈的人工甜味剂，甜度约为蔗糖的 200 倍，被用作 6000 多种产品的添加剂。阿斯巴甜（APM）于 1980 年初提交了上市前的安全性评估。由 GD-Searle 进行的研究产生了有争议的结果。
由于阿斯巴甜的广泛商业传播，1997 年拉马齐尼研究所（RI）开始在啮齿动物身上进行一项大型实验项目，以测试阿斯巴甜的致癌作用，实验模型具有更敏感的特征，即大量的大鼠和小鼠，从产前开始治疗，观察直至自然死亡。总的来说，该项目包括研究 2270 只大鼠和 852 只小鼠。这些研究表明，阿斯巴甜是实验动物的致癌剂，诱导多种恶性肿瘤的发生率显著增加，与剂量相关，其中包括血液肿瘤和肝癌。
拉马齐尼研究所对阿斯巴甜的这些研究结果为评估人工甜味剂及其可能的健康风险开辟了一个真正的新领域。对其他广泛使用的人工甜味剂，如乙酰磺胺酸钾、三氯蔗糖、糖精，包括它们的混合物，进行充分的长期致癌性生物测定，同样对公共健康也很重要。
