Sweetness and Sweeteners

Most living beings aspire for surfeit and in acceptance of food products sweet taste plays a major role. Sugar, which is one of the most commonly used materials to impart sweet taste, has the disadvantage of being associated with a number of adverse health related issues. As a result, many research hours are spent in trying to produce low and non- caloric sweeteners and to modify the temporal profiles of these to mimic that of sugar.

Since the discovery of taste receptors and the recent breakthrough in the culturing of primary taste bud cells, substantial progress has been made in the field of Sweeteners and their perception. Utilizing this knowledge, some research groups have directed their efforts toward enhancing sweetness, by way of additives that result in a net reduction of calories. The symposium was organized to highlight the current state of the science and to report recent significant findings in Biology, Chemistry, and Psychophysics of sweeteners and sweetness.

The book will follow the seven sessions of the symposium as separate chapters:

(1) Structural Studies of the Sweetener Receptor, (2) Modeling of the Sweetener Receptor, (3) Sweet Taste Transduction, (4) Quantifying the Responses of Sweet-Sensitive Taste Bud Cells, (5) Modulation of Sweet-Sensitive Taste Bud Cell Signaling, (6) Advances in the Discovery and Commercial Development of Synthetic Non-Caloric Sweeteners, and (7) Advances in the Discovery and Commercial Development of Natural Non-Caloric Sweeteners.