Taste modifier sweeteners:

Taste modifiers are proteins that do not taste sweet by themselves but modify taste receptors to temporarily make sour things taste sweet.

Miraculin from ‘Miracle Plant’:

A shrub that grows in the hot and humid wet lowlands of West Africa and has berries that have a low sugar content and a mildly sweet tang. The berries have been eaten for centuries with no adverse effects and have been taken to treat diabetes and correct chemotherapy related taste disturbances. The berries contain a protein ‘Miraculin’, a readily soluble protein that tastes sweet enough to replace sugar as a sweetener in acidic foods or drinks. This protein binds to the sweet receptacles on our tongues, to cause even acidic foods that are generally sour, to be perceived as sweet without causing other flavours to be affected. The effect lasts 30 mins to an hour. It has low heat stability i.e. it cannot activate the taste buds when heated to over 100⁰C or at pH levels below 3 or above 12, at room temperature.

Miraculin is now being produced through genetically modified E-coli bacteria, Lettuce and Tomatoes. It has been approved as a harmless additive in Japan.

Monellin:

A sweet protein discovered in the fruit of another West African shrub known as the serendipity berry. It is about 800 to 2000 times sweeter than sucrose. Monellin has a slow onset to sweetness and a lingering after taste. Like miraculin, monellin sweetness is pH-dependent, the protein is tasteless below pH2 and above pH9. Blending the sweet protein with bulk and / or intense sweeteners reduces the persistent sweetness and shows a synergistic sweet effect. Heat over 50⁰C at low pH denatures monellin proteins, causing a loss of the sweetness.

Monellin can be useful for sweetening some foods and drinks, as it is a protein readily soluble in water due to its hydrophilic properties. However, it may have limited application because it denatures under high temperature conditions, which makes it unsuitable for processed food. It may be relevant as noncarbohydrate tabletop sweetener, especially for individuals such as diabetics who must control their sugar intake.

In addition, monellin is costly to extract from the fruit and the plant is difficult to grow. Alternative production such as chemical synthesis and expression in micro-organisms are being investigated. For instance, monellin has been expressed successfully in yeast (Candida utilis) and synthesised by solid-phase method. The synthetic monellin produce by yeast was found to be 4000 times sweeter than sucrose.

Monellin is approved in Japan as a harmless additive, according to the List of Existing Food Additives issued by the Ministry of Health and Welfare.

Thaumatin:

Thaumatin is a low-calorie, intensely sweet tasting protein (about 100,000 times as sweet as sucrose) and is a flavour modifier. The protein is often used primarily for its flavour-modifying properties and not exclusively as a sweetener.

The thaumatins were first found as a mixture of proteins isolated from the Katemfe fruit of West Africa. Some proteins in the thaumatin family of sweeteners are roughly 2000 to 3000 times more potent than sugar. Although very sweet, thaumatin’s taste is markedly different from sugar’s. The sweetness of thaumatin builds very slowly. Perception lasts a long time, leaving a liquorice-like aftertaste at high usage levels. Thaumatin is highly water-soluble, stable to heating, and stable under acidic conditions.

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