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by anjel 1405 days ago
Just wondering why sugar alcohols like sorbitol and erythritol were excluded from this study.
3 comments

By messing with part of the fructose transport mechanisms sugar alcohols are messing with the microbiome so likely would have stood out. There is a reason at least here there are labels warning of too much consumption.
Erythritol as a NNS is claimed/marketed not to effect the gut biome, indeed to pass through the body unmetabolized.
This is a bit more complicated, it is not really metabolized but it does have a big impact because it is absorbed by the gut and also change bacterial populations... https://academic.oup.com/advances/article/10/suppl_1/S31/530...
According to the article in the link, erythritol doesn't change bacterial populations.
Yes that mean that in their experimental setting it didn't change. Doesn't mean it doesn't in other conditions or when measured by other means.
generally any alternative sugar that isn't metabolized by you is metabolized by bacteria
I could see how this would relate to sugar cravings. Or sweet craving. More and more of a certain kind of bacteria lines the gut and grows better in it's main food supply. So what breaks these NNSs down?
I'm more curious about Allulose[1] which is claimed to have anti-hyperglycemic effects by reducing glucose absorption in the intestines.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psicose

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32708827/

...or xylitol?