Metabolic effects of aspartame in adulthood: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized clinical trials
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Data about harms or benefits associated with the consumption of aspartame, a nonnutritive sweetener worldwide consumed, are still controversial. This systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled clinical trials aimed to assess the effect of aspartame consumption on metabolic parameters related to diabetes and obesity. The search was performed on Cochrane, LILACS, PubMed, SCOPUS, Web of Science databases, and on a gray literature using Open Grey, Google Scholar, and ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. Searches across all databases were conducted from the earliest available date up to April 13, 2016, without date and language restrictions. Pooled mean differences were calculated using a random or fixed-effects model for heterogeneous and homogenous studies, respectively. Twenty-nine articles were included in qualitative synthesis and twelve, presenting numeric results, were used in meta-analysis. Fasting blood glucose (mmol/L), insulin levels (μU/mL), total cholesterol (mmol/L), triglycerides concentrations (mmol/L), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (mmol/L), body weight (kg), and energy intake (MJ) were considered as the main outcomes in subjects that consumed aspartame, and results were presented as mean difference; % confidence interval, range. Aspartame consumption was not associated with alterations on blood glucose levels compared to control (-0.03 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.21 to 0.14) or to sucrose (0.31 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.05 to 0.67) and on insulin levels compared to control (0.13 μU/mL; 95% CI, -0.69 to 0.95) or to sucrose (2.54 μU/mL; 95% CI, -6.29 to 11.37). Total cholesterol was not affected by aspartame consumption compared to control (-0.02 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.31 to 0.27) or to sucrose (-0.24 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.89 to 0.42). Triglycerides concentrations were not affected by aspartame consumption compared to control (0.00 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.04 to 0.05) or to sucrose (0.00 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.09 to 0.09). High-density lipoprotein cholesterol serum levels were higher on aspartame compared to control (-0.03 mmol/L; 95% CI, -0.06 to -0.01) and lower on aspartame compared to sucrose (0.05 mmol/L; 95% CI, 0.02 to 0.09). Body weight did not change after aspartame consumption compared to control (5.00 kg; 95% CI, -1.56 to 11.56) or to sucrose (3.78 kg; 95% CI, -2.18 to 9.74). Energy intake was not altered by aspartame consumption compared to control (-0.49 MJ; 95% CI, -1.21 to 0.22) or to sucrose (-0.17 MJ; 95% CI, -2.03 to 1.69). Data concerning effects of aspartame on main metabolic variables associated to diabetes and obesity do not support a beneficial related to its consumption.
Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.
How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.084 | 0.249 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.046 | 0.006 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; both teacher heads agree on what is shown here.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".