Fake sweetener Splenda fills our oceans, scientists find

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A new study by scientists from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington found that the bulk of the popular sweetener Splenda, which is used  all over the world, is winding up in the Gulf Stream, the “conveyor belt of  water transport” that circulates in the Atlantic Ocean from the coast of North  American to Europe, Africa and beyond.

The study, conducted by the  scientists at the university’s Marine Atmospheric Chemistry Research Laboratory  and the journal Marine Chemistry, said that only about 10 percent of the  main component in Splenda, which is sucralose, is absorbed by the body,  meaning 90 percent of it leaves the body and winds up in sewage  systems.

“Sucralose, discovered in 1976 and made popular by Splenda in 1999, is used in 80 countries to sweeten foods and drinks  without the calories and carbohydrates of sugar,” said the university in a press  release. “Although it is a derivative of table sugar (sucrose), sucralose cannot  be effectively broken down by the bacteria in the human digestive tract. As a  result, the body absorbs little or no calories and 90 percent of the chemical  compound leaves the body through human waste and enters sewage  systems.”

Long-term effects? We don’t know yet, and that’s the  problem

Ralph Mead, Brooks Avery, Jeremy Morgan and Robert Kieber,  professors at the lab, along with graduate student Aleksandra Kirk, said they  were surprised by the dearth of peer-reviewed research regarding what happens to  sucralose once it enters the environment.

They  said some scientists from Switzerland and North America previously found the  chemical compound inland, but the MACRL researchers focused on whether sucralose  had entered ocean currents.

After the research team found significant  levels of the compound in North Carolina’s Cape Fear River, scientists  conducted research cruises, sampling waters of the Gulf Stream off the coasts of  North Carolina and Florida.

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