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Curculin
Curculin or neoculin is a sweet protein that was discovered and isolated in 1990 from the fruit of ''Curculigo latifolia'' (Hypoxidaceae), a plant from Malaysia. Like miraculin, curculin exhibits taste-modifying activity; however, unlike miraculin, it also exhibits a sweet taste by itself. After consumption of curculin, water and sour solutions taste sweet. The plant is referred to locally as 'Lumbah' or 'Lemba'. Protein structure The active form of curculin is a heterodimer consisting of two monomeric units connected through two disulfide bridges. The mature monomers each consist of a sequence of 114 amino acids, weighing 12.5 kDa (curculin 1) and 12.7 kDa (curculin 2), respectively. While each of the two isoforms is capable of forming a homodimer, these do not possess the sweet taste nor the taste-modifying activity of the heterodimeric form. To avoid confusion, the heterodimeric form is sometimes referred to as "neoculin". *1, 1-50: DNVLLSGQTL HADHSLQAGA YTLTIQNKCN LVKYQ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Miraculin
Miraculin is a :Taste modifiers, taste modifier, a glycoprotein extracted from the fruit of ''Synsepalum dulcificum''. The berry, also known as the miracle fruit, was documented by explorer Chevalier des Marchais, who searched for many different fruits during a 1725 excursion to its native West Africa. Miraculin itself does not taste sweet. When taste buds are exposed to miraculin, the protein binds to the sweetness receptors. This causes normally sour-tasting acidic foods, such as citrus, to be perceived as sweet. The effect can last for one or two hours. History The sweetening properties of ''Synsepalum dulcificum'' berries were first noted by des Marchais during expeditions to West Africa in the 18th century. The term ''miraculin'' derived from experiments to isolate and purify the active glycoprotein that gave the berries their sweetening effects, results that were published simultaneously by Japanese and Dutch scientists working independently in the 1960s (the Dutch team cal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Miraculin
Miraculin is a :Taste modifiers, taste modifier, a glycoprotein extracted from the fruit of ''Synsepalum dulcificum''. The berry, also known as the miracle fruit, was documented by explorer Chevalier des Marchais, who searched for many different fruits during a 1725 excursion to its native West Africa. Miraculin itself does not taste sweet. When taste buds are exposed to miraculin, the protein binds to the sweetness receptors. This causes normally sour-tasting acidic foods, such as citrus, to be perceived as sweet. The effect can last for one or two hours. History The sweetening properties of ''Synsepalum dulcificum'' berries were first noted by des Marchais during expeditions to West Africa in the 18th century. The term ''miraculin'' derived from experiments to isolate and purify the active glycoprotein that gave the berries their sweetening effects, results that were published simultaneously by Japanese and Dutch scientists working independently in the 1960s (the Dutch team cal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sugar Substitutes
A sugar substitute is a food additive that provides a sweetness like that of sugar while containing significantly less food energy than sugar-based sweeteners, making it a zero-calorie () or low-calorie sweetener. Artificial sweeteners may be derived through manufacturing of plant extracts or processed by chemical synthesis. Sugar substitute products are commercially available in various forms, such as small pills, powders, and packets. In North America, common sugar substitutes include aspartame, monk fruit extract, saccharin, sucralose, and stevia; cyclamate is also used outside the United States. These sweeteners are a fundamental ingredient in diet drinks to sweeten them without adding calories. Additionally, sugar alcohols such as erythritol, xylitol, and sorbitol are derived from sugars. Approved artificial sweeteners do not cause cancer. Reviews and dietetic professionals have concluded that moderate use of non-nutritive sweeteners as a safe replacement for sugars can ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curculigo Latifolia
''Curculigo'' is a flowering plant genus in the family Hypoxidaceae, first described in 1788. It is widespread across tropical regions of Asia, Africa, Australia, and the Americas. Curculin is a sweet protein that was discovered and isolated in 1990 from the fruit of ''Curculigo latifolia'', a plant from Malaysia. Like miraculin, curculin exhibits taste-modifying activity; however, unlike miraculin, it also exhibits a sweet taste by itself. After consumption of curculin, water and sour solutions taste sweet. The plant is referred to locally as 'lembah' or 'lumbah'; English: 'weevil-wort'. ;Species # '' Curculigo annamitica'' Gagnep. – Vietnam # '' Curculigo breviscapa'' S.C.Chen – China (Guangxi, Guangdong) # '' Curculigo conoc'' Gagnep. – Vietnam # '' Curculigo disticha'' Gagnep. – Vietnam # '' Curculigo ensifolia'' R.Br. – Australia # '' Curculigo erecta'' Lauterb. – Philippines, Sumatra, New Guinea, Solomon Island # '' Curculigo maharashtrensis'' M.R.Almeida & ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hypoxidaceae
Hypoxidaceae is a family of flowering plants, placed in the order Asparagales of the monocots. The APG IV system of 2016 (unchanged from the 1998, 2003, and 2009 versions) recognizes this family. The family consists of four genera totalling some 160 species. The members of the family are small to medium herbs, with grass-like leaves and an invisible stem, modified into a corm or a rhizome. The flowers are born on leafless shoots, also called scapes. The flowers are trimerous, radially symmetric. The ovary is inferior, developing into a capsule or a berry. Uses Curculin is a taste modifying sweet protein that was discovered and from the fruit of a plant in this family (''Curculigo latifolia ''Curculigo'' is a flowering plant genus in the family Hypoxidaceae, first described in 1788. It is widespread across tropical regions of Asia, Africa, Australia, and the Americas. Curculin is a sweet protein that was discovered and isolated in ...''). Consuming it causes water to t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thaumatin
Thaumatin (also known as talin) is a low-calorie sweetener and flavor modifier. The protein is often used primarily for its flavor-modifying properties and not exclusively as a sweetener. The thaumatins were first found as a mixture of proteins isolated from the katemfe fruit (''Thaumatococcus daniellii'') (Marantaceae) of West Africa. 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 concentrations. Thaumatin is highly water soluble, stable to heating, and stable under acidic conditions. Biological role Thaumatin production is induced in katemfe in response to an attack upon the plant by viroid pathogens. Several members of the thaumatin protein family display significant ''in vitro'' inhibition of hyphal growth and sporulation by various fungi. The thaumatin protein is considered a prototype for a pathogen-response protein do ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monellin
Monellin, a sweet protein, was discovered in 1969 in the fruit of the West African shrub known as serendipity berry (''Dioscoreophyllum cumminsii''); it was first reported as a carbohydrate.GE Inglett, JF May. Serendipity berries - Source of a new intense sweetener. J Food Sci 1969, 34:408-411. The protein was named in 1972 after the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, U.S.A., where it was isolated and characterized. Protein composition Monellin's molecular weight is 10.7 Atomic mass unit, kDa. It has two noncovalently associated polypeptide chains: an A chain sequence with 44 amino acid residues, and a B chain with 50 residues. Monellin chain A (44 AA): Monellin chain B (50 AA): Amino acid#Table of standard amino acid abbreviations and properties, Amino acid sequence of the sweet protein monellin adapted from Swiss-Prot biological database of protein. Monellin has a secondary structure consisting of five beta-strands that form an antiparallel beta-sheet and a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brazzein
Brazzein is a sweet-tasting protein extracted from the West African fruit of the climbing plant Oubli (''Pentadiplandra brazzeana'' Henri Ernest Baillon, Baillon). It was first isolated by the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1994. Brazzein is found in the extracellular region, in the pulp tissue surrounding the seeds. With pentadin, discovered in 1989, brazzein is the second sweet-tasting protein discovered in the Oubli fruit. Like the other sweet proteins discovered in plants, such as monellin and thaumatin, it is extremely sweet compared to commonly used sweeteners (500 to 2000 times sweeter than sucrose). The fruit tastes sweet to humans, monkeys, and bonobos, but gorillas have mutations in their sweetness receptors so that they do not find brazzein sweet, and they are not known to eat the fruit. Traditional use The Oubli plant (from which the protein was isolated) grows in Gabon and Cameroon, where its fruit has been consumed by the apes and local people for a long time ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sugar Substitute
A sugar substitute is a food additive that provides a sweetness like that of sugar while containing significantly less food energy than sugar-based sweeteners, making it a zero-calorie () or low-calorie sweetener. Artificial sweeteners may be derived through manufacturing of plant extracts or processed by chemical synthesis. Sugar substitute products are commercially available in various forms, such as small pills, powders, and packets. In North America, common sugar substitutes include aspartame, monk fruit extract, saccharin, sucralose, and stevia; cyclamate is also used outside the United States. These sweeteners are a fundamental ingredient in diet drinks to sweeten them without adding calories. Additionally, sugar alcohols such as erythritol, xylitol, and sorbitol are derived from sugars. Approved artificial sweeteners do not cause cancer. Reviews and dietetic professionals have concluded that moderate use of non-nutritive sweeteners as a safe replacement for sugars can he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territories, nine Minor Outlying Islands, and 326 Indian reservations. The United States is also in free association with three Pacific Island sovereign states: the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. It is the world's third-largest country by both land and total area. It shares land borders with Canada to its north and with Mexico to its south and has maritime borders with the Bahamas, Cuba, Russia, and other nations. With a population of over 333 million, it is the most populous country in the Americas and the third most populous in the world. The national capital of the United States is Washington, D.C. and its most populous city and principal financial center is New York City. Paleo-Americ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taste Modifiers
The gustatory system or sense of taste is the sensory system that is partially responsible for the perception of taste (flavor). Taste is the perception produced or stimulated when a substance in the mouth reacts chemically with taste receptor cells located on taste buds in the oral cavity, mostly on the tongue. Taste, along with olfaction and trigeminal nerve stimulation (registering texture, pain, and temperature), determines flavors of food and other substances. Humans have taste receptors on taste buds and other areas, including the upper surface of the tongue and the epiglottis. The gustatory cortex is responsible for the perception of taste. The tongue is covered with thousands of small bumps called papillae, which are visible to the naked eye. Within each papilla are hundreds of taste buds. The exception to this is the filiform papillae that do not contain taste buds. There are between 2000 and 5000Boron, W.F., E.L. Boulpaep. 2003. Medical Physiology. 1st ed. Elsevier Sc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plant Proteins
Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclude the fungi and some algae, as well as the prokaryotes (the archaea and bacteria). By one definition, plants form the clade Viridiplantae (Latin name for "green plants") which is sister of the Glaucophyta, and consists of the green algae and Embryophyta (land plants). The latter includes the flowering plants, conifers and other gymnosperms, ferns and their allies, hornworts, liverworts, and mosses. Most plants are multicellular organisms. Green plants obtain most of their energy from sunlight via photosynthesis by primary chloroplasts that are derived from endosymbiosis with cyanobacteria. Their chloroplasts contain chlorophylls a and b, which gives them their green color. Some plants are parasitic or mycotrophic and have lost the ability t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
