title: Sweet taste receptor gene variation and aspartame taste in primates and other species.
abstract: Aspartame is a sweetener added to foods and beverages as a low-calorie sugar replacement. Unlike sugars, which are apparently perceived as sweet and desirable by a range of mammals, the ability to taste aspartame varies, with humans, apes, and Old World monkeys perceiving aspartame as sweet but not other primate species. To investigate whether the ability to perceive the sweetness of aspartame correlates with variations in the DNA sequence of the genes encoding sweet taste receptor proteins, T1R2 and T1R3, we sequenced these genes in 9 aspartame taster and nontaster primate species. We then compared these sequences with sequences of their orthologs in 4 other nontasters species. We identified 9 variant sites in the gene encoding T1R2 and 32 variant sites in the gene encoding T1R3 that distinguish aspartame tasters and nontasters. Molecular docking of aspartame to computer-generated models of the T1R2 + T1R3 receptor dimer suggests that species variation at a secondary, allosteric binding site in the T1R2 protein is the most likely origin of differences in perception of the sweetness of aspartame. These results identified a previously unknown site of aspartame interaction with the sweet receptor and suggest that the ability to taste aspartame might have developed during evolution to exploit a specialized food niche.
authors.affiliation: Monell Chemical Senses Center, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA.
authors.forename: Xia
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Alexander A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Bachmanov
authors.forename: Kenji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Maehashi
authors.forename: Weihua
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Raymond
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Lim
authors.forename: Joseph G
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: Brand
authors.forename: Gary K
authors.initials: GK
authors.lastname: Beauchamp
authors.forename: Danielle R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Reed
authors.forename: Chloe
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Thai
authors.forename: Wely B
authors.initials: WB
authors.lastname: Floriano
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001218:Aspartame; D001483:Base Sequence; D014644:Genetic Variation; D006801:Humans; D008958:Models, Molecular; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D011323:Primates / Q000235:genetics*; D043562:Receptors, G-Protein-Coupled / Q000235:genetics*; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D013549:Sweetening Agents; D013649:Taste / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D043562:Receptors, G-Protein-Coupled; D013549:Sweetening Agents; C431926:taste receptors, type 1; D001218:Aspartame