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Trial, not randomized · measured lab tests or safety

10-day trial in healthy adults: sucralose with a carbohydrate lowered insulin sensitivity

Dalenberg and colleagues · Cell metabolism · 2020

Original title: Short-Term Consumption of Sucralose with, but Not without, Carbohydrate Impairs Neural and Metabolic Sensitivity to Sugar in Humans.

Under review. A person has not yet checked this summary against the paper. It is written from the PubMed abstract. Until a person checks it, search engines are asked not to list this page.

What the study found

Points to harm

Sucralose drinks taken with a carbohydrate, but not without, lowered insulin sensitivity over 10 days. Brain responses to sweet taste also dropped. Carbohydrate alone had no effect.

The study at a glance

Type of study
Trial, not randomized
Who or what was studied
healthy adults
What was tested
Seven sucralose-sweetened drinks over 10 days, with or without a carbohydrate added; carbohydrate alone was also tested
What it measured
Lab tests or markers
How long
1.5 weeks
Who has a stake
No stake declared
No competing interests declared.
Journal
Cell metabolism, 2020
Source
PubMed record 32130881. This page is based on the abstract only.

How much this study counts

  • –Not randomized: the groups may differ in ways that affect the result.
  • •The abstract does not say how many people took part.
  • –Short: 1.5 weeks. Longer-term effects are unknown.
  • –Measured lab tests or markers, which stand in for body weight and metabolic health. A better marker does not always mean better health.
  • ✓No competing interests declared.
  • •Summarized from the PubMed abstract only. The full paper may hold details the abstract leaves out.

✓ Strength– Limit• Note

These points come from fixed rules about the type of study, its size and length, what it measured, and who has a stake. Every study on Digestery gets the same rules.

Where this study sits

Each dot is one on-topic paper on this question. Steps near the top answer the question more directly.

↑ Stronger evidence

  1. Trials in people: body weight

    4

    1 benefit, 1 mixed, 2 no difference

  2. Trials in people: other measures

    0

    None among the papers we read.

  3. Trials in people: lab tests or safety

    7

    1 benefit, 1 mixed, 4 no difference, 1 harm

    ↑ This study is the ringed dot

  4. Population studies

    5

    1 benefit, 4 harm

  5. Blood levels and genes

    1

    1 harm

↓ Weaker evidence

  • Points to benefit
  • Mixed
  • No difference
  • No direction
  • Points to harm

How it fits with the other research

The short answer to “Do artificial sweeteners cause weight gain?”

Trials say no; population studies disagree.

Confidence: low. Based on 32 on-topic papers.

Read the full answer

Of the other 6 papers on the same step: 1 benefit, 1 mixed, 4 no difference. This one found harm. It differs from most of them.

Other papers on the same step

See all 32 studies on this question

How this page was made

Label

First read of the abstract
Claude Sonnet
Independent second read
Claude Haiku
Differences settled
The two reads differed. The reviewer checked the abstract and kept the first read. Claude Opus 5.5.
Headline
Claude Sonnet, from the checked study record. A script checked its numbers and wording.
Numbers
Checked against the abstract by a script
“How much this study counts”
Fixed rules, the same for every study
Source check by a person
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