Metabolism of HFCS & Sugar - From the Experts
John S. White, Ph.D., Caloric Sweetener Expert and President, White Technical Research discusses how the body handles high fructose corn syrup and sugar.
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Science and Research
Research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition points to similarities between high fructose corn syrup and sugar.
Sweeteners Facts
Sweeteners that contribute calories to the diet are
called caloric or nutritive sweeteners. All common
caloric sweeteners have the same composition: they contain fructose and glucose in essentially equal proportions. All caloric sweeteners require processing to produce a food-grade product.
| Fructose | a simple sugar commonly found in fruits and honey |
| Glucose | a simple sugar that serves as a building block for most carbohydrates |
| High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) | free (unbonded) fructose and glucose in liquid (syrup) form; produced from corn |
| Sucrose | crystalline white table sugar; produced from sugar cane or sugar beets; fructose and glucose bonded together |
| Invert sugar | free fructose and glucose in liquid (syrup) form; produced from the breakdown of sugar |
| Hydrolyzed cane juice | free fructose and glucose in liquid (syrup) form; produced from the breakdown of cane juice |
| Honey | liquid (syrup) product; principally free fructose and glucose with minor levels of other sugars and some trace minerals |
| Fruit juice concentrate | concentrated, filtered, clarified fruit juice; fructose-to-glucose ratio varies by fruit source, but generally equivalent to other nutritive sweeteners (orange juice and grape juice have a fructose to glucose ratio of 1 to 1, while apple juice has a ratio of 2 to 1) |
Nutritional Characteristics
Common caloric sweeteners share the same general nutritional characteristics:
- each has roughly the same composition—equal proportions of the simple sugars fructose and glucose;
- each offers approximately the same sweetness on a per-gram basis; one gram (dry basis) of each adds 4 calories to foods and beverages;
- each is absorbed from the gut at about the same rate;
- similar ratios of fructose and glucose arrive in the bloodstream after a meal, which are indistinguishable in the body.
Since caloric sweeteners are nutritionally equivalent, they are interchangeable in foods and beverages with no measurable change in metabolism.
What if caloric sweeteners are removed from foods?
To replace one caloric sweetener with another provides no change in nutritional value. To remove sweeteners entirely from their commonly used applications and replace them with high intensity sweeteners would drastically alter product flavor and sweetness, require the use of chemical preservatives to ensure product quality and freshness, result in a reduction in perceived food quality (bran cereal with the caloric sweeteners removed would have the consistency of sawdust), and would likely require the addition of bulking agents to provide the expected texture, mouth feel or volume for most baked goods.
Sources
Hanover LM, White JS. 1993. Manufacturing, composition, and applications of fructose. Am J Clin Nutr 58(suppl 5):724S-732S.
White JS. 1992. Fructose syrup: production, properties and applications, in FW Schenck & RE Hebeda, eds, Starch Hydrolysis Products – Worldwide Technology, Production, and Applications. VCH Publishers, Inc. pp. 177-200.
White JS. 2008. Straight talk about high-fructose corn syrup: what it is and what it ain't. Am J Clin Nutr 88(6):1716S-1721S.
Widdowson EM and McCance RA. 1935. The available carbohydrate of fruits: Determination of glucose, fructose, sucrose and starch. Biochem. J. 29(1):151-156.