Insights into the effect of artificial sweeteners on the structure, stability, and fibrillation of type I collagen

Artificial sweeteners (AS) are widely used as sugar substitutes because natural sweetener (sugar) leads to a number of health issues, including diabetes, obesity, and tooth decay. Since natural sugar (sucrose), diabetes and skin are highly interlinked, and also sucrose is known to inhibit the fibrillation of collagen, the major protein of the skin, a study on the impact of AS on collagen is important and essential. Herein, we have studied the influence of commonly used AS such as Sucralose (SUC), Aspartame (APM), and Saccharin (SAC) on the structure, stability, and fibrillation of collagen using various spectroscopic methods. The circular dichroism and turbidity results suggest that the AS does not disrupt the triple helix structure and also the fibrillar property of collagen, respectively. The fibrillar morphology was sustained, although there was a trivial difference in the entanglement of fibrils in the presence of SAC, compared to native collagen fibrils. The thermal stability of collagen is maintained in the presence of AS. Fluorescence and STD-NMR results indicate that the interaction between AS and collagen was weak, which supports the intact structure, stability, and fibrillation property of collagen. The current study thus suggests that the chosen AS does not influence collagen properties.