Project description
A new natural low-caloric sweet protein
Excess sugar consumption is associated with increased rates of obesity, diabetes, dental cavities, gum disease and many other health ailments. Worse still is that this may result in high numbers of deaths annually and a significant economic burden for healthcare systems. While artificial sweeteners serve as a non-caloric alternative, these are associated with side effects like increased risk of cancer. Naturally occurring sweet proteins in some tropical plants serve as new low-calorie nutritious sweeteners superior to sugar or artificial sweeteners. However, the large-scale production of these proteins faces challenges and limitations preventing their application in the food industry. The EU-funded Milis project proposes a novel protein with low caloric content and without aftertaste and unhealthy chemical components. The product can be up to 500 times sweeter than sugar per gram.
Objective
Excess sugar consumption is a major contributor to the alarming rates of obesity, diabetes, and dental disease that exist in
many developed countries. According to the Credit Suisse Research Institute, close to 400M people worldwide are affected
by Type II Diabetes. 4.8M people die of chronic disease every year, a number that is quickly rising. Costs to the global
healthcare system are estimated at a staggering $470B per year, representing 10% of all the healthcare costs. Artificial
sweeteners offer a non-caloric alternative to sugar but have health concerns of their own, and are not always effective in
maintenance of a healthy diet. However their use is not totally safe. Saccharine, for example, previously used on a large
scale, was abandoned as soon as it was linked with development of bladder cancer. Artificial sweetener consumption
modulates the gut microbiota and raises the risk of glucose intolerance. Sweet proteins that occur naturally in some tropical
plants can have a sweetness a thousand times that of sucrose. This indicates that proteins potentially represent novel lowcalorie,
nutritious sweeteners – superior to either sugar or artificial sweeteners. However, producing naturally occurring
sweet proteins on a large scale is challenging and limitations of their physicochemical properties will constrain their
application in the food industry.
Milis Bio developed “Milis”, a novel protein which will be 200 - 500 times sweeter than sugar per gram. Milis presents low
caloric content, no aftertaste, and no unhealthy chemical components. Milis allows the consumer to think only about how
great their food tastes, rather than worrying about what’s in it. Using a protein as a flavouring guarantees that the ingredient
will be low-calorie, easily digestible, and suitable for diabetics.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques.
- engineering and technologyother engineering and technologiesfood technology
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesbiochemistrybiomoleculesproteins
- medical and health sciencesclinical medicineendocrinologydiabetes
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Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinator
P31VW90 CORK
Ireland
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.