|
|
|
| 6/19/2003 |
Fried food ingredient mutates DNA
|
|
|
|
|
9:00:56 AM
Washington, June 19 - Acrylamides, cancer-causing agents recently found in some fried and baked foods, damage DNA by causing a spectrum of mutations, researchers reported on Tuesday.
Swedish researchers caused a global furor in 2000 when they reported that acrylamides, used to purify water and in other industrial processes, could be found in a range of baked and fried foods.
They seem to be formed by exposing high-carbohydrate foods to high temperatures such as those found in baking and frying.
The chemicals can cause cancer in laboratory animals but have never been linked to human cancer.
Ahmad Besaratinia and Gerd Pfeifer of the City of Hope National Medical Center in Duarte, California found that acrylamides can mutate DNA.
Cells exposed to acrylamide had more adducts -- specific types of mutations in the DNA -- than untreated cells, they reported in this week's issue of the journal of the National Cancer Institute.
They noted that they treated mouse cells only, not human cells.
They said the best way to find out if acrylamide causes cancer in people is to do epidemiological studies -- studies of populations to see if people who eat more foods containing acrylamides have higher rates of cancer.
One such study, published by US and Swedish researchers last January, found no link between acrylamide consumption and the risk of bladder or kidney cancer.
|
|
|
