A pilot study of the contribution of energy-dense Caribbean diets to acrylamide exposure with associated health risks for a population of university students in Trinidad and Tobago.

Previous studies on university students have indicated a significant decline in the consumption of fruits and vegetables complemented by an increase in energy-dense foods. The food toxicant, acrylamide, typically occurs in carbohydrate-rich, energy-dense foods that have been heated. Hence, this work presents an estimated dietary acrylamide exposure for university students in Trinidad and Tobago. A 2-day dietary recall method was used to obtain the food consumption information from 683 university students of differing sociodemographic backgrounds. The acrylamide exposure was estimated using a deterministic approach. The median acrylamide intake was estimated to be 1.39 µg/kg bw/day. The estimated mean acrylamide dietary intakes for the female and male population were 1.40 and 1.37 µg/kg bw/day, respectively. Coffee was determined to be the major dietary contributor to acrylamide exposure. However, bread was the food item that was most frequently consumed among the students. Using multiple linear regression, a possible correlation was detected between the acrylamide exposure and these variables: dietary habits (mostly eat out; p < 0.05), and Indian ethnicity (p < 0.10). Using the margin of exposure approach, dietary acrylamide exposure was found to be a health concern with regards to neurotoxicity and carcinogenicity. An evaluation of the procedures and results from this pilot study was carried out for the potential of conducting a full-scale research project.

Mechanistic evidence for the effect of sulphur-based additive: methionine, on acrylamide reduction.

The unavoidable presence of acrylamide in foods has fuelled the search for a suitable food additive, one that can successfully mitigate dietary acrylamide levels without changing food quality or compromising the health of consumers. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of a sulphur-based additive and amino acid, methionine, on acrylamide reduction. Differential scanning calorimetry, supported by chromatographic measurements, has shown that methionine interacts with acrylamide at a possible optimum temperature of 160°C, thereby disfavouring acrylamide polymerisation. Analysis of the methionine-acrylamide interaction via density functional theoretical modelling (DFT/6-31 + G(d)/RCAM-B3LYP) revealed that methionine's reducing effect may be driven by a Michael-type conjugation of the vinyl group of acrylamide at both the sulphur atom (∆Gf = -53 kJ mol-1) and the amino group (∆Gf = -11.84 kJ mol-1) of methionine. The former conjugation pathway results in a product that is more thermodynamically feasible.