If you have ever regretted having ordered a spicy meal, take note: a new study that identifies molecules that suppress the heat of Peppers Chile suggests the possibility of adapting these compounds in a “anti-species” seasoning for food that is too burning to eat.
The research helps to explain the differences in the spicy of Chile, or spicy, by identifying three compounds in a variety of pepper samples that predicted the chemical analysis, and the participants of the study in a confirmed tasting panel, are linked to a lower heat intensity.
The findings have multiple potential applications: Personalized Chile reproduction, an alternative of pain relief to capsaicin and, in homes with a variety of sensibilities of culinary spices, a new seasoning to put in the pantry.
“If you are at home and you have asked for a kitchen that has spices that is too hot for some tastes, you can sprinkle a Chilean form that has these suppressor agents that will mark it,” said Senior Devin Peterson’s study author, professor of Food Science and Technology at the State University of Ohio.
“I think the idea of using a natural material such as anti spices, especially for someone with children, would have value as a domestic ingredient.”
The investigation was published online on May 14 in the Agricultural and Food Chemistry Magazine.
The intensity of the heat of the pepper has long been attributed to two members of a class of compounds called Capsaicinoids: Capsaicin and dihydrocapsaicin. The heat units of Scoville, a scale used for more than a century to determine the spicy of the Chilean peppers, are calculated according to the concentration of each pepper of these two compounds.
For this study, Peterson and his colleagues obtained 10 chili cultivars, determined their Scoville units based on their capsaicinoid content, and normalized the group so that all samples, prepared in dry dust, had the same number of Scoville units. Then, the researchers added standardized powders to tomato juice and asked a trained tasting panel to evaluate their accessories.
“All are on the same base and all standardized, so they should have had a similar heat perception, but they did not,” said Peterson, also director of the Faculty of the Health Research Initiative of the State of Ohio. “That is a fairly clear indication that other things were at stake and impacting perception.”
With these sensory perception data in hand, the researchers created statistical models and consulted molecular structures in libraries of existing chemicals to reach five candidate compounds that are expected to reduce the perceived spicy perceived of the peppers.
Then, a second panel of trained tasters compared the coupling of a range of capsaicinoid samples mixed with variable levels of these candidate compounds during the tests in which different samples were placed on each side of the tongue simultaneously.
The second round of sensory results combined with high -resolution mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance resonance experiments led the team to reduce the effects of heat suppression to three compounds: Capsianoside I, ROSAOSIDE and GINGERGLICOLIPIDES A. These results describe a general mechanism that affects the heat levels of Chili Pepper, but are not exclusive for any variety of specific specific varieties.
Peterson’s laboratory studies the complex relationships between oral cavity receptors and food compounds that influence human perception of flavor. The broad objective: apply findings to improve the taste of healthy foods without adding sugar, salt and fats.
“What is perhaps underestimated from a scientific perspective is how important the food flavor is for its dietary patterns and its enjoyment in life,” he said. “So, part of what we focus on is, how do we make healthy eating less difficult?”
However, when it comes to capsaicinoids, there is also an involvement of pain management of the results of this study.
The TRPV1 receptors in the oral cavity perceived by Chile Chile spicy are triggered by molecules, including capsaicin, which cause sensations of pain and heat. These same receptors are present throughout the body, which means that the capsaicin in supplement and the topical form facilitates the pain by initially exposing the receptors to the sign of irritation and eventually desensitizing them to that stimulus so that the pain disappears.
Recently identified heat suppression compounds can have the same desensitization effect, without the initial burn, Peterson said.
This work was supported by the Fabores Research and Education Center, which Peterson founded and directs, at the Faculty of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences of the State of Ohio. Joel Borcherding, former graduate student, and Edisson Tello, research professor, both in the Department of Food Science and Technology of the State of Ohio, was co -author of the study.