• Corpus ID: 85835462

The addictive behaviour induced by food monosodium glutamate. Experimental study

@inproceedings{Buzescu2013TheAB,
  title={The addictive behaviour induced by food monosodium glutamate. Experimental study},
  author={Anca Buzescu and Aurelia Nicoleta Cristea and Carol Davila},
  year={2013}
}

• A. Buzescu, A. Cristea, C. Davila
• Published 2013
• Biology

Introduction. Glutamic acid under the form of monosodium salt (monosodium glutamate) is regulated in the EU as a food additive (E 621), a fl avoring agent, to give the so-called „umami“ taste. Endogen glutamic acid is the major excitatory neurotransmitt er of the central nervous system. Cortico-striatal glutamatergic transmission has been implicated in both the initiation and expression of addiction-related behaviors. In this paper, we have proposed to examine the extent to which food addictive behavior manifests itself in experimental animals, after repeated consumption of monosodium glutamate (MSG). Materials and methods. We have experimented on NMRI adult mice. Monosodium glutamate (MSG) was given daily, dissolved in water in the drinking bott les, for three weeks. Three doses of MSG were tested. Each lot of mice had two identical drinking bott les, one with MSG solution, another with plain water. The consumption of MSG solution was measured daily, together with the consumption of water, for all working groups. Results. The mice consumed preferentially the solution of monosodium glutamate (MSG), not the plain water. The greatest increase in MSG solution consumption, 71,02% (p<0.0001), was noticed in the group receiveing the highest dose (=1/10 DL50/mice). Conclusions. We experimentally demonstrated that monosodium glutamate (MSG) may induce an addictive alimentary behavior.