EBASIS (Bioactive Substances in Food Information Systems), a web-based database that contains compositional and biological effects data for bioactive compounds of plant origin, has been updated with new data on fruits and vegetables, wheat and, due to some evidence of potential beneficial effects, extended to include meat bioactives. eBASIS remains one of only a handful of comprehensive and searchable databases, with up-to-date coherent and validated scientific information on the composition of food bioactives and their putative health benefits. The database has a user-friendly, efficient, and flexible interface facilitating use by both the scientific community and food industry. Overall, eBASIS contains data for 267 foods, covering the composition of 794 bioactive compounds, from 1147 quality-evaluated peer-reviewed publications, together with information from 567 publications describing beneficial bioeffect studies carried out in humans. This paper highlights recent updates and expansion of eBASIS and the newly-developed link to a probabilistic intake model, allowing exposure assessment of dietary bioactive compounds to be estimated and modelled in human populations when used in conjunction with national food consumption data. This new tool could assist small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the development of food product health claim dossiers for submission to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

Dietary antioxidants, such as the carotenoids, may protect DNA from oxidative damage. This has been proposed to explain the epidemiological association between higher consumption of fruits and vegetables, which are rich in antioxidants, and lower incidence of cancer. However, this remains to be demonstrated conclusively. The effects of carotenoid supplementation on 1) baseline DNA damage, 2) susceptibility of cellular DNA to oxidative attack, and 3) DNA repair were measured in the human lymphocyte cell line Molt-17. Baseline DNA damage, susceptibility to oxidant attack (100 μmol/l H2O2 for 5 min at 4°C), and disappearance of DNA single-strand breaks (SSB) after oxidative challenge were monitored by single-cell gel electrophoresis. DNA repair patch synthesis activity in cell extracts was determined using assays that measure nucleotide incorporation during repair of oxidative lesions in template DNA. Unlike single-cell gel electrophoresis, the parameters measured with these assays are not dependent on stran...

Food, nutrition, and health are linked, and detailed knowledge of nutrient compositions and bioactive characteristics is needed to understand these relationships. Additionally, increasingly these data are required by database systems and applications. This communication aims to describe the contribution to databases and nutrition fields as well as the activities of EuroFIR AISBL; this member-based, non-profit association was founded to ensure sustained advocacy for food information in Europe and facilitate improved data quality, storage, and access as well as encouraging wider exploitation of food composition data for both research and commercial purposes. In addition to the description of its role and main objectives, a snapshot of EuroFIR AISBL’s activities over the years is also given using a quantitative research literature analysis approach. The focus of this communication is to provide descriptions and updates of EuroFIR’s online tools, i.e., FoodEXplorer, eBASIS, and PlantLIBRA, by highlighting the main uses and applications. Integrating food-related infrastructures and databases, following standardized and harmonized approaches, and considering interoperability and metrological principles are significant challenges. Ongoing activities and future plans of EuroFIR AISBL are highlighted, including, for instance, work within the Food Nutrition Security Cloud (FNS-Cloud) to make food, nutrition, and (food) security data more findable, accessible, interoperable, and ultimately reusable.

Purpose: Growing concern about excess added sugar intake and associated adverse health effects has increased interest in non-nutritive sweeteners (NNS) as low-calorie alternatives that preserve sweetness. Previous studies focus on health effects of replacing added sugar, or environmental impacts of NNS alone. However, none evaluate the environmental impact ramifications of replacing added sugar with NNS in a whole dietary setting. This study addresses that gap. Methods: The baseline diet reflected an average diet of Dutch adults consuming > 2200 kcal/day (mean 2866 kcal/day). Added sugar (54 g/day), identified from recipe data, was replaced with steviol glycosides and a bulking agent (e.g., sorbitol) to create the NNS diet. Both diets were linked to life cycle assessment data and optimized separately for nutritional adequacy and the 2023 IPCC 1.5 °C target of 2.04 kgCO ₂ -eq/day. Results: Both diets had equivalent global warming potential (GWP, 4.18 kgCO ₂ -eq/day), but the NNS diet used 11% more water (compared to 1.19 × 10 ^− 1 m ³ /day of baseline diet). When optimized for nutritional adequacy, GWP for both diets reduced 13%, and water consumption increased 3–9%. When optimized for nutrient adequacy and emissions targets, water consumption decreased by 11–15% across both diets. Conclusion: These results highlight an opportunity for policymakers and consumers to focus on the health benefits of added sugar reduction rather than environmental trade-offs. Both dietary patterns can be further improved regarding nutritional and climate goals, suggesting that balanced, low-emission diets are attainable across different sweetness strategies. The study identifies methodological challenges in modeling realistic dietary substitutions and provides guidance for future research.