Chemical interactions between additives in foodstuffs: a review

This paper critically reviews the key literature on food additive-additive chemical interactions published over the last 30 years together with appropriate relevant information on food additive-food component interactions. Five main classes of food additive are included, reflecting the research effort to date: the sulfur (IV) species of preservatives, synthetic food colouring materials, nitrate and nitrite, ascorbic acid, and sorbic acid. Within each class, aspects of the chemistry (reactivity), functionality, stability, use and reactions with other specific food additives are reviewed. Where appropriate, the importance of interactions of food additives with other components of food (i.e. nutrients and non-nutrients) has been assessed and certain aspects of toxicology included. The practical outcome of this review is presented as a set of recommendations for future research in this area. The use of the data in this review is proposed as a training set to develop the framework into a diagnostic tool. This might be used ultimately for the development of a multilevel framework, operating systematically, to understand the important parameters that dictate the outcome of additive interactions.