Chinese scientists have discovered two edible or medicinal sweet plants: pterygium and fuchsia, from which the compound separated is more than ten times sweeter than sucrose. This series of results has recently been published in the International Journal Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry.
The Kunming plant research institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences found a variety of sweet plants, including two kinds of sweet plants, Samara and capuchin, through the field investigation of the characteristic edible and medicinal plants in Yunnan minority areas and the evaluation of taste sense.

The author of the paper and associate researcher of the Kunming Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Duzhizhi, introduced that the aromaaceae plant, the Samara Vine, is locally known as "soil licorice" or "large pair of life" in Yunnan, and its peel can be used for pickling pickles., roots can be used as medicine, whole plant can cure tuberculosis. The leguminous medicinal plant, the hairy fruit fish Vine, is sweet and is sometimes used as a substitute for licorice in ethnic medicine.
By tracking the taste activity of pterygium, the researchers found that the pericarp contained 10 new sweet steroid glycosides, ranging in sweetness from 50 to 400 times that of sucrose. The seven new sweet compounds found in their roots range in sweetness from 25 to 400 times that of sucrose.

In the capulose, the researchers found four new sweet triterpene saponins, two of which were 150 and 80 times sweeter than sucrose. Duzhizhi said: "We used animal acute toxicity experiments and found that these two compounds did not show toxicity at the tested concentration, confirming the rationality of the use of hairy fish vines as a substitute for licorice in the community from the point of view of sweet taste. "

From: Guangxi Sugar Network