• Korean Journal of Food Science and Technology
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.311-315
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• 1996

Thermal stability of aspartame was investigated as affected by the temperature and pH during heating. The thermal stability study of aspartame heated at $60-100^{\circ}C$ showed that aspartame was degraded more rapidly as the heating temperature increased. Activation energy for thermal degradation was 20.77 kcal/mol. The thermal degradation products, a diketopiperazine (DKP) and ${\alpha}$-aspartylphenylalanine (${\alpha}$-AP), were rapidly increased while the aspartame concentration decreased. The pH change of aspartame solution was rapidly decreased during initial three hours of heating and more significant at high temperature. In the pH range ()』 3-7, aspartame was the most unstable at pH 7 and stable at pH 4. The thermal degradation rate contants were 0.827 at pH 7, 0.286 at pH 6, 0.072 at pH 5 and 0.045 at pH 4 during initial heating at $100^{\circ}C$.