ABSTRACT
Products ...............................................................................25 2.5 Toxicity and Risk Assessment of Acrylamide ................................................25
In April 2002, researchers at Stockholm University in Sweden found, for the rst time, a considerable amount of potential carcinogen acrylamide in fried or baked potatoes and cereals, which prompted investigation of the acrylamide levels in various foods by the Swedish National Food Administration (SNFA) (SNFA, 2002). The ndings have attracted wide attention and evoked an international health alarm. Also, analytical results were quickly validated by British Food Standards Agency (BFSA) and several government agencies from Norway, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. Meanwhile, many international organizations and research institutions performed research on the analytical approaches, formation mechanism, mitigation recipes, toxicology, and risk assessment of acrylamide in foods. In March 2005, the Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) together announced that certain foods processed or cooked at high temperature, especially Western-style snacks, might contain considerable levels of acrylamide and harm human health to a certain extent (INFOSAN, 2005). Later, in May 2010, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) published the monitoring report about the acrylamide levels in various foods based on the analytical results of 3461 samples from 22 European Union (UN) members and Norway (EFSA, 2010). The acrylamide hazard in diet has attracted continuous concerns worldwide in recent decades.
