الفهرس 
الفصل الاولOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
 |  | from | 163 |  |  |
| | | from | 163 | | |
Abstract
Food additives are chemical substances added to foods to produce specific desirable effects. Most food additives such as preservatives or enhancer of palatability have been implicated with harmful effects to the consumers (Madiha et al., 2012). One of such food additives is monosodium glutamate (MSG). Monosodium glutamate (C5H8NO4Na, E621) is the sodium salt of glumatic acid, a naturally occurring nonessential amino acid (Yousif et al., 2016). It is composed of 78% glutamic acid, 22% sodium and water (Husarova and Ostatnikova, 2013). The part of MSG that had deleterious effect on the human body is glutamate not the sodium (Yaqub et al. 2008). LD50 of MSG in rats ranges between 15 and 18 g/kg BW (Kolawole, 2013).
The toxicity concerns following the intake of MSG have been controversially discussed (Boonnate et al., 2015). Over consumption of MSG for a long time led to many of the toxic effects such as various inflammatory diseases and obesity (Euteum et al., 2014). Neuronal cell death is associated with glutamic production of free radicals in various organs (Degoset al., 2013). The brain is the most susceptible to oxidation due to its high rate of metabolic activity (Shivasharan et al., 2013). The ability of MSG to damage nerve cells of the hypothalamus is a pointer to the alteration of the neural control of reproductive hormones secretion via the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal regulatory axis. Such alterations in the reproductive hormones secretion may adversely affect the reproductive capacity of the affected animals (Igwebuike et al., 2011). The in vivo neurotoxic effects of MSG are related to acute and chronic neurodegenerative defects, such as hypoglycemia, ischemia, trauma and both dementia and Alzheimer’s disease (Rajagopal et al., 2013). Moreover, MSG has been associated with male infertility by causing testicular degeneration and alteration of sperm cell population and morphology (Das and Ghosh, 2010; Igwebuike et al., 2011).