As usual today in the morning I ate a cereal bar for breakfast and I went to school. Cereal bars normally are said to be made of natural ingredients, but today, when I looked at the ingredient list though, I found a quite strange substance: Butylated hydroxytoluen. I mean, one knows this isn’t natural just by reading the name!
Butylated hydroxytoluene, for short BHT, is a fat soluble organic compound that is used as an anti-oxidant and food additive (E number E321). It works by slowing down the oxidation rate of ingredients which can cause a change in smell and color. So basically it helps the product to maintain the color, aroma and freshness.
It is primarily used to prevent fats in foods from becoming rancid, but it is also used as an antioxidant in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, jet fuels, rubber and petroleum products.
In the pharmaceutics area it is used as an anti-viral agent in pet foods and it has been shown to suppress some viruses in humans.
It is primarily made from the chemicals p-cresol & isobutylene. P-cresol is a chemical that is a mosquito attractant while isobutylene is a flammable substance one hydrocarbon away from common butane:
CH3(C6H4)OH + 2 CH2=C(CH3)2 → ((CH3)3C)2CH3C6H2OH
When pure it is found as a white, crystalline or flaked solid, odorless or having a characteristic faint.
It really is incredible that one compound can be used to treat food we can digest safely and at the same time it is used to treat oil and plastic which are toxic for us.
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