eBASIS (Bioactive Substances in Food Information Systems) and Bioactive Intakes: Major Updates of the Bioactive Compound Composition and Beneficial Bioeffects Database and the Development of a Probabilistic Model to Assess Intakes in Europe

Abstract

eBASIS (Bioactive Substances in Food Information Systems), a web-based database that contains compositional and biological effects data for bioactive compounds of plant origin, has been updated with new data on fruits and vegetables, wheat and, due to some evidence of potential beneficial effects, extended to include meat bioactives. eBASIS remains one of only a handful of comprehensive and searchable databases, with up-to-date coherent and validated scientific information on the composition of food bioactives and their putative health benefits. The database has a user-friendly, efficient, and flexible interface facilitating use by both the scientific community and food industry. Overall, eBASIS contains data for 267 foods, covering the composition of 794 bioactive compounds, from 1147 quality-evaluated peer-reviewed publications, together with information from 567 publications describing beneficial bioeffect studies carried out in humans. This paper highlights recent updates and expansion of eBASIS and the newly-developed link to a probabilistic intake model, allowing exposure assessment of dietary bioactive compounds to be estimated and modelled in human populations when used in conjunction with national food consumption data. This new tool could assist small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the development of food product health claim dossiers for submission to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

The unmapped chemical complexity of our diet

“…For example, the remarkable governmental and community efforts behind databases like the USDA 3,41,42 , FooDB 43 , Frida 2 , PhenolExplorer 44 and eBasis 45 have already resulted in a wealth of information on food composition. Rapid advances in metabolic reconstructions and biochemical modelling enable us to infer specific pathways from the genome, and through machine learning we can combine metabolic pathway information with the existing food composition databases in a systematic fashion, potentially elucidating the missing chemicals.…”

Polyphenols: A concise overview on the chemistry, occurrence, and human health

“…Nowadays, the main core public databases, gathering extensive data on the polyphenol content of foods and beverages are (a) the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) databases (USDA website https://www.usda.gov/); (b) the Phenol‐Explorer (Phenol‐Explore website http://phenol-explorer.eu/; Neveu et al, ); (c) the eBASIS‐Bioactive Substances in Food Information Systems (eBASIS website http://www.eurofir.org/our-tools/ebasis/; Kiely et al, ; Plumb et al, ).…”

“…It is based on the compilation of expert, who critically evaluated data extracted from peer‐reviewed literature as raw data. Currently, data points inserted in eBASIS for phenolic compounds were 639 for simple phenols, 3,616 for flavanols, 1,039 for flavones, 1,733 for flavanones, 3,669 for flavonols, 4,541 for anthocyanins, 6,543 for isoflavones, 2,695 for lignans, 405 for stilbenes, and 533 for proanthocyanidins (eBASIS website http://www.eurofir.org/our-tools/ebasis/; Plumb et al, ). Table reports examples of the sources of the main class of polyphenol as reported throughout exisiting databases.…”

“…The need for categorization of polyphenols and for the implementation of specific and dedicated databases emerged, based on both analytical data and collected data taken from literature throughout a harmonized and standardized approach for the evaluation of an adequate dietary intake . Plumb et al, 2017).…”

“…Currently, data points inserted in eBASIS for phenolic compounds were 639 for simple phenols, 3,616 for flavanols, 1,039 for flavones, 1,733 for flavanones, 3,669 for flavonols, 4,541 for anthocyanins, 6,543 for isoflavones, 2,695 for lignans, 405 for stilbenes, and 533 for proanthocyanidins (eBASIS website http://www. eurofir.org/our-tools/ebasis/; Plumb et al, 2017). Table 1 the studies of bioactivities, starting from the evaluation of interactions between compounds by in vitro assays, throughout studies on cell lines and animal models, to bioavailability and intervention studies until epidemiological and clinical trials in humans.…”