Most of us try to cut calories when we can, and many of us look to artificial no-calorie sweeteners as one way to do it. If that’s how you satisfy your sweet tooth, there’s a good chance you could be choosing reduced-calorie foods and beverages sweetened with sucralose, a popular type of no-calorie sweetener used to replace sugar.

It’s also the primary sweetener in some brands of tabletop sweetener packets including Equal Sucralose and SPLENDA. Sucralose is sold under other brand names too, such as Cukren, Zerocal, Nevella, Canderel Yellow and SucraPlus. But no matter what it’s called, sucralose is “genotoxic,” and might be harmful to our DNA — the carrier of our genetic information, a new North Carolina State University study shows. It could also be contributing to a “leaky gut”.

The specific culprit is called sucralose-6-acetate.

In a leaky gut, the gut’s lining may have large cracks or holes, allowing partially digested food, toxins and bugs to penetrate the tissues beneath it.

“To put this in context, the European Food Safety Authority has a threshold of toxicological concern for all genotoxic substances of 0.15 micrograms per person per day,” Susan Schiffman, corresponding author of the study, said in a press statement. “Our work suggests that the trace amounts of sucralose-6-acetate in a single daily sucralose-sweetened drink exceed that threshold.”

The researchers conducted a series of in-vitro (performed in a test tube, culture dish or outside a living organism) experiments exposing human blood cells to sucralose-6-acetate and monitoring them for markers of genotoxicity. “In short, we found that sucralose-6-acetate is genotoxic, and that it effectively broke up DNA in cells that were exposed to the chemical,” Schiffman, an adjunct professor in the joint department of biomedical engineering at North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said.

Since previous studies showed sucralose may be playing havoc with our guts, the researchers exposed sucralose and sucralose-6-acetate specifically to gut epithelial tissues — the tissues that line our gut wall. They found that both chemicals cause leaky gut.

What is leaky gut? Inside our bellies, we have an extensive intestinal lining covering more than 4,000 square feet of surface area. When working properly, it forms a tight barrier that controls what gets absorbed into our bloodstream. But a leaky gut’s lining may have large cracks or holes, allowing partially digested food, toxins and bugs to penetrate the tissues beneath it.

“[W]e found that sucralose-6-acetate…effectively broke up DNA in cells that were exposed to the chemical,”

This may trigger inflammation and changes in the gut flora (normal bacteria) that could lead to problems within the digestive tract — and beyond.

“We found that gut cells exposed to sucralose-6-acetate had increased activity in genes related to oxidative stress, inflammation and carcinogenicity,” Schiffman said.

The new study raises concerns about the potential health effects associated with sucralose. Considering the researchers’ findings, Schiffman is clear: “It’s time to revisit the safety and regulatory status of sucralose, because the evidence is mounting that it carries significant risks. If nothing else, I encourage people to avoid products containing sucralose. It’s something you should not be eating.”

Consider satisfying your sweet tooth with low or no-calorie natural and exotic alternatives, such as sweeteners from the Asian monk fruit, stevia (a plant from the sunflower family) or yacon syrup, derived from the South American yacon plant.

The study is published in Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health Part B.