Starting from previous structure鈥揳ctivity relationship studies of taste modifiers based on homoeriodictyol, dihydrochalcones, deoxybenzoins, and
trans-3-hydroxyflavones as obvious analogues were investigated for their masking effect against caffeine. The most active compounds of the newly investigated taste modifiers were phloretin, the related dihydrochalcones 3-methoxy-2鈥?4,4鈥?trihydroxydihydrochalcone and 2鈥?4-dihydroxy-3-methoxydihydrochalcone, and the deoxybenzoin 2-(4-hydroxy-3-methoxyphenyl)-1-(4-hydroxyphenyl)ethanone. Starting with the whole set of compounds showing activity >22%, a (Q)SAR pharmacophore model for maskers of caffeine bitterness was calculated to explain the structural requirements. After docking of the pharmacophore into a structural model of the broadly tuned bitter receptor hTAS2R10 and docking of enterolactone and enterodiol as only very weakly related structures, it was possible to predict qualitatively their modulating activity. Enterodiol (25 mg L
鈥?) reduced the bitterness of the 500 mg L
鈥? caffeine solution by about 30%, whereas enterolactone showed no masking but a slight bitter-enhancing effect.
Keywords:
flavor modifiers; bitter masking; dihydrochalcones; deoxybenzoins; trans-3-hydroxyflavanones; enterodiol
