Priority-based assessment of food additives database of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.

Abstract

The priority-based assessment of food additives (PAFA) is a database maintained by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. PAFA contains extensive administrative, chemical, and toxicological information on 1685 regulated direct food additives. The database also has limited administrative and chemical information on an additional 1236 direct additives. The total 2921 substances represent everything added to food in the United States. PAFA contains up to 150 different kinds of information about each chemical. Administrative and chemical information includes Chemical Abstracts Service Registry numbers, Code of Federal Regulations citations, the annual usage and estimated daily U.S. human consumption, the Joint Committee on Food Additives Allowable Daily Intakes, the FDA Redbook structure categories of the chemicals, and their technical effects. Toxicology information shows the type of studies done for each chemical, the species of animals tested, the toxicological effects observed and the sites where they were seen, the lowest doses that cause a toxicological effect in each study, a source citation, and other types of related information.