Peanuts cause frequent and severe food allergies in western countries. According to Quentin Sattentan, Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, Oxford, UK, and colleagues these allergic reactions are most likely to occur when eating dry roasted peanuts.

The researchers extracted proteins from dry roasted and raw peanuts and subsequently administered them to laboratory animals. Next, the scientists monitored the severity of allergic reactions, thereby revealing that mice exposed to dry roasted peanut proteins developed a more severe allergic response as compared to mice exposed to raw peanut proteins. Further analysing the reason behind this phenomenon, the researchers demonstrated that roasted peanuts contain high levels of advanced glycation end products (AGEs). These compounds, derived from glycation reactions occurring during high temperature roasting procedures, strongly stimulated the immune system of mice exposed to roasted peanuts proteins, thereby causing the allergic reactions.

By discovering the chemical modifications which trigger allergic responses to peanuts, this study may help to develop new strategies to eliminate chemical allergenic groups.

• Dry roasting enhances peanut-induced allergic sensitization across mucosal and cutaneous routes in mice,
  Amin E. Moghaddam, William R. Hillson, Mario Noti, Kate H. Gartlan, Steven Johnson, Benjamin Thomas, David Artis, Quentin J. Sattentau,
  J. Allergy Clin. Immunol. 2014.
  DOI: 10.1016/j.jaci.2014.07.032