Artificial sweeteners such as Splenda and Equal could be contributing to the very problem they are attempting to tackle. They trigger higher blood sugar levels in some people by disrupting the microbiome, an inscrutable ecosystem of bacteria in our guts, according to researchers. These discoveries were published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.

Researchers learned that saccharin, sucralose and aspartame—commonly used non-calorie sweeteners in food and beverages—caused mice to be at a dramatically increased risk for glucose intolerance, which can lead to diabetes. Of the seven human participants who did not previously use artificial sweeteners, four developed significant glucose intolerance after ingesting saccharin for a week.

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