According to an article by Ulrich H. Engelhardt, Ina Bahar & Ulf Delker, it suggests that mitigating the presence of two common food-born toxicants in roasted coffee is impossible, since one increases with longer, darker roasts, while the other decreases.
The study found that the chemical compound acrylamide formed quickly during the browning phase, but decreased as roasts went longer and darker. Meanwhile, methylfurans concentrations were lowest with the lightest roasts and increased as roasts darkened.
Both chemical types have been a popular subject among food chemistry researchers due to their presence in popular foods, as well as their classifications among public health agencies.
The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has classified acrylamide — which occurs naturally during most baking, roasting or otherwise browning of foods — as a “probably human carcinogen” while the United States EPA has classified it as “likely to be carcinogenic to humans.” Furan also falls into the IARC classification of “probably carcinogenic.”
The study comes with the caveat that coffee is also loaded with antioxidants that are believed to be beneficial to human health. Multiple recent studies have suggested regular coffee consumption can help fend off death from all causes, including cancers. In detail, please refer to the article, https://www.maxapress.com/article/doi/10.48130/BPR-2023-0008.
