Reference no: EM132751128

The licorice discussed here is true, unmodified licorice from the licorice plant, which contains glycyrrhizinic acid. Many popular candies that are labeled as "licorice" these days either contain no true licorice (they contain artificial flavors instead) or have the glycyrrhizinic acid deliberately removed from the licorice. But some licorice candies do indeed still contain unmodified licorice. Furthermore, many herbal supplements and home remedies that list "licorice" or "licorice root" as an ingredient do contain the potentially dangerous glycyrrhizinic acid. Eating a small amount of authentic licorice on one day will not give you enough glycyrrhizinic acid to do much harm. Typically, you must eat a very large amount of licorice in one sitting (4 bags) or eat it every day for a couple of weeks before the glycyrrhizinic acid builds up enough to become dangerous. For someone who loves eating licorice or someone who is taking daily herbal pills with licorice, overdosing is very easy. A paper in the Journal of Human Hypertension states: "We now know that the effects of eating liquorice depends on the dose but prolongation of the consumption from 2 to 4 weeks does not influence the response. The maximal blood pressure rise is reached after the first 2 weeks. These results are in accordance with previous studies, which reveal that the liquorice-induced hormonal changes can be measured as soon as 1 week after the start of consumption of 100 g of liquorice."What is the difference between a chemical process and a physical process in chemistry?