SCIENTIFIC OPINION ADOPTED: 8 November 2016 doi: 10.2903/j.efsa.2017.4646 Re-evaluation of locust bean gum (E 410) as a food additive EFSA Panel on Food Additives Nutrient Sources added to Food (ANS), Alicja Mortensen, Fernando Aguilar, Riccardo Crebelli, Alessandro Di Domenico, Maria Jose Frutos, Pierre Galtier, David Gott, Ursula Gundert-Remy, Claude Lambr  e, Jean-Charles Leblanc, Oliver Lindtner, Peter Moldeus, Pasquale Mosesso, Agneta Oskarsson, Dominique Parent-Massin, Ivan Stankovic, Ine Waalkens-Berendsen, Rudolf Antonius Woutersen, Matthew Wright, Maged Younes, Leon Brimer, Paul Peters, Jacqueline Wiesner, Anna Christodoulidou, Federica Lodi, Alexandra Tard and Birgit Dusemund Abstract Following a request from European Commission, the EFSA Panel on Food Additives and Nutrient Sources added to Food (ANS) provides a scientiﬁc opinion re-evaluating the safety of locust bean gum (E 410) as a food additive. Locust bean gum (E 410) is an authorised food additive in the EU. Locust bean gum (E 410) as speciﬁed in the Commission Regulation (EU) No 231/2012 is derived from the ground endosperm of the seeds of the strains of carob tree, Ceratonia siliqua (L.) Taub. (Family Leguminosae). An acceptable daily intake (ADI) ‘not speciﬁed’ was allocated by the Joint Food and Agriculture Organization/World Health Organization Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) in 1981. Although not evaluated by the Scientiﬁc Committee for Food (SCF), it was accepted by the SCF in 1991 for use in weaning food, and in 1994, in infant formulae for special medical purposes. Locust bean gum is practically undigested, not absorbed intact, but signiﬁcantly fermented by enteric bacteria in humans. No adverse effects were reported in 90-day toxicity and carcinogenicity studies in rodents at the highest doses tested and there was no concern with respect to the genotoxicity and to reproductive and developmental toxicity of locust bean gum (E 410). The Panel concluded that there is no need for a numerical ADI for locust bean gum (E 410), and that there is no safety concern for the general population at the reﬁned exposure assessment for its reported uses as a food additive. However, infants and young children consuming foods for special medical purposes may show a higher susceptibility to gastrointestinal effects of locust bean gum due to their underlying medical condition. The Panel concluded that the available data do not allow an adequate assessment of the safety of locust bean gum (E 410) in these foods for infants and young children. © 2017 European Food Safety Authority. EFSA Journal published by John Wiley and Sons Ltd on behalf of European Food Safety Authority. Keywords: locust bean gum (E 410), carob bean gum, food additive, CAS Registry number 9000-40-2 Requestor: European Commission Question number: EFSA-Q-2011-00510 Correspondence: ﬁp@efsa.europa.eu EFSA Journal 2017;15(1):4646 www.efsa.europa.eu/efsajournal