Infographics

The "Exercise in a Vial" Peptide — 247 Papers, Zero Completed Human Trials, One That Just Started

MOTS-c is a mitochondrial-derived peptide marketed as 'exercise in a vial' — 247 papers of strong preclinical metabolic and exercise-mimetic data, but zero completed human trials (the first only just started). Real mechanism, no human efficacy proof yet.

MOTS-c + SS-31 + NAD+ — What's Actually Tested vs. What's Taught

The MOTS-c + SS-31 + NAD+ 'mitochondrial stack' — separating the real trial evidence behind each component from the marketing that bundles them into one protocol.

The Peptide That Failed Four Trials and Got Approved for $800,000 a Year

SS-31 (elamipretide/Bendavia) is a cardiolipin-binding mitochondrial peptide with strong preclinical mechanism data — but four separate placebo-controlled human RCTs (Barth syndrome, heart failure, mitochondrial myopathy, dry AMD) have each missed their primary endpoint. FDA leadership overruled eight of its own reviewers to grant accelerated approval anyway, as Forzinity, for one narrow indication (Barth syndrome, ≥30 kg) — at a US list price around $800,000/year. The identical peptide sequence sells gray-market for $75–130 a vial with no FDA sterility or potency oversight. Includes a working peptide dose calculator and the full trial-by-trial endpoint table.

The Pineal Tetrapeptide — Telomerase, Telomeres & the Longevity Question

Epithalon (Ala-Glu-Asp-Gly, AEDG) is a synthetic pineal tetrapeptide with 150+ PubMed papers and a credible cell-line telomerase story — but zero placebo-controlled RCTs for the synthetic compound in humans. The striking 12/15-year mortality signal (28% fewer deaths; ~2× lower CV mortality) used Epithalamin extract, not synthetic AEDG. A 2025 independent lab confirmed telomere elongation in normal cells and ALT activity in two breast-cancer lines. FDA Category 2 restriction lifted April 2026; PCAC recommended 503A listing July 2026 pending rulemaking. Includes a working peptide dose calculator.

What the Research Actually Shows

GHK-Cu is a naturally-occurring copper peptide with genuine (if industry-funded) human evidence for topical anti-aging and deep animal/lab evidence for wound healing. The injectable form remains unreviewed by regulators — not because it was tested and found wanting, but because an unpatentable 50-year-old molecule has no company willing to fund the trial; the largest human injectable dataset came from India, not the US.

What the Research Actually Shows

TB-500's real science is filed under thymosin beta-4 — a natural repair peptide with genuine, internationally-run human trials for dry eye and skin ulcers (Italy, Poland, Korea-funded). The muscle/tendon/joint use it's sold for has strong animal evidence but no human trials anywhere yet, because it's an unpatentable fragment nobody has funded to test — not because it's been disproven. WADA-banned for athletes.

What the Research Actually Shows

A stomach-derived healing peptide studied continuously since 1993 by a Croatian lab, with an unusually clean animal safety record (LD1 never reached) and real if small human pilot data — thin on large trials mainly because an unpatentable peptide has no sponsor to fund a Phase III. The US reversed its 2023 compounding ban in early 2026; the world's evidence, not just Washington's, is the honest picture. (Originator's commercial conflicts disclosed.)

The Approved Dual-Agonist Making Lilly $36.5B a Year

Mounjaro (type 2 diabetes, FDA-approved 2022) and Zepbound (obesity, FDA-approved 2023) are the same molecule — real, peer-reviewed, and now the world's best-selling drug ($36.5B in 2025). SURMOUNT-5 shows it beat semaglutide head-to-head; Lilly's own DEXA substudy shows about a quarter of the weight lost is muscle; a boxed thyroid-tumor warning carries over from the whole GLP-1 class; and the ~$100–150/month compounded version got shut down by FDA enforcement right as Lilly's branded supply caught up — including a warning letter against Lilly's own marketing.

How the Affordable Version Got Shut Down

Millions of Americans legally got compounded Ozempic/Wegovy/Mounjaro/Zepbound for ~$200/month during the shortage — until the two patent holders, who made $69.5 billion combined in 2025 on these drugs, got it banned, sued the compounders, and are now facing a federal antitrust suit accusing them of coordinating to kill that competition. See what the rest of the world pays, and judge the timing for yourself.

The Triple-Agonist Phase 3 Just Confirmed

Eli Lilly's investigational triple-hormone-receptor drug posted a striking 28.3% weight-loss claim in its own 2026 press release — but that number hasn't cleared independent peer review, published trial data shows a meaningful share of the weight lost is muscle, and the FDA hasn't approved it. A genuinely strong candidate wrapped in real unknowns: long-term safety, cost, and access all remain open. Follow the money — the trials are Lilly-run and a $13B franchise is at stake.

What the Research Actually Shows

NAD+ precursors (NMN, NR) reliably raise blood NAD+ in international human trials — and the FDA moved to ban NMN from the supplement market in 2022, right after a company co-founded by NMN's own lead researcher filed to patent it as a drug. Follow the money, see what Japan and China never stopped selling, and decide for yourself.

Cholesterol, Arterial Plaque & Blood Sugar — What the Research Actually Shows

Berberine is a 1,400-year-old Chinese and Ayurvedic medicine with a deep, mostly Chinese-run randomized-trial base showing real cholesterol and blood-sugar effects — sold as a US 'supplement' not because the science is weak, but because a plant compound can't be patented, so no drug company will fund the mega-trial that would compete against its own $100B+ statin/metformin/GLP-1 franchise.

What the Research Actually Shows

Beta-glucan is really three fibers under one name: the oat/barley type genuinely lowers cholesterol, the yeast type is sold hard by one company with thin proof (EFSA rejected its immune claim), and — largely unknown in the US — Japan has prescribed mushroom-derived beta-glucan alongside chemotherapy for 40 years, with real but mixed survival data. Cheap and very safe across all three; the honest split is strength of evidence and who's funding the claim, not hype vs no-hype.

What the Research Actually Shows

CoQ10 vs its pricier cousin ubiquinol — the head-to-head absorption data is more mixed than the marketing (the best elderly trial found no significant edge), the landmark heart-failure trial and its independent Russian and Japanese confirmations used the cheaper ubiquinone form, and statins quietly deplete your CoQ10 in a way nobody's commercially incentivized to tell you. Cheap and safe either way.

What the Research Actually Shows

What the research actually shows about hyaluronic acid — organized by how people really take it (joints, skin, eyes), with oral use front and center — including the Japanese science that pioneered oral HA, honest international guideline data on the injections (20 of 27 countries recommend them), and the real money question behind the injection debate most pages skip. Very safe: little reason not to try the cheap oral form.

What the Research Actually Shows

L-theanine's real research base is mostly Japanese, not American — decades of Tokyo and Nagoya trials on stress, sleep, and even schizophrenia and ADHD that never make US supplement blogs. Genuinely one of the safest compounds we've covered: no found overdose ceiling, non-habit-forming, and a real (if honestly debated) case for benefit.

What the Research Actually Shows

Betaine (TMG) has one real, modest strength benefit and reliably lowers homocysteine — but it's a cheap, unpatentable molecule nobody funds large human trials on, so the evidence stays thinner than its safety record deserves. The 'raises LDL' warning is real but narrower than advertised: it shows up only at higher doses in people who already have metabolic risk.

What the Research Actually Shows

Taurine is a cheap, unpatentable amino acid with real cardiometabolic evidence and a 40-year approved heart-failure-drug history in Japan the US press rarely mentions. The 2023 longevity finding wasn't debunked in 2025 — just narrowed — and the human trial that would settle it has never been funded, because no one profits from it. Genuinely safe: the downside of trying it is close to zero.

What the Research Actually Shows

Creatine is the most-proven supplement on the shelf — hundreds of trials back real strength and muscle gains, and the kidney / hair-loss / 'steroid' scares are myths that don't survive contact with the data. The honest other half: recent hype calling it a brain-disease cure or belly-fat melter has outrun the trials, which came back negative. This page busts the myths in both directions.

What the Research Actually Shows

Iron deficiency is real and common — but so is iron overload, which your body cannot reverse on its own. This page centers YOUR ferritin number over any institution's agenda, with international data (Denmark's fortification reversal, the Zanzibar trial stopped early for excess deaths) showing what happens when 'just take more iron' gets tested in the real world.

What the Research Actually Shows

Niacin: an essential B vitamin most people already get from food — and at ~100x that dose, a cheap generic heart drug with a real outcome-trial record (it beat patented ezetimibe head-to-head on artery thickness) that lost ground the same years two $14,000/year patented alternatives launched. High-dose liver toxicity and a 2024 inflammation signal are real; this dose belongs under a doctor's care.

What the Research Actually Shows

A 60-year-old WHO-essential medicine — the ER antidote for Tylenol overdose — that the FDA moved to ban as a supplement in 2020 on a legal technicality, while Europe sold it over the counter the whole time. Cheap, safer than the drug it treats, with real early GlyNAC/anti-aging promise and a genuinely mixed COVID record reported straight. (No pharma villain invented where the evidence didn't show one.)

What the Research Actually Shows

Glycine is a cheap, genuinely safe amino acid with real (if modest) sleep evidence — backed by Japan's own government sleep-health claim — plus a promising, internationally-replicating GlyNAC anti-aging story. No company profits from it, which is exactly why the trials stay small, not because anyone's hiding something. Near-zero risk to try.

The 1962 FDA-Approved Anemia Drug Bodybuilders Never Gave Back

Nandrolone (Deca) is a 1962 FDA-approved anabolic steroid — never withdrawn for safety, still Schedule III, still made by zero US manufacturers — with a genuinely strong human RCT record (20 trials: osteoporosis fracture reduction, HIV wasting beating testosterone, dialysis lean mass). But the internet's #1 reason to use it, joint pain, has zero placebo-controlled trials — only the presenter's own uncontrolled 48-patient pilot (62.5% dropout). Built from a board-certified urologist's video that discloses his own prescribing bias and Rugiet sponsorship; fertility loss, 'deca dick,' virilization in women, and unresolved cardiac risk get equal weight to the joint and lean-mass upside. A second board-certified physician reviewing the same combination counsels most men to avoid it.

What They're Actually Used For

Three cheap generic estrogen-blockers — rock-solid FDA-approved for postmenopausal breast cancer and the world's first-line PCOS fertility drug (letrozole). Off-label in men's TRT and male infertility the FDA and Endocrine Society have taken no position at all; real-world data shows judicious use working and crashed-estradiol harm when it isn't, so we show both and hand you the decision.

What It's Actually Used For

DMSO has two FDA approvals (human bladder, animal trauma) and a 55-year run as a registered prescription anti-inflammatory in Russia — the same 'sore joint' use Americans still do off-label — because the US trials were halted in 1965 over an unrelated animal-safety scare and never resumed for a drug nobody can patent. A decades-long low-toxicity record and real international clinical use make it worth an honest look, not a dismissal.

What the Research Actually Shows

THC was isolated in Israel in 1964 and is regulated as medicine or public-health policy in Israel, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, and Portugal — while the US kept it Schedule I for 50+ years under a government research monopoly and documented pharma lobbying. This page weighs the world's data, the real risks, and who profits from which answer, without handing the reader Washington's verdict as the final word.

LDN at 1.5–4.5 mg nightly is used off-label as a cancer adjunct. Preclinical OGF-OGFr and immune data are consistent across models; human evidence is sparse: a Duke glioma QoL RCT (n=110) found no QoL benefit, Berkson ALA+LDN case series document striking individual pancreatic/RCC survivals that cannot isolate LDN alone, Bihari reported benefit in a large private-practice series without a control arm, and an MD Anderson 2025 series found 80% pain response in 20 patients. No Phase 3 efficacy RCT exists — a funding gap for a 1984 generic, not a failed test. Hard stop: concurrent opioids. Broader LDN overview: /infographics/low-dose-naltrexone.

A 1984 Generic at 1/10th Its Approved Dose — What the Trials and the Doctors Who Use It Actually Show

Naltrexone is one molecule, two very different stories. At its FDA-approved 50mg dose (1984/1994) it's unremarkable addiction medicine. At 1.5-4.5mg — a tenth to a thirty-third of that dose — it's been prescribed off-label since the 1980s for fibromyalgia, Crohn's disease, multiple sclerosis, and chronic pain, pioneered by Dr. Bernard Bihari, MD, and carried forward by clinicians like Dr. Jill Smith (Crohn's RCT author and treating gastroenterologist), Dr. Burton Berkson (pancreatic cancer case series), and Dr. Phil Boyle (2,000+ LDN pregnancies, fertility). The randomized-trial record is real and genuinely split: one positive and one negative RCT each in fibromyalgia and MS, a Cochrane 'insufficient evidence' verdict in Crohn's built on just 46 people, plus one completed glioma QoL RCT (Duke 2022, n=110, null on QoL — not survival) and no completed Phase 3 efficacy RCT for cancer outcomes. Dedicated cancer page: /infographics/ldn-cancer. Nobody profits from testing an unpatentable low dose of a 60-year-old generic — the same molecule reformulated and patented (Vivitrol, Contrave) got fully funded trials and FDA approval; plain LDN did not. Unlike some suppressed generics, we found no censorship story here — no warning letters, no board actions against prescribers — just a funding gap. Not medical advice: naltrexone fully blocks opioids, so anyone on opioid medication must not start it without their doctor.

A Nobel-Winning Medicine the US Buried — What the World's Data Actually Shows

Ivermectin is three stories in one word. As an antiparasitic it is a Nobel Prize-winning (2015), WHO-essential medicine given billions of times — river blindness (50M+ treated yearly), strongyloidiasis, scabies (an 88% drop in a 26,188-person program) — and it is safer than the Tylenol in your cabinet. As a COVID medicine it was used by whole countries with strong real-world results (Brazil's 223,128-person Itajaí program: up to 92% lower death in regular users, dose-response; India's Uttar Pradesh/Delhi/Goa rollouts; Peru; the Bryant 24-RCT meta showing reduced mortality) — while the United States ridiculed it ('you are not a horse'), pharmacies refused legal prescriptions, doctors were deplatformed and decertified, and the one question that mattered was never funded to a fair answer, because a $25 generic cannot compete for research dollars with a $1,400 patented pill. The establishment 'negative' trials (TOGETHER, ACTIV-6) used a single low dose given late and are shown here as one interested position, not the verdict. As a cancer therapy it is an emerging, genuinely promising frontier — real activity against breast/ovarian/colorectal models via Wnt and the P-glycoprotein pump — starved of the human trials nobody will fund. Follow the money: the party that profits from 'it doesn't work' is the industry that loses billions if it does. You decide.

The One-Time Gene Edit Aiming to Lower Cholesterol for Life

VERVE-102 is Eli Lilly's experimental one-time gene-editing infusion that claims to permanently switch off the PCSK9 gene to lower cholesterol for life. The genetics behind the idea are rock-solid, but the product itself is investigational (not approved), tested in only ~35 people, irreversible, industry-reported, and precedent puts one-time gene therapies at $2-3M — so read the striking early numbers as a sponsor's press release, not settled science.

The SSRI That Promised "Better" — What a Decade of Data Shows

Vilazodone launched in 2011 as the first SSRI + 5-HT1A partial agonist, sold on faster onset and fewer sexual side effects. The trials show typical SSRI-class efficacy (NNT 8), a real GI burden (29% diarrhea vs 10% placebo at 40mg/day) that is the actual dropout driver, and a food requirement that cuts absorption roughly in half if skipped — buried in most write-ups. The sexual-dysfunction claim has genuine supporting data but was never confirmed by an adequately-powered, statistically-analyzed head-to-head against a cheap generic SSRI: the one trial built to test it ran no inferential statistics, and the trial built to test whether switching fixes existing dysfunction folded at 4 patients. AbbVie’s own relapse-prevention trial did not separate from placebo on time-to-relapse. Generic since 2022 ($28-60/mo) vs. brand ($350-455/mo, same molecule). Includes a working discontinuation-taper calculator.

The Home Respiratory Protocol — Dilution Math, Real Risk, and What the Research Shows

A home harm-reduction protocol some people use — dilute food-grade hydrogen peroxide plus a drop of Lugol's iodine in saline, breathed through a nebulizer — built by a credentialed cardiologist (Dr. Thomas Levy, MD/JD) and adapted into an ultra-dilute variant by Dr. David Brownstein, MD. Not FDA-approved, not a cure claim: the lab data shows dilute peroxide disables viruses and microbes in solution, but zero controlled human trials exist for nebulizing it into a sick person's lungs, and real concentration-linked harm is documented — including at the protocol's own working dose. The whole safety story is the dilution math: a 12% food-grade bottle is 4× stronger than the 3% most write-ups assume. Not medical advice — talk to your doctor.

What the Research Actually Shows

Antidepressants: real benefit for some, oversold by decades of marketing. Covers the FDA's own unpublished trial data (Kirsch), a documented ghostwritten fraud (Study 329), why withdrawal was undersold for 20 years, France's therapy-first default, and why a $17B+ ad industry has every reason to tell you the good news louder than the bad.