Mucuna pruriens extracts containing 15%, 40% or 99% L-dopa are being offered for sale.
Does anyone know how such formulations are achieved? It seems inconceivable that in purifying L-dopa, the process can be stopped at exactly 15% or 40%. Are these concentrations achieved simply by standardising Mucuna pruriens seed powder with pure L-dopa? If so, is the pure L-dopa synthetic or extracted from Mucuna?
I imagine for the lower concentrations they extract the beans in a mix of water and ethanol, dry it to a powder, then measure the l dopa concentration. Then dilute it with fillers or pure bean powder of known strength until the desired concentration is reached.
The 99% one is tricky. I would guess that is more likely a synthetic l dopa added to some bean or filler as it’s unlikely they can cheaply purify the bean extract to get 99% l dopa? That would involve chromatography if they did that I think which would be expensive on scale.
My guess anyway.
I read a study some weeks ago on treating Parkinsons with Macuna Pruriens beans, ground up, in countries like Africa where large populations have no access to pharmaceutical drugs for Parkinsons (it was very successful!). My memory of that article (and I'm not swearing by it; you can look it up to check) is that macuna beans themselves vary in strength.
I know the British Supplements macuna is 99% and I've also been curious about that. That said, I know the owner Chris takes his business extremely seriously, pays for lab reports, only buys the best, is determined that they be better than anything on the high street etc etc (he's quite a character) so I would be suprised if that 99% formulation is anything other than kosher. That said it could be l dopa extract *from* macuna rather than synthetic as suggested below. Worth dropping them a line to ask? Let us know what you learn if so.
I rather liked the idea of taking ground up macuna like in the study, as nature formulates things with many other components that are also useful to the body.
Reetpetitio writes: "Worth dropping them a line to ask?"
I've done just that but a reply may be slow coming. British-supplements.net are about a week behind with orders and customer services. It does say that all supplements are made in the UK. Presumably the L-DOPA extraction process is in the UK too.
I dropped them a line and got the following from Daniel at british-supplements.net: "You can find all the ingredient information that we can give you, halfway down the relevant product page for the product(s) that you wish to purchase. Much of the information we would like to disclose on these products is censored and therefore we have to ask that you do your own research."
The information he refers to reads: "CLEAN MUCUNA EXTRACT - 357.3mg extract At 99% which is 353.7mg L-Dopa +Uptake blend 39.7mg (1:1:1: Black Pepper extract (10% piperine), Ginger extract (5% Ginerol), Cumin extract (10:1) in each Capsule."
From this I assume the L-DOPA is natural and extracted from Mucuna.
The 99% thing is interesting. Much as they are a good company, I'm not sure I'd go for it. One of the reasons I think macuna pruriens does so well is that there's more to it than just l-dopa; nature in her wisdom incorporates other very important balancing and complementary elements (alkaloids, antioxidants, other amino acids etc).
Psalmody I'd be curious to know what they say is making up the other 85%?
@Reetpetitio wrote: "One of the reasons I think macuna pruriens does so well is that there's more to it than just l-dopa..."
I'm indeed assuming that the whole bean is important. But unfortunately, neither of the two organic versions purchased (Indigo Herbs & Nature's Root) come with a figure for the L-DOPA content. I'm therefore assuming they are in the range 3-5%, i.e 30-50 mg per gram. In fact Nature's Root website says "The amount of L-DOPA in our Organic Mucuna Powder can vary depending on batch but is is typically around 3-5%".
(And I I've only just noticed my misspelling of Mucuna in this thread's title etc, for which apologies.)
Interesting. I think I mentioned that I read a study done in from memory, Africa, where peope took the powdered macuna bean for lack of access to meds, and did very well - in fact better - than on synthetic L-dopa. But I don't recall the percentage it was. The difficulty is indeed that batches can vary but I guess if Nature's Root know its within those parameters then perhaps that's not too much variance. (Hence the extraction of l-dopa from the bean to create standardised reliable extracts)
I'll try and trace the Africa study you mention. There are also the encouraging open access studies by Cilia et al. 2017 ( n.neurology.org/content/89/... ) and Katzenschlager et al. 2004 ( jnnp.bmj.com/content/jnnp/7... ).
Might it have been 'Could Mucuna pruriens be the answer to Parkinson's disease management in sub-Saharan Africa and other low-income countries worldwide?' by Fothergill-Misbah et al. ( 2020)? It is not open access but I have read it and it confirms what you say. Furthermore Cilia is mentioned in it as saying there is an ongoing trial of Mucuna in Parkinson's in Ghana. As that paper is 3 years ago, I've emailed him to see if the trial is published.
Perhaps I saw the Ghana study then as I only have access to Open Access studies.... let me know where you get to!
Just checking I hadn't saved it and I found this - it's the wild west out there!
'For Mucuna seed extract, authenticated samples contained 2.5% to 3.9% levodopa. But among Mucuna supplements that listed a specific quantity of seed extract on the label, the actual quantity of levodopa was 228% to 2,186% greater than the estimated quantity.'
medpagetoday.com/special-re...
I cannot yet access the JAMA Neurology paper that Kristina Fiore mentions in her article that you posted. But I have another paper on analyses of L-Dopa in Mucuna extracts offered for sale which also shows values widely differing from those advertised. It is the wild west indeed!
Just found it; this is the one I read - you've already seen it. It mentions Africa but isn't actually a study done there.
I started taking mucana a few months ago & so happy I did.
I bought 15% & took 2 a day so changed to 30% (different brand) but didn’t have same effect.
I’ve gone back to 2 x15% 4 times a day. I was diagnosed 6 years ago and PD meds gave me diahorrea and stomach pain.
What brand and how many milligrams per pill ? Which symptoms did it help ?
Brand is Piping Rock. Each capsule is 350mg. I dont have tremor but it helps all symptons which has been alot like fatigue, tingling, mobilty, weakness. I tried PD meds Madopar, Sinemet and Kinesome which gave me dreadful gut pain & diahorrea. I told Neurologist what I was doing. I still take 1/4 100gm tablet ( 25mg x 4 times a day) of Kinsome with the Mucana. I want to wean the Kinesome off if I can but will do gradually.
I dont have the off times as severe as I used to either. The Mucana seems to work faster too.
I use naturebell brand certified 30% Ldopa. I’m experimenting with adding small amounts of carbidopa
I take percentages with a grain of salt, both literally and figuratively. Salt will help clumpy powders disperse in water. As for strength, I let the effects (compared to pharma L/D) tell me how strong it is. Recently shipped Piping Rock is very good and I think their quote of roughly 50mg L-dopa per cap is in range. Bulk Supplements powder is also good, though less refined. Maybe half as strong. I don't have a scale, so I'm sort of going by volume measure. A few weeks ago I tried halving my C/L dosage and making up the diff with Mucuna. I felt great for a few days (I was taking as much as I wanted, pretty much.) It came back to bite me. Be careful of over-doping. Exercise is still our REAL medicine.
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