Zinc carnosine, a health food supplement that stabilises small bowel integrity and stimulates gut repair processes
Laboratory studyOther animalsHumansWith zinc (as zinc carnosine)
This study tested carnosine together with zinc (as zinc carnosine). Its results cannot be assigned to carnosine alone. More combination studies.
- Design
- Laboratory study
- Subjects
- cell lines (HT29, RIE, MDCK); rat gastric and mouse small-intestinal injury models (numbers not stated in abstract); 10 healthy human volunteers in a randomised crossover arm
- Dose used in the study
- cells: up to 100 micromol/L; rats: 5 mg/mL oral (gastric model); mice: 40 mg/mL oral (small intestine); humans: zinc carnosine 37.5 mg twice daily with indomethacin 50 mg three times daily
- Duration
- human arm: 5 days per treatment period
- What was measured
- Cell migration and proliferation; gastric injury (indomethacin plus restraint, rats); villus shortening (indomethacin, mice); human gut permeability by lactulose:rhamnose ratio.
What the authors reported
The authors report that zinc carnosine increased epithelial cell migration and proliferation in a dose-dependent manner, with about a threefold increase at 100 micromol/L in HT29 cells. In animals, oral zinc carnosine reduced gastric injury by 75% at 5 mg/mL and reduced small-intestinal villus shortening by 50% at 40 mg/mL. In 10 volunteers, indomethacin raised gut permeability about threefold (0.35 to 0.88) on placebo, while no significant increase was seen with zinc carnosine. They conclude that zinc carnosine stabilises gut mucosa at concentrations likely to be reached in the gut lumen and that further studies are warranted.
Limits of this study
Mixed laboratory, animal and small human study; the human arm had 10 volunteers and measured permeability, not symptoms. The compound combines zinc and carnosine, so effects cannot be attributed to carnosine alone.
Source
PubMed 16777920 · doi:10.1136/gut.2006.099929
Entry checked against abstract (University College Cork research portal record) on 2026-10-11. The dose shown is the dose the researchers used. It is not a recommendation. How to read this page.