Comment · Mon, October 26, 2015 · Ceretropic & Nootropics Depot
How do we know nootropics vendors are giving us the right nootropics?
Original post in this thread
Bobz216 · 7 points
I will preface this by stating that in no way am I attempting to flame or discredit any of the companies listed or alluded to in this post, nor am I attempting to come off as conceited, pompous, etc. I apologize if any of my words seem to come out this way.
My sister is a Pharmacist and is very uncertain about the state of the nootropics industry. Since many companies can just tell you "Hey, yeah, this is the correct nootropic, here's a GS/MS sheet", but how do we know these tests are legit? Photoshop is a thing, if someone just gives you a picture of a GS/MS sheet, how can you confirm it's legitimate?
For example, Ceretropic says they work with USP & Sigma Aldrich for testing. How can we confirm this? This is in no way meant to flame you, Ceretropic, I would legitimately like to see verification as to how we can all know that what we're buying is legitimate. (Definitely no hard feelings toward you, /u/misteryouaresodumb, I would just love to bring this up as a point to see how this all works.)
My sister is under the impression that this industry, without regulation by the government or FDA, is unsafe as a whole and entirely unreliable. That, because we're all just "random peop…
What they were answering
Direct reply to the original post — see the thread post above.
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb · Ceretropic & Nootropics Depot
Come on down to our office. I'll show you our lab, our Sigma/USP reference materials, and can even get you on the phone with our reps there. If you sister is worried about Photoshop, then in-person is the only way to get around that.
On that same token, how does your sister test for identity/purity at the pharmacy? I guarantee she just trusts the pharmaceutical companies word for it. I'll see if I can find the study on my computer again, but they showed that there can be up to a 20% difference in purity/dosing amounts with certain brand name and generic medications. No pharmacy that I have ever seen has an in-house lab. They just trust the pharma companies. I think she might be a bit misinformed at how involved the FDA is in the batch-to-batch testing/verification in the pharma industry. The punish those that step out of line, but don't actually prevent things from happening. Even the fines are pretty lax for some of the mixups that happen. They set standards, and yell at people that they catch not following them. The are far from omnipotent.
We were the first to bring out Tianeptine Sulfate. So I had to work closely with Colmeric Analyticals to create reference standards. We used NMR to identify the compound, and then used HPLC to ensure it was pure. Now that we have reference standards, we use FTIR and our in-house HPLC to test identity and purity. I was going to buy an NMR. However, I sat down with the guys at Thermo Scientific, and they flat out told me their Picospin 80 is not accurate enough for production use. They said we would need to go with a cryogenic magnet unit to get the accuracy we want. That is a very large and expensive machine, so we decided to keep sending out for NMRs for the time being. Our next units are probably going to be a mass spec attachment for our HPLC, UV-VIS, and NIR attachment for our FTIR. That will help us to get better data on the natural extracts we are doing for Nootropics Depot now.
Your sister should know that the pharma industry cares about profits much much more than I do. I want to advance our community, and care about the people in it. Profit makes my projects possible, but that is not why I do it. You can always email me or message me about concerns. I try to answer everyone that does very quickly. Being concerned about the state of the nootropics and supplement industry is a very valid standpoint. However, that is what we are trying to change. We have come a long way in the past couple years, and have a long way to go. However, it is far less concerning than it was a couple years ago; due in no small part to the actions of many people in the community. Us, Newstar, Liftmode/Newmind, Powder City, etc. have all been crucial in pushing us forward. I can honestly say they are all great companies, and have all played a part in making the nootropics industry better for consumers.