Comment · Wed, July 31, 2019
Functional Yeast Extract vs Epicor
Original post in this thread
ShouldReallyGetWorkn · 6 points
Just noticed functional yeast extract on the shop.
I see it mentions immune benefits on the product page.
I was wondering how the yeast extract compares to Epicor?
What they were answering
ar-jan · 2 points
Someone pointed me to an article which basically says beta-glucan from mushroom extracts is more effective for aiding the immune system than yeast-based extracts. Thoughts?
https://oriveda.wordpress.com/beta-glucan-yeast-or-mushroom/
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb
That's a whole lot of speculation based on a single researcher's findings. Oriveda does that a lot. Furthermore, if you actually open the study they link, you can see the numbers are not as they summarized. Maitake does seem to be almost double as effective in certain measures, like spleen interleukin 2, but not 4X. Also, the Saccharomyces cerevisiae extract is more effective in certain measures, like B-lymphocyte CD19. Maitake is a bit more effective at B-lymphocyte CD4 and CD8, but again not 4X. The maitake they use is also a patented high-potency extract. It would not be fair to compare 1:1 powdered maitake to it in a like-for-like sense. So we certainly can't make assumptions on whether or not our yeast extract is 4X less potent than a mushroom like maitake, nor can we make the blanket statement that mushroom beta-glucans are generally more effective than yeast beta-glucans. In fact, that study says that the Saccharomyces cerevisiae extract comes out on top in a number of measures. It's also cheaper than maitake and other mushrooms. Both have their place, and I think we need to look at the specific extracts rather than grouping things as a whole.
Our Immune Defense stack that is coming out not only has our yeast extract in it, but it also has two other potent mushroom extracts in it as well. So we hit on various types of beta-glucans in our stack. That's going to be the most effective. However, the yeast is good on its own as well.