Dr Traj Nibber, CEO and Director of Research at AOR has a wealth of experience and knowledge in the field of nutritional science and supplementation. We have asked him for his expert opinion on a number of nutrients, to feature in our blog. We hope you enjoy these insights and overviews of some key nutrients.
In this post he looks at the amino acid L-Theanine and the importance of choosing the right source when manufacturing a supplement.
L-Theanine is a major active ingredient found naturally in green tea leaves. In the early 1980’s researchers in Japan found that L-Theanine was primarily responsible for the relaxant effect of green tea.
L-Theanine is an amino acid that has been found useful as a relaxant. Unlike the family of catechins (very large molecules) found in green tea, L-Theanine is an amino acid, which is much smaller in size. As a result, L-Theanine is easily absorbed and gets into the brain to exert a relaxant effect.
AOR Inc. uses L-Theanine from Taiyo based out of Japan, the company that has conducted all the human studies. L-Theanine is extracted from pure green tea leaves only with water as the solvent for extraction. No synthetic amino acids or fermentation are used in the extraction process.
Whilst many companies claim that they use L-Theanine derived from pure green tea leaves, often they use L-Theanine that has been produced through either a synthetic process (starting from amino acids), or a fermentation process, which may use green tea leaves as a starting material but often include other ingredients.
The green tea leaves used by AOR as the starting material are sourced from areas where the use of pesticides is prohibited. Furthermore, all batches are monitored for heavy metals, pesticides, and solvent residues to ensure that all Health Canada and FDA standards are met.
L-Theanine is recognized as a GRAS (generally recognized as safe) and there are no reports of issues with health and safety. Further, there is no toxicity linked with L-Theanine from pure green tea leaves, since its production from this source in the early 1980’s! Health Canada, the EU, the US and many other countries with very strict regulatory laws allow the use of L-Theanine for use as a supplement.
Discover the AOR L-Theanine supplement here
