The nutraceutical industry is increasingly leaning towards supplements sourced from natural origins. However, the issue of synthetic ingredient adulteration in natural supplements remains a significant concern. The nutraceutical companies often label their product as all-natural. There are various instances of adulterating artificial ingredients in their all-natural claimed products1,2. This highlights the importance of carbon-14 (C-14) analysis in tracing the adulteration of synthetic ingredients. Carbon-14 testing can discriminate between plant-derived and artificial ingredients. Carbon-14 testing uses Accelerated Mass Spectrometry (AMS). AMS can detect very low concentrations of atoms (parts-per-trillion to parts-per-quadrillion). How is carbon-14 testing done? Let’s briefly discuss it.
Plants fix atmospheric CO2 through photosynthesis. Carbon-12 is the most abundant isotope of carbon. In the atmosphere, cosmic rays hit the nitrogen atoms and knock out a proton from the nitrogen atom, thus creating carbon-14. Hence, every organic matter contains a known level of radioactive carbon (C-14). However, after the death of a plant, the radioactive decay of C-14 starts with a half-life of 5730 years, and after 45,000 years, no radioactivity remains. Measuring the amount of C-14 left can provide valuable information for archaeological and geological surveys. This could even discriminate between natural and synthetic ingredients, as synthetic ingredients don’t have a C-14 isotope.
For performing C-14 analysis, the sample is kept in a quartz tube and heated at 900 °C under vacuum, leading to the formation of CO2. The carbon dioxide is reduced to graphite and then placed into an aluminium cathode holder, which is ultimately put into the cathode wheel and analysed by AMS. The results of C-14 testing are expressed in % biobased carbon content. A biobased content of 0% indicates an artificial ingredient, while a 100% biobased content indicates a natural ingredient3. Our berberine has undergone C-14 testing and achieved 100% biobased carbon content, confirming that it is entirely derived from natural sources, as claimed.
There are various reported cases of adulteration of nutraceutical products. In one case study, 14 turmeric extract supplements were tested for authenticity. Out of 14, only 9 samples were found to have 100% biobased carbon content, indicating natural ingredients2. In another study on the authenticity of garlic oil, out of 5, only 1 sample was all-natural (100% biobased carbon content)1.
This highlights the need to authenticate the label claim. Consumers deserve to know whether their supplements are derived from nature or artificially synthesized. Carbon-14 testing is a definitive method to ascertain potential false label claims and ensure transparency.
References
(1) Gershon, H.; Lykkeberg, A.; Goren, F.; Mason, S. Identifying Fraudulent Natural Products: A Perspective on the Application of Carbon-14 Analysis. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. American Chemical Society December 11, 2019, pp 13393–13399. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jafc.9b01821.
(2) You, H.; Gershon, H.; Goren, F.; Xue, F.; Kantowski, T.; Monheit, L. Analytical Strategies to Determine the Labelling Accuracy and Economically-Motivated Adulteration of “Natural” Dietary Supplements in the Marketplace: Turmeric Case Study. Food Chem 2022, 370. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodchem.2021.131007.
(3) Synal, H. A. Developments in Accelerator Mass Spectrometry. Int J Mass Spectrom 2013, 349–350
