What it is
Pinealon is three amino acids: glutamic acid, aspartic acid and arginine — Glu-Asp-Arg, or EDR. Formula C15H26N6O8, molecular weight 418.40 (PubChem CID 10273502). It is one of the short synthetic "peptide bioregulators" developed at the St Petersburg Institute of Bioregulation and Gerontology by Vladimir Khavinson and co-workers, the same programme that produced the pineal-linked tetrapeptide epitalon and the "cytogen" tripeptides sold alongside it, such as vesugen.
What it is said to be good for, and what supports it, are far apart. It is sold for memory, brain ageing and stress resistance. No randomised trial has tested any of these, ClinicalTrials.gov lists no study, and the published record is small and comes mostly from one research network.
How it is said to work
The bioregulator programme's central idea is that very short peptides enter the cell nucleus and switch genes on or off. For pinealon, the support for that idea is laboratory work: a 2011 study of fluorescent-labelled short peptides entering the nucleus of HeLa cells and binding DNA fragments in a test tube, a 2019 modelling paper on how Glu-Asp-Arg might bind DNA, and a 2020 review by Khavinson's group proposing an Alzheimer's-related gene mechanism. The 2011 cell study in Rejuvenation Research concluded pinealon "is able to interact directly with the cell genome" — an inference from cell-cycle changes in cultured cells, not a measurement in people.
What the research record shows
The census (PubMed, 2026-10-15): 22 records, 0 randomised trials; ClinicalTrials.gov: 0 studies.
| Kind of evidence | What was found | Records |
|---|---|---|
| Cell and chemistry studies | Lower reactive oxygen species and less necrotic death in rat nerve cells, neutrophils and PC12 cells; serotonin expression in cortex cell culture; DNA binding | 2011, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2019, 2020 and others |
| Rat studies | Caspase-3, cytokines and behaviour after low oxygen, carotid artery occlusion or in old rats; protection of offspring from prenatal hyperhomocysteinaemia | 2008–2015, mostly Adv Gerontol |
| Human reports | 150 truck drivers vs 150 metal workers (2012); locomotive crews, 100 mcg capsules twice daily for two weeks (2012); 32 adults aged 41–83 with organic brain syndrome given pinealon or vesugen (2015); a work-ability report (2015); 110 people across four 'geroprotective' methods (2016) | 5, all in Adv Gerontol, in Russian |
| Reviews | Narrative reviews by the developers (2013, 2020); a 2026 orthopaedic review mentioning it among therapeutic peptides | 3 |
Our count from the PubMed summaries: 12 of the 22 records are in Advances in Gerontology, a Russian journal, and 8 list Khavinson as an author. One of the 22 is unrelated — a food-science paper on a different tetrapeptide that matched the search.
The human reports, read closely. The 2012 truck-driver study compared 150 drivers with 150 metal workers using a psychological questionnaire, then reported that "bioregulating peptides" improved psychoemotional measures, with the best effect from pinealon combined with vesugen — the abstract describes no placebo group and no randomisation. The 2015 study gave pinealon or vesugen to 32 people; it reported "anabolic" effects on biological-age measures, found vesugen more active than pinealon, and also recorded "prooxidant activity" and a fall in CD34+ blood stem cells that its own authors called "significant inhibition of hemopoiesis." The 2012 locomotive-crew report states the preparation used: one capsule of 100 mcg pinealon twice a day for two weeks, taken by mouth. The 2016 report compared four approaches in 110 people (carbon-dioxide baths, hyperbaric oxygen, massage, and the pinealon–vesugen pair) and found the peptide pair most active on biological-age indices. None of the five is described as a randomised or placebo-controlled trial, and none has been replicated by an independent group in the indexed literature.
Safety
No randomised trial and no registered study means there is no reliable count of adverse effects. The only human report with blood measures noted the CD34+ fall and pro-oxidant activity above. "No reported harm" in this record means few people were studied, not that harm was looked for and excluded. Products sold online are research chemicals with no approved labelling, no verified dose and no manufacturing standard a buyer can check.
Where it stands
- United States: no FDA-approved product; no Drugs@FDA application found for pinealon or Glu-Asp-Arg (2026-10-15).
- Trials: none registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (2026-10-15).
- Elsewhere: sold as a research chemical. Peptifact's pinealon dosage page covers the dosage question.
Related reading
Pinealon's best-known relative from the same programme is Epitalon, the four-residue 'anti-ageing' bioregulator; another bioregulator in the library is cartalax. For the evidence on peptides sold for the brain more broadly, see peptides for focus and mood; for another short peptide developed in Russia and sold for the brain, semax.