More Than Twenty Years of Research on Lyprinol™

Lyprinol™ and its antecedent product, stabilised green lipped mussel powder, have been the subject of more than twenty years of scientific and medical research in Australia and other countries.

Researchers had conducted a number of initial clinical studies of green lipped mussel powder for arthritis in the 1970’s. However, the majority of these studies proved unsatisfactory. In 1978 a husband and wife doctor team, the Drs. R.G. and S.L.M. Gibson, conducted an outstandingly positive study in Glasgow, Scotland at two major public hospitals, the results of which were published in a peer reviewed journal in 1980:

The 1980’s

dried New Zealand green lipped mussel powder for the treatment of arthritis.

In 1982, following discussions with RMIT University in Melbourne, McFarlane Laboratories decided to fund research in the Natural Products Chemistry Unit of RMIT’s Department of Applied Biology.  The challenge for RMIT was to seek and identify the active component or components which was believed to exist in the N.Z. green lipped mussel.  This work was planned to cover an initial two year period but has continued to this day.

In 1983, the research team at RMIT was joined by a Japanese research group headed by Professor Takuo Kosuge, head of the Shizuoka College of Pharmacy at Shizuoka University, Japan  and one of Japan’s most respected research chemists.

After testing all known anti-oxidants without success, Professor Kosuge turned to research that he had conducted twenty years earlier on a traditional method used by  Japanese fisherman to preserve their stored fish for future consumption.  Professor Kosuge postulated that the answer to the problem of rapid oxidation of green lipped mussel powder might lie in his earlier research into this traditional method. Indeed, such proved to be the case.  As a result of this work McFarlane patented and developed a natural stabilisation process for green lipped mussel powder which prevented its oxidation and allowed it to be studied by researchers without degrading in potency.

This work occurred at the time that McFarlane’s Australia assumed control of the Auckland processing plant of McFarlane New Zealand.

RMIT University Research

The RMIT University research team was headed by Professor Robert Borland and was supported by Associate Professor Theo Macrides, a graduate of Oxford University, and Professor Andrew Sinclair, Professor of Food Sciences, who is considered one of the world’s foremost experts in lipids.

The 1990’s

In the early 1990s the RMIT group approached Dr. Henry Betts, who is the Principal Scientist of the Rheumatology Research Laboratory at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Adelaide, South Australia.

It was through this research that Dr. Betts developed a strong interest in the mussel’s non-polar lipid fractions which were later named Lyprinol™ by the MacLab Group.

Once the active fractions of the green lipped mussel had been identified, it was decided that animal studies should be conducted to test safety and efficacy. The research team was fortunate when Dr. Michael Whitehouse of the Department of Medicine, The University of Queensland in Brisbane, an internationally recognised expert in the testing of anti-inflammatory compounds, agreed to become involved.

Dr. Whitehouse readily agreed to become involved in researching the anti-inflammatory properties of stabilised green lipped mussel powder. Dr. Whitehouse had conducted work previously into the anti-inflammatory properties of green lipped mussel powder.  Dr. Whitehouse approached the project as a sceptic as he had previously tested the unstabilised mussel powder in his animal models with poor results.

Dr. Whitehouse has stated that Lyprinol™ represents a quantum leap forward in nutritional therapeutics whilst at the same time condemning the inferior quality of  other non-stabilised mussel powder products  produced in New Zealand. 

During Dr Betts’ testing of Lyprinol™, he discovered that the lipids were potent 5-lipoxygenase inhibitors.  The 5-lipoxygenase pathway is a principal pathway of inflammation in the human body. Dr. Betts advised his findings to Professor Robert Borland, a Fellow of the Royal College of Pathologists and a Fellow of Darwin College, Cambridge University and at the time the Dean of Biomedical Science at RMIT University. This discovery opened up the possibility of testing and using  Lyprinol™ for the treatment of various chronic inflammatory disorders such as arthritis, asthma, inflammatory bowel diseases, psoriasis and other disorders in which the lipoxygenase inflammation pathway is involved.

As a result of this discovery, Professor Borland approached Professor A. Emelyanov, Chief Respiratory Physician at the Department of Allergy and Lung Disease, Pavlov Medical University, St. Petersburg, Russia, to investigate the efficacy of Lyprinol™ for the treatment of mild to moderate asthma patients.  A clinical trial was conducted on 40 patients in a double-blind placebo-controlled study.  The results were significant as each patient experienced a noticeable effect in the reduction of his rescue and preventative medication.  Both Professor Emelyanov and his collaborator, Professor Peter J. Barnes of the Department of Thoracic Medicine, National Heart and Lung Institute in London, are eminent researchers in respiratory medicine.  Professor Barnes, a world acclaimed expert in the field of asthma, has published over 800 peer reviewed articles.  Professor Emelyanov is a respiratory physician who has been responsible for testing many new asthma drugs introduced by large pharmaceutical companies.

These same medical researchers expect to conduct a further extension of this clinical study on the treatment of Lyprinol™ for moderate to severe asthma patients  commencing in November, 2002.

In June, 2002, the Prince Alfred Hospital in Queensland announced on Channel 9 Television News that Professor Mitchell of the Asthma Foundation in Queensland had commenced a clinical trial to study Lyprinol™’s sparing effect with steroids in treating moderate to severe asthma cases.  This study has now been completed and the results will be released shortly.

Pharmalink International Limited Purchase of Lyprinol™

During the intense media interest arising in August, 1998 as result of the announcement made by The Queen Elizabeth Hospital, a New Zealand based research scientist suggested that, since Lyprinol™ was an anti-inflammatory compound, it might suppress or weaken the immune system and therefore could lead to an increase in colds and other diseases.  Pharmalink’s scientists repudiated this claim based on reports from thousands of patients who appeared to be healthier, not less healthy, from their use of Lyprinol™. Nevertheless, Pharmalink decided to conduct a clinical study in this area in order to refute the thesis of suppression of the immune system.  A team led by Professor Larisa Rudenko, Department of Virology, Institute of Experimental Medicine, St. Petersburg, Russia, conducted a double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical study which showed that Lyprinol did not suppress the immune system at all but actually boosted the effectivity of the body’s response to an oral flu vaccine used in the study by more than 100%. For these reasons, the researchers concluded that Lyprinol™ possessed significant prolonged immuno-stimulating effects on post-vaccination antibody and cell mediated immune responses to a vaccination of live influenza.  The researchers showed that the treatment of Lyprinol™ produced no side effects and did not lead to any suppression of systemic or local immunity nor did it alter total or differential white blood counts.

Later in 1998 Drs. S.L.M. Gibson and R.G. Gibson published the results of a double-blind randomised 3-month study of patients with Osteo-Arthritis (“OA”), so-called “wear and tear arthritis,” or Rheumatoid Arthritis (“RA”), an auto-immune disorder.  Sixty patients were enrolled in a parallel comparison study and for a further 3-month period using the lipid extract (Lyprinol™) for all patients.  The clinical study was conducted at the Outpatient Department of the Glasgow Homeopathic Hospital, Scotland.  The patients on Lyprinol™ received 210mg per day.

An ongoing study is being conducted by Dr. Niels H.P. Hertz, MD, in Copenhagen, Denmark.  This study includes 13 patients with longstanding Osteo-Arthritis in one or both knees and/or hips.  Twelve of 13 patients have reported a dramatic 50% reduction of pain (VA), and 50% an improvement at day 21-28. The same results were confirmed at day 42-56.

There is ongoing a double-blind placebo-controlled clinical study at the Hong Kong University which is a U.S. FDA approved clinical study center using an FDA clinical protocol for the study of Lyprinol™ for arthritis of the knee and hip.  The study involves 90 patients and is due for completion in January 2003.

Other research studies completed on Lyprinol™ are:

●          Hooper S.  The effect of marine oils on markers of thrombosis in the blood of healthy females. Oct 1998, Thesis, BSc (Hon), Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne, Victoria, AU.

●          Halpern, G.M. “Anti-inflammatory Effects of a Stabilized Lipid Extract of Perna canaliculus (Lyprinol).”  Allergie & Immunologie 32(2000)272-78.