What is Suntheanine?

Suntheanine is a nutraceutical – a nutritional supplement which is natural. It is a branded version of l-theanine. If you have heard of green tea, which is known for its calming and de-stressing effects along with anti-oxidant properties, then the active ingredient which is beneficial in the green tea is l-theanine.

Green tea has been used since times immemorial in Japan and is known for its holistic and positive effects. It actually promotes alpha waves in the brain. Otherwise these waves are present only after deep meditation.

The benefits of Suntheanine

What exactly does Suntheanine do? It has unimaginable benefits like:

• It is relaxing.
• It is calming, without making you feel sleepy.
• It decreases the side effects of ephedrine and caffeine.
• It reduces hypertension and sleep disturbances which are associated with high doses of caffeine.
• It helps with mental clarity.
• It makes you feel more positive.
• It lowers pre menstrual symptoms.
• It reduces irritability.
• It diminishes nicotine addiction.
• It works to increase the efficacy of anti-cancer drugs like doxorubicin, idarubicin and adriamycin.

What is Suntheanine?

Suntheanine is a nutraceutical – a nutritional supplement which is natural. It is a branded version of l-theanine. If you have heard of green tea, which is known for its calming and de-stressing effects along with anti-oxidant properties, then the active ingredient which is beneficial in the green tea is l-theanine.

Green tea has been used since times immemorial in Japan and is known for its holistic and positive effects. It actually promotes alpha waves in the brain. Otherwise these waves are present only after deep meditation.

The benefits of Suntheanine

What exactly does Suntheanine do? It has unimaginable benefits like:

It is relaxing.
It is calming, without making you feel sleepy.
It decreases the side effects of ephedrine and caffeine.
It reduces hypertension and sleep disturbances which are associated with high doses of caffeine.
It helps with mental clarity.
It makes you feel more positive.
It lowers pre menstrual symptoms.
It reduces irritability.
It diminishes nicotine addiction.
It works to increase the efficacy of anti-cancer drugs like doxorubicin, idarubicin and adriamycin.

And this is not empirical or anecdotal experience, but is backed by years of study and research in Japan. All the research is based on the effects of Suntheanine, 100 percent pure l-theanine and not an extracted version.

Why not just drink green tea?

Green tea has only 1-2 percent of l-theanine which is the natural amino acid promoting relaxation and responsible for all the benefits.

It is simply not possible to drink enough green tea to reap all the benefits of l-theanine. You would need to drink 20 cups of green tea to get the same effects as you get from regular dosage of Suntheanine capsules.

Therefore, researchers came up with a process using enzymatic technology to synthesize 100 percent pure l-theanine. This pure l-theanine comes in the form of Suntheanine and is identical to the l-theanine which is found in green tea.

Why take Suntheanine?

There are many stresses of every day modern life which are exacerbated by pollution, nutritionally deficient food in common diets, lack of sleep and the like leading to or compounded by physical and psychological problems. It is no wonder that increasing numbers of people are turning to chemicals like Xanax, Prozac and more to calm them down and deal with the stress. However, these have many side effects, which can be dangerous. Wouldn’t you rather have something which is natural and has no known side effects? Many people are doing so, that is why Suntheanine is gaining in popularity.

The difference between Suntheanine and other brands of l-theanine

If you want the highest quality product of l-theanine, you want Suntheanine, the leading brand, it contains 100 percent l-theanine. Other brands of l-theanine contain anywhere from 50-98 percent of l-theanine. Some of them contain 50 percent d-theanine, which is an impure version of l-theanine. These are called racemised versions. Suntheanine is more effective than other brands of l-theanine, because it is purer and offers all the benefits.

If you have one capsule of Suntheanine versus that of some of the other brands, you will have double the dose of pure l-theanine. Therefore it works better and faster, since your body does not have to digest all the extra ingredients to get to the l-theanine contained in Suntheanine.

Just one dose of Suntheanine is equivalent to 20 cups of green tea. And it works within 30 minutes. So you get fast relief and feel calmer. Suntheanine was selected as the Nutraceutical of the Year at Nutracon 2000 and received the Food Ingredient Research Award at the FIE 1998.

Medicines in Japan undergo rigorous testing. And synthetic l-theanine has been approved for use since 1964 in products like chocolate, soft drinks, herbal teas and chewing gum among other food items.

The FDA has classified this supplement as GRAS (generally recognized as safe), but still recommends that you should not exceed a daily dose of 1200 mg on the higher end.

References:

1. Sugiyama T. Cancer Letters, 2004 Aug 30, Vol 212, pp 177-84
2. Murakami, S. Biosci Biotechnol Biochem. April 23.; 73(4):817-21. 2009
3. Liu. Q. Cytotecnology. 59:211-217. 2009