We’ve covered this often asked and endlessly debated question repeatedly at RaisingNAD. Scientists say Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) is the better choice — and Nestlé Health Science (a subsidiary of Nestlé), which recently launched a new product with NR as the key ingredient, calls NR: “the most efficient NAD+ precursor“. Yet, NMN (FAQs and Anecdotes) remains incredibly popular. So what should you do? Well, while Chromadex Chairman Frank Jaksch is obviously in the NR camp, he recently made a compelling case in plain English why the choice should be obvious.

Chromadex Chairman Frank Jaksch on the “Cellular Health: The Next Big Market Opportunity“ Webcast:

“As I mentioned before, you may be hearing about another NAD precursor called NMN.

There is a lot of highly misleading information going around about NMN.

NMN is the phosphorylated metabolite of NR

Despite what you may be hearing — our opinion and others — there is no known transporter for NMN.

What does that mean?

The only way NMN can enter the cell is that it’s converted into Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) by an enzyme called CD73.

So, if you wanted to take NMN as a supplement you would have to take more than 600mg to be anywhere near equivalent to 300mg dose of NR.

Other shortcomings?

There’s very little published clinical research on NMN to date.

NR has been successfully notified in the US by the FDA with both GRAS and NDI.

NMN has not.

It (NR) has also been notified successfully in many other countries including the EU.

NMN has not.

So, our stance on this is as long as there is a cost effective supply of NR, there is no reason to take NMN especially with the risks out there — considering that there’s very little if any safety data or clinical studies to substantiate it so far.”

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