More About Herbal Extracts
Divide and benefit
In their whole, raw forms, herbs and mushrooms are naturally teeming with phytonutrients that work together to bring about both specific beneficial effects and overall well-being. But as researchers have discovered the individual constituents that give herbs and mushrooms their health-promoting properties, they’ve started extracting and isolating these components to create more potent ingredients called standardized extracts.
Most herbs have an active component; that’s the constituent presumed to be responsible for the lion’s share of its benefits and the focus of most research. A standardized herbal extract is one that has been specially manufactured to provide a certain level or percentage of this active component. Sometimes a standardized herbal extract will also be a trademarked ingredient. Both standardization and trademarks offer additional assurances of a product or ingredient’s efficacy and safety.
A standardized extract is also an ideal way to obtain heightened levels of an active ingredient that would otherwise require an unrealistic amount of the herb to obtain the same level.
An example of standardization is green tea extract. Green tea possesses many active constituents, but the one believed to provide the most benefit is a class of phytonutrients called catechins. Our standardized Green Tea Extract 400 mg is a specially processed standardized extract that ensures a minimum of 40% catechins, much higher than you’d get from drinking a cup of tea or swallowing a capsule of whole green tea herb.
NOW® standardized herbal extracts
While whole herbs are ideal for general health and well-being, standardized herbal extracts offer more potent and condensed active herbal ingredients that can be more appropriate and beneficial under certain circumstances.
We offer a great selection of the most popular and effective standardized herbal extracts, including staples such as Curcumin, Ginkgo Biloba, and Green Tea Extract alongside more specialized and unique herbs such as Andrographis, Gymnema Sylvestre, Maitake Mushroom, and more.
We choose to offer potencies that match those used in scientific studies, and we test exhaustively to ensure identity, purity, quality and potency.
The NOW® Difference
With more than 45 years in the natural products industry NOW knows a thing or two about herbal products. We use well-established, reputable sources for our raw materials, and our state-of-the-art in-house laboratories afford us unparalleled control over quality and purity. We use trademarked ingredients in certain formulations and offer a great selection of standardized herbal extracts.
