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Growth Factor |
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Bovine colostrum is the yellowish, pre-milk liquid produced from the mammary
glands of cows during the first 24 to 48 hours after giving birth. It contains
insulin like growth factors I and II. Colostrum is also known as first milk, and
is one of the oldest and most exceptional foods that can be found in nature.
This is because it is the milk created by the mammalian (mother) for her
offspring in the first 24 hours of giving birth. The effective substances that
are present in the first milk are found nowhere else in nature in such high,
perfectly balanced concentrations as only nature can do. Humans have not found a
way to replicate this perfect growth food and immune enhancing substance.
Colostrum is important for the nutrition, growth and development of newborn
infants and contributes to the immunologic defense of the neonates. Colostrum
causes rapid infant growth, especially that of the visceral organs.
Colostrum-the legit stuff-has been shown in studies to decrease bodyfat and
slightly increase lean body mass. The problem, however, is that there's no
regulation on the quality of colostrum at this time. Technically, you're talking
about an extremely narrow window of time when you can harvest the
"milk" and still call it colostrum-just a few hours after a cow has
delivered her offspring. Furthermore, you have to be very careful how you
process the raw colostrum to prevent denaturing its active protein fractions. It
is important then that your colostrum is freeze dried and not spray dried which
can be damaging to the colostrum and that it is standardised to a high level -
containing 35% IgG. Quality colostrum for this reason alone can cost three to
four times the cost of high-quality whey isolate.
Colostrum, real colostrum, has been demonstrated to increase IGF-1
in athletes during strength training (Mero A, et al. J Appl Physiol 1997
Oct;83(4):1144-51).
More importantly, though, it's been shown to increase performance in
numerous occasions (Smeets R, et al. J Strength Cond Res 2000;14(3):359-372/
Buckley J, et al. "Effects of an oral bovine colostrum supplement (Intact
TM) on running performance." 1998 Australian Conference of Science and
Medicine in Sport, Adelaide, South Australia, October 1998. Buckley J, et al.
"Oral supplementation with Bovine Colostrum (intact TM) increases
vertical jump performance." Abstract presented at the 4th annual congress
of the European College of Sports Science. Rome. 14th-17th July, 1999.)
Furthermore, it's been demonstrated to significantly increase lean body
mass (Antonio J., Bovine supplementation in trained individuals. J Strength
Cond Res 2000;14(3):359-372) as well as decrease body fat to a significant
degree (Buckley J, et al. "Effects of an oral bovine colostrum supplement
(intact TM) on running performance." 1998 Australian conference of
Science and Medicine in Sport, Adelaide, South Australia, October 1998.)
These studies are of good quality and supply evidence that colostrum works in
healthy humans while exercising.
Bovine colostrum contains bovine versions of many human growth factors,
including insulin-like growth factor, transforming growth factor, epithelial
growth factor, and even growth hormone, that are capable of stimulating muscle
growth. The concentration of bovine insulin-like growth factor I (ILGF-I) in
colostrum ranges from 200 to 2,000 mcg/L, compared with less than 10 mcg/L in
normal cow’s milk. Thus, in theory, bovine colostrum might be able to
stimulate muscle growth in humans. However, although bovine ILGF-I has been
shown to be identical to human ILGF-I in some analytical studies and to be
absorbed and transported into the circulation in calves, the effects of bovine
ILGF-I and other bovine growth substances in humans after oral administration,
has not been determined in clinical trials. IGF is a polypeptide consisting of a
67-amino-acid chain. It is broken down into dipeptides, tripeptides and single
amino acids. Newborn infants digestive have a neutral pH of around 7.0 in their
undeveloped digestive systems. This means it cannot split the chain of
polypeptides. After day two, the infants stomach turns quickly acidic and this
is why the mother stops producing colostrum. This is wehere a little controversy
as to whether adult humas can actually absorb and utilise bovine colostrum,
however there are definate studies that propose that dinking bovine colostrum
with a micellar casein drink have definate conclusive absorbtion rates.
In a study out of Australia, researchers examined if bovine colostrum - as
compared to whey protein concentrate (WPC) - can affect muscle size (limb
circumference) as measured by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
Subjects were given 60 grams a day of either the colostrum or WPC over eight
weeks. They all trained with weights over that time period. The abstract was
poorly written, but it appears the researchers tested people who had never
weight trained before and had them do biceps curls in their non-dominating arm.
After eight weeks it was found that those taking the colostrum had better gains
in muscle size than those taking WPC alone.
The MRIs revealed that the increase in muscle size was due to an actual
increase in the muscle and not other tissues or fat surrounding the muscle. This
could spell excellent potential for colostrum as a growth product, let alone an
immune enhancing agent.
In a preliminary study of male athletes, supplementation with 125 ml of
colostrum per day for eight days produced a statistically significant increase
in the serum concentration of insulin-like growth factor. However, the magnitude
of the increase was small, and the clinical significance of that change is not
clear. Thus, claims that bovine colostrum can help burn fat and promote muscle
growth by raising the level of ILGF-I or other molecules may be considered
premature.
There have been recent studies carried out over a 14 day period on
supplementing the diet with 2 grams of quality bovine colostrum. These
particular studies showed an impressive rise of 17% in IGF-1 levels which could
conclusively assist muscular growth and development.
Most manufacturers recommend 1,000 to 4,000 mg per day of freeze-dried
colostrum.
Bovine colostrum is rich in immunoglobulins (antibodies), growth factors,
various proteins, and enzymes. Recently it has been stated that colostrum is as
high an immunity enhancer as the very well recognised Glutamine. The question is
whether these immunity factors, which are meant for the calf, exert any effects
in humans. It has been claimed that bovine colostrum can help fight certain
infections. However, the research studies used to support that claim used
colostrum derived from cows immunized in a way that caused them to produce
unusually large amounts of a specific antibody in their colostrum. For example,
in a double-blind study, children with diarrhoea caused by a rotavirus were
treated with immunoglobulins extracted from colostrum derived from cows
immunized with rotavirus. Compared with the placebo, administration of the
immunoglobulins significantly reduced the amount of diarrhoea and the amount of
oral rehydration solution required. In addition, the rotavirus was eliminated
from the stool significantly more rapidly in the immunoglobulin group than in
the placebo group (1.5 days vs. 2.9 days). In one study, it was shown that cow
colostrum contains a glycoprotein that acts as a protease inhibitor which,
indeed, allows the immunity and growth factors to survive destruction from
digestive acids.
In addition to a positive effect against acute rotavirus diarrhoea, there is
also evidence that specific forms of colostrum (derived from specially immunized
cows or those with confirmed presence of specific antibodies) are effective
against diarrhoea caused by Cryptosporidium parvum, Helicobacter pylori,
Escherichia coli, and Clostridium difficile. However, it
is not known whether commercially available colostrum provides significant
amounts of the specific immunoglobulins that are active against these organisms.
Furthermore, unless the immunoglobulins are present in high enough
concentrations, the preparation is not likely to be effective. There is evidence
that the majority of the antimicrobial effect of both bovine colostrum and one
of its chief antibiotic components (lactoferrin) are destroyed by gastric
secretions and by the digestive enzyme, trypsin.
Bovine colostrum may be helpful in protecting against peptic ulcer formation
caused by nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as aspirin and ibuprofen. In
a study in rats, pretreatment with 0.5 or 1.0 ml of a colostrum preparation
reduced indomethacin-induced gastric injury by 30% and 60%, respectively.
Whether bovine colostrum exerts this effect in humans has not been determined.
A very recent study employed a double-blind, placebo controlled, parallel,
randomised design to determine the effect of supplementation with a low fat, low
lactose, concentrated bovine colostrum protein powder (intactä , NorthField
Laboratories Pty Ltd) on plasma IGF-1 concentrations and endurance running
performance.
After an initial familiarisation period in the two weeks prior to
commencement, 39 males, aged 18-35 years, completed an 8 week running program (3
x 45 minutes/week at lactate threshold) whilst consuming 60g/day on intact TM
bovine colostrum
(n=23, peak VO2 53.5 ± 1.1 ml.kg.1 min.1) or whey protein (n=16, peak VO2
54.2 ± 1.7 ml.kg.1 .min.1 ).
All subjects followed dietary guidelines provided by the researchers and kept
food diaries throughout the study period for subsequent dietary analysis.
Subjects completed 2 incremental treadmill running tests to exhaustion (10
km/hr, incremented 1% grade every 3 min) separated by 20 minutes of recovery at
weeks 0, 4 and 8. There were no differences in plasma IGF-1 concentrations
between the groups at week 0 (colostrum 231.1 ± 10.7 ng/ml, placebo 221.0 ±
13.3 ng/ml; P=0.37). Plasma IGF-1 concentrations did not change in either group
during the study period (P=0.90).
There were no differences in the distance covered (m) or work done (kJ;
vertical distance covered x body mass x 9.81 m/s2 ) during the first (colostrum
4649 ± 238 m, 155.8 ± 15.7 kJ; placebo 4464 ± 320 m, 140.2 ± 19.6 kJ;
P>0.46) or the second (colostrum 4044 ± 357 m, 120.6 ± 21.3 kJ; placebo
3942 ± 388 m, 110.7 ± 21.1 kJ; P>0.91) treadmill runs at week 0. Distance
covered and work done during the first treadmill run increased in both groups
during the study period (P<0.01), but at similar rates (P>0.69).
During the second treadmill run both groups exhibited similar increases in
the distance covered and work done from weeks 0-4 (P>0.20) but, from weeks
4-8 the intact TM colostrum group continued to improve whilst the performance of
the placebo group plateaued, such that by week 8 the colostrum group ran further
(colostrum 4662 ± 251 m, placebo 4237 ± 323 m; P=0.04) and did more work than
the placebo group (colostrum 150.7 ± 17.1 kJ, placebo 124.2 ± 18.9 kJ;
P=0.03). The TEM for running time (which equates to distance covered and work
done) was 2%.
There were no differences in dietary intakes between the two groups. These
results indicate that oral supplementation with intact TM bovine colostrum
improves the ability to perform a second bout of maximal exercise following a
relatively short period of recovery from a prior bout of maximal exercise.
Claims that bovine colostrum elevates mood, that "colostrum is a natural
and healthy means of stimulating the brain to release serotonin and dopamine and
prolong their re-uptake," or that "colostrum also activates the
release of other chemicals in the brain that affect alertness and
concentration" are unsubstantiated at this time.
As bovine colostrum is not an essential nutrient, no deficiency state exists.
At the time of writing, there were no well-known drug interactions with
bovine colostrum.
The only recognised draw back to colostrum supplementation, disregarding the
price, is that if you do not have enough of the lactase enzyme to digest the
product you may experience some gas or bloating.
References:
Mero, A., Miikkulainen, H., Riski, J., Pakkanen, R., Aalto, J.,
Takala, T. (1997). Effects of bovine colostrum supplementation on
serum IGF-1, IgG, hormone and saliva IgA during training. J. Appl.
Physiol. 83(4): 1144-1151. |
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