Pinealon

Pinealon (Glu-Asp-Arg, EDR) is a synthetic tripeptide developed by Prof. Vladimir Khavinson and colleagues at the St. Petersburg Institute of Bioregulation and Gerontology, positioned as the brain/CNS-focused member of the institute's "cytogen" line of single-sequence synthetic bioregulator peptides, alongside Vilon (thymus), Epithalon (pineal gland), and Vesugen (vascular endothelium), all also built on this site.

Chemically, Pinealon is a three-residue peptide: molecular formula C15H26N6O8, molecular weight approximately 418.40 g/mol (independently cross-checked via manual atomic-mass calculation from the formula, which matched), CAS number 175175-23-2, PubChem CID 10273502. Its internal institute code is T-33, following the same numbering convention used for other Khavinson cytogens in this catalog (such as Chonluten's T-34 designation).

At Verified Peptides, we think Pinealon has a genuinely more substantial preclinical evidence base than several other Khavinson cytogens built in this catalog, spanning multiple distinct cell-culture and animal-model studies from the same research institute, described in detail below.

The broader scientific context for a brain/CNS-focused antioxidant peptide connects to well-established, independently documented biology: oxidative stress — an imbalance between reactive oxygen species production and the cell's antioxidant defenses — is a recognized contributor to neuronal aging and neurodegenerative disease processes, studied extensively across neuroscience independent of any Khavinson-specific framework. This mainstream oxidative-stress biology provides the legitimate scientific backdrop against which Pinealon's proposed neuroprotective effects are framed, even though the specific claim that this tripeptide meaningfully modulates that process in vivo rests on a research base confined to one institute.

At Verified Peptides, we think Pinealon has one of the more substantial multi-study preclinical evidence bases among the Khavinson-associated cytogens in this catalog, and we want to describe it directly. Beyond the cell-culture oxidative-stress studies described above, a particularly notable study (Arutjunyan et al., International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, 2012, PMID 22567179) examined Pinealon in a rat model of prenatal hyperhomocysteinemia — pregnant Wistar rats given methionine in drinking water to induce elevated homocysteine, a condition associated with impaired offspring neurodevelopment. Methionine-exposed offspring showed impaired spatial learning and orientation in the Morris water maze test at postnatal days 10 and 45, and Pinealon administration to the affected offspring restored cognitive performance nearly to normal levels, alongside increased cerebellar neuron resistance to oxidative stress. We think this specific finding is worth highlighting because it involves an actual behavioral/functional outcome measure (spatial learning performance) rather than only a cell-culture biomarker, which is a meaningfully more translational type of evidence than most other Khavinson cytogen studies in this catalog provide.

We want to be equally direct about the limitations of this evidence base: all three of the studies described above originate from the same institute that developed Pinealon (Khavinson's group, St. Petersburg Institute of Bioregulation and Gerontology), and we are not aware of any independent replication by researchers outside that institute, nor any human clinical trial — registered or published — involving Pinealon. This places Pinealon in a moderate position on this catalog's evidence spectrum: genuinely multi-study and mechanistically more detailed than compounds like Cardiogen or Crystagen (for which little to no dedicated research was located), but still entirely confined to one research lineage, unlike genuinely independent, multi-group literatures such as Thymulin's or Nesiritide's. Elevated maternal homocysteine (hyperhomocysteinemia), the condition modeled in the prenatal study described above, is itself a well-established, independently studied risk factor in human maternal-fetal medicine, associated in epidemiological research with adverse pregnancy outcomes and altered offspring neurodevelopment. This gives the Pinealon prenatal study a connection to a genuinely significant area of clinical research interest, even though the specific peptide intervention tested has not moved beyond this one animal-model study to our knowledge.

No FDA, EMA, or other Western regulatory body has evaluated or approved Pinealon for any indication. At Verified Peptides, we sell research-grade Pinealon exclusively for laboratory research, and we think its relatively detailed, multi-study cell-biology and animal-behavioral evidence — while still single-institute in origin — represents a genuinely more substantive research foundation than several other Khavinson cytogens built in this catalog.

Pinealon's prenatal hyperhomocysteinemia study is a genuinely distinctive research application within this catalog: elevated maternal homocysteine is an independently established risk factor for adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes in offspring, studied well beyond any Khavinson-specific research context, giving Pinealon's specific finding (restored spatial learning performance in affected offspring) a connection to a broader, legitimate area of developmental neuroscience research.

The finding that Pinealon's protective effect occurred "despite elevated homocysteine levels" in the cited prenatal study — meaning the peptide did not appear to reduce homocysteine itself, but rather protected against its downstream toxic effects on developing brain tissue — is a mechanistically specific and non-obvious detail, distinguishing Pinealon's proposed action from a simple metabolic correction and instead suggesting a more general cytoprotective mechanism relevant across different sources of oxidative/toxic cellular stress.

Pinealon's institute code, T-33, follows the same internal numbering convention Khavinson's group has used across its cytogen catalog for decades, alongside Chonluten's T-34 and other similarly-coded compounds — a naming system that predates and is independent of the commercial brand names most researchers encounter these compounds under today.

Despite Pinealon's association with "pineal" in its commercial name, its studied research applications span multiple cell types beyond pineal tissue specifically — cerebellar granule cells, neutrophils, PC12 cells, and cerebral cortex neurons have all been used in published Pinealon research, suggesting its studied protective mechanism may be more broadly applicable across cell types experiencing oxidative stress rather than narrowly specific to pineal gland biology.

At Verified Peptides, we require independent third-party HPLC purity testing and mass spectrometry identity confirmation for every batch of research-grade Pinealon we offer, with a Certificate of Analysis (COA) available for each lot. As a three-residue peptide, Pinealon is straightforward to synthesize to high purity using standard solid-phase peptide synthesis methods.

We source exclusively from manufacturers operating under Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP)-aligned quality systems, and every lot is independently verified rather than accepted solely on a supplier's internal documentation. Researchers should always request and review the specific COA for the lot they receive, confirming purity percentage and molecular identity before use in any experimental protocol.

Lyophilized Pinealon is stable when stored at -20°C, protected from light and moisture, and researchers can generally expect the unreconstituted peptide to maintain integrity over an extended period under these conditions. At Verified Peptides, we ship lyophilized peptide with appropriate cold-chain packaging to preserve stability in transit.

Once reconstituted with bacteriostatic water or another appropriate sterile diluent, Pinealon solution should be stored refrigerated at 2–8°C and used within the timeframe indicated on the product's documentation. As with other short peptides in this catalog, reconstituted solutions are generally less stable than the lyophilized form and more susceptible to degradation and microbial contamination with repeated freeze-thaw cycling.

Researchers should avoid repeated freeze-thaw cycles of reconstituted material and should follow the specific storage guidance provided with each lot's documentation to preserve sample validity for research use.