Garlic Forte

Garlic Quality Issues

Alliin (an odorless amino acid) is naturally found in Garlic cloves but is rapidly converted to allicin (a strong smelling volatile sulfide) when exposed to the enzyme alliinase in the presence of water or when the Garlic clove is crushed – as shown below by the absence of the alliin peak in the HPLC trace on the right hand side. Allicin is rather unstable and is the precursor to a range of sulfur containing compounds including, diallylsulfides, ajoenes and vinyldithiins. It is important that quality products take this enzymatic process into account since there is strong published evidence for Garlic preparations standardized this way. Therefore alliin must be present together with the correct amount of alliinase in the tablet to allow full conversion to allicin. Furthermore, because stomach acid can degrade the activity of alliinase, quality products should be enterically coated to protect the enzyme. That is why all MediHerb Garlic Forte tablets are enterically coated and are tested not only for the level of alliin but for its conversion into allicin, “its allicin-releasing ability.”