Metabolic HealthApr 30, 2026
Trimethylglycine (TMG) is one of those compounds that does a lot of heavy lifting in your body without getting much credit. It serves as both a cell protector and a methyl donor, two roles that touch everything from liver health to cardiovascular function. The biochemistry is solid, the animal data are extensive, and a handful of human studies point to real benefits for fatty liver and exercise performance. The gap? Large, long-term clinical trials are still missing for most of the conditions TMG might help.
TMG is a natural metabolite of choline, found abundantly in beets, spinach, wheat, and many other foods. Your body also makes it from choline, with the highest concentrations showing up in the kidney, liver, and brain. You're already consuming some from your diet. The question is whether supplementing more of it makes a meaningful difference.
NutrientsApr 29, 2026
TMG, often marketed as the "TMG amino acid," is one of the most misunderstood supplements on the shelf. It's not a protein-building amino acid at all. It's a trimethylated derivative of glycine that serves as an osmolyte and one of your body's key methyl donors, helping convert the potentially harmful molecule homocysteine back into the useful amino acid methionine.
That methyl-donating role is what makes TMG genuinely interesting. But there's a complication worth knowing about: gut bacteria can also convert TMG into trimethylamine (TMA), which your liver then oxidizes into TMAO, a molecule associated with cardiovascular, renal, and metabolic diseases. Whether TMG tips toward benefit or risk likely depends on your gut microbiota, how much you take, and what else you eat.
NutrientsApr 28, 2026
Methylated B vitamins reduced homocysteine by roughly 30% and LDL cholesterol by about 7.5% compared to placebo in people carrying common gene variants that impair normal B vitamin processing. That's a meaningful result. But the same research that makes the case for methylated forms also raises a less comfortable point: too much synthetic folic acid or B12 over time may disrupt the very methylation pathways these vitamins are supposed to support, with potential links to cancer risk and altered neurodevelopment.
The story of methylated vitamins is really a story about a biochemical bottleneck, who it affects, and why the form of the vitamin you take matters as much as whether you take it at all.
