Collagen

Say hello to collagen, your secret weapon when it comes to sneaky nutrition, a radiant outer glow and optimum inner health. Collagen is a vital protein that starts to deplete as we kiss goodbye our 20s, weep! Whilst our bodies naturally synthesise this magic age repellent, it can't keep up with the speed in which time passes us by. Our internal health starts to suffer, our joints lose the spring in their step, our bones start to creak and our skin, hair and nails bear the brunt of our declining inner workings.

What's to be done? Fear not because a decent collagen supplement can slow down the misery of clocking up the years, completely transforming your journey past 30, allowing you to take control and restore some of that much missed youthfulness.

Provenance is key and marine collagen could be from anywhere and extracted from anything in the sea, including shark skin. 

WillPowders collagen is Swiss, and sourced from grass-fed cattle hides. That’s eating nose to tail at its best. 

Marine and plant collagens are made up of Type I collagen (skin, hair, nails); whereas, bovine collagen is made up of Type I and Type III (skin, hair, nails and the stuff that keeps you alive: blood vessels, gut, organs, tissue, joints, arteries and bones.

Bovine collagen, however, is the closest to human collagen you can get and includes 18 amino acids.  Rich in glycine, proline, and hydroxyproline, highly important building blocks for life

Marine collagen molecules may be smaller and therefore more easily absorbed; however, they are absorbed so fast, they are discarded quickly. In addition, Marine collagen is made up on type I, collagen the body synthesises by itself, making marine collagen a pointless supplement.

Our bovine collagen is made into hydrolysed peptides which are easily absorbed; however, they are larger molecules meaning absorption takes longer, offering longer lasting benefits for joint and bone health.. 

When marine collagen is extracted from the animal, it retains its fishy flavour and odour, meaning it is often flavoured with synthetic ingredients. This can play havoc with your gut function and therefore hinder your sleep, mood and immunity, not to mention the risk of bloating up like a puffer fish.  In addition, supplements made from the sea are not tested for BMAA (Biogenic Amines Analysis), which is essential in food safety and quality control. 

Unflavoured, WillPowders Bovine is tasteless and comes from farms that do not use growth hormones and the cows have zero exposure to Glyphosate, a pesticide that is a carcinogenic, an endocrine disruptor, genotoxic, can irritate the respiratory system and skin and wreaks havoc on gut microbiota.  

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Helps to maintain a healthy gut barrier; protects against neurological diseases and helps to maintain structure and function of blood vessels.

Promotes smoother, more youthful-looking skin; supports thicker, stronger hair and prevents brittle nails.

Helps to maintain flexibility, bone strength, muscle recovery and reduces inflammation and muscle loss.

Contains glycine, an amino acid that can improve sleep quality. Accelerates tissue repair and regeneration.

Promotes satiety and helps preserve lean muscle mass.

Supports nutrient absorption in the gut, ensuring that essential nutrients reach the brain for optimal function.

The FFS Facebook Community chew the fat and our WillPowders customers rave about our collagen.

There are 18 amino acids in our bovine collagen, 3 key amino acids that lends the majority of the benefits: glycine, proline, and hydroxyproline. These 3 amino acids are highly important building blocks of collagen, tendons, and ligaments. They have also been shown to support health in a number of other ways, such as promoting normal inflammatory processes and supporting immune function. Our collagen also includes: Alanine, Arginine, Asparagine, Cysteine Traces, Glutamine, Glycine, Histidine, Hydroxylysine, Hydroxyproline, Valine, Isoleucine, Threonine, Serine, Proline, Phenylalanine, Methionine, Lysine, Leucine and Tyrosine.

Read our collagen blogs for more information of specific amino acids and their benefits: Glycine, Glutamine

Yes it is. Marine collagen only contains type I collagen, something the human body synthesises in abundance on its own. Therefore, supplementing with marine collagen is utterly pointless and just gets discarded by the body.

For more information, check out our blogs...

Marine or Bovine?

What's in You Collagen Supplement? The Glutamine Edition.

The Benefits of Your Collagen Supplement.

Collagen is a key component in bones, skin, muscles, and other body parts. Collagen is a protein. Your body makes it, but natural synthesis slows down as you age. You produce 1 to 2% less collagen per year after the age of 30.

The Benefits of Collagen

Absolutely. The glycine in the WillPowders bovine collagen helps to support the body's natural synthesis of collagen.

Don't just take our word for it, check out our customer stories...

Supplementing with bovine collagen supports your body's natural synthesis of collagen. Our modern diets do not allow us to absorb enough collagen from our food to stay ahead of the rate it depletes.

The Benefits of Collagen

Yes. Collagen is a protein and packed full of amino acids which are the building blocks of life.

The Benefits of Collagen

You can spread out your servings of Collagen Peptides throughout the day. We would recommend 10-15g per day, although as this is food - please adjust to your personal need. If you are in training (maybe for a marathon) or peri-menopausal you may benefit from up to 30g per day.

Collagen

Bovine Collagen is nicer on your sense of smell, taste and mouthfeel!

Bovine collagen has superior sensory acceptability over marine collagen giving a better consuming experience.  After all, we eat for the sensory experience as well as the nutrients and fuel.   

Highlights of the study for the superior sensory experience of consuming bovine collagen are: 

• Results showed the sensory experience of consuming bovine collagen was more pleasant than consuming marine collagen: ‘the aroma and taste of the marine collagens impacted their acceptability and were associated with fishy, sour, bitter, and salty attributes.’
• Collagen that is low in flavour was more acceptable to participants in the study: ‘Overall, collagen that was low in flavor was more acceptable to the participants in this study.’
• To ensure an acceptable way of incorporating collagen into a diet, bovine collagen is superior as: ‘marine collagen incorporation into foods should be avoided unless off-aromas and flavors can be masked by other properties.’
• When mixing collagen with water alone, bovine collagen scored more highly in this study as acceptable

Authors: Jamal Amyoony, Mackenzie Gorman, Tanvi Dabas, Rachael Moss, Matthew B. McSweeney

Published: 03 November 2023 https://doi.org/10.1111/1750-3841.16822

Study Link

Bovine collagen has a broader range of collagen types and so a broader range of potential mechanisms to support health and vitality than marine collagen

• While recent research shows marine collagen does contain collagens other than Type I, they aren’t in large numbers.  If you are seeking a broader spectrum of possible benefits, bovine collagen, with collagen types 1 and 3, offers potential benefits to internal structures and organs of the body as well as to skin.  Bovine collagen may support you building beauty and strength from the inside out!
• Type 3 collagen’s function is to form the structural framework of the spleen, liver, lymph nodes, smooth muscle and adipose tissue and is located in lymphatic system, spleen, liver, cardiovascular system, lung and skin.  
• Type 1 collagen’s function is to resist tension and is found in the dermis, tendon, ligaments, capsules of organs, bones, dentin and cementum.  

Authors: Andrew M Holwerda, Luc J C van Loon

Published 04 May 2022

Study Link - Nutrition Reviews, Volume 80, Issue 6, June 2022, Pages 1497–1514,

• The amount of glycine and proline provided by regular diets is probably insufficient for facilitating increased rates of tissue collagen synthesis.  Bovine collagen scores more highly than marine collagen, particularly for proline, gram for gram, so if you want to supplement your diet to support the role of collagen in your body to facilitate increased rates of tissue synthesis, make bovine collagen your friend.
• Basically, if you (or a chap you know) are training hard, merely eating well and bumping up proteins in your regular diet, including the use of such things as whey powders, it might not be enough to encourage your body’s repair systems to kick in.

‘Collagen-derived dietary-protein sources, such as gelatin and collagen hydrolysate, provide large amounts of proline and glycine. It has been proposed, therefore, that collagen-derived protein sources may be preferred to support connective tissue protein remodeling.’

Authors: Andrew M Holwerda, Luc J C van Loon

Date Published: 04 May 2022

Study Link

Citation

Don’t spend your money just to pee Type 1 collagen back out!

• Where we choose to spend our wealth is, of course, our own concern.  However, we all know that if we take water soluble vitamin supplements and our body already has enough of those vitamins that day, we end up just peeing them back out.  Essentially, your third fruit juice won’t pump you with more vitamin C; any excess is excreted.  The same is true of Type 1 collagen.  
• A genetic disorder might interfere with the body’s production of Type 1 collagen, but in a healthy person, type 1 collagen is the most abundant of collagens in our body.  However, there is interest in the role of type 1 collagen in the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis and this may be a reason to supplement the diet with type 1 collagen.  However, as healthy adults, our bodies, on most days, have plenty of Type 1 collagen, ‘Type I collagen is one of the most abundant molecules in the body’.
• So, while we can choose to support the body by supplementing this resource, if we want to support our body with collagen in the way it may most need supporting, then we should concentrate on Type III collagen as this particular collagen may require supplementary boost to help us repair after exercise.

Authors: K. Henriksen, M.A. Karsdal, in Biochemistry of Collagens, Laminins and Elastin (Second Edition), 2019

Published: 2019

Study Link

• While research shows that some specific marine collagens do have antioxidant properties, a marine collagen product would have to consistently contain those very specific species in order to consistently claim antioxidant properties.  With bovine collagen, the antioxidant and antibacterial properties are there every time.

Authors: Authors: Walaa Al Hajj1 , Mohamed Salla1,2, Maha Krayem1,2, Sanaa Khaled1,2, Hussein F. Hassan3 , and Sami El Khatib1,2,4*  *Corresponding Author: Dr. Sami El Khatib (sami.khatib@liu.edu.lb;)

Study Link

3.1.1. Bovine 

Hydrolyzed Collagen—Sources and Applications

HC can be extracted from different sources and tissues [71], it can be extracted from bovine Achilles tendon by using different enzymes such as alcalase, pepsin, trypsin, and collagenase produced by Penicillium aurantiogriseum. It shows antihypertensive, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activity [85,86]. HC from bovine lung showed antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activity [87]. HC from the nuchal ligament of bovine by papain action can be used as a promising precursor of angiotensin-I-converting enzyme (ACE)-inhibitory peptides [88]. 

Authors: by Arely León-López, Alejandro Morales-Peñaloza, Víctor Manuel Martínez-Juárez, Apolonio Vargas-Torres, Dimitrios I. Zeugolis and Gabriel Aguirre-Álvarez

Study Link

Environment International, Aquaculture practices and potential human health risks: Current knowledge and future priorities

To be fair to some marine collagens - they can be sourced from companies who supply products that have the Marine Stewardship Commission stamp.  The idea of humble fishermen catching fish on a single line in a turquoise ocean with the sun gently warming their backs is not likely to be the backstory on your marine collagen supplement.  It is worth noting that lots of ‘marine collagen’ simply isn’t ‘marine’ collagen, at least it’s certainly not the idea of what is marine that most of us have - fish that have swum freely in romantic briny seas. In general, ‘marine’ collagen may not be from sea fish at all!  

Some marine collagens come from aquaculture, a word to describe the industry of farmed fish. There are concerns in some quarters that, as the fastest growing branch of the food industry, it is only a matter of time until aquaculture succumbs to an unforeseen crisis.  

‘However, recent research has provided evidence that current aquaculture production practices could lead to exposures to various biological and chemical agents that are of significant concern to human health.’

‘In conclusion, the potential impacts of current aquaculture practices on human health are varied and broad-reaching and may differ among geographical regions. But the active flow of aquaculture products in the global market means that potential human exposures to contaminants found in aquaculture products are not confined to the areas where aquaculture production is taking place. In order to adequately understand, address and prevent these impacts at local, national and global scales, researchers, policy makers, governments, and aquaculture industries must collaborate and cooperate in exchanging critical information and developing targeted policies that are practical, effective and enforceable.’

Experts suggest that ‘For many consumers, its [aquaculture] products are seldom consciously differentiated from products from capture fisheries. And if they [the consumer] are made aware of the industrial production behind those products, the resulting attitude may often be concern or scepticism’. 

There is a wealth of great news stories for health and wellbeing from very specific collagens from very specific fish, and we applaud that this research may be crucial to the future of burns and wound treatments in medicine, but this specificity is not what marine collagen constitutes.  Often, unfortunately, in the same way we might greet the composite fish nature of a crab stick with suspicion, we have to consider that unless we do due diligence for ourselves with lengthy and studious research into marine collagen products, we might well be consuming the marine collagen equivalent of a crab stick.

The Swiss Farmed cows that we use in our bovine collagen are, well, cattle!  One species, one breed, one traceable diet of grass, one country of origin: Switzerland, a country designated as negligible BSE status.

Authors: Amir Sapkota, Amy R. Sapkota, Margaret Kucharski, Janelle Burke, Shawn McKenzie, Polly Walker, Robert Lawrence

Study Link

Study Link

We now know that microplastics are in the fish food chain from ocean caught fish and in aquaculture.  The only thing that aquaculture doesn’t yet know is the size of the problem in their fisheries. And while the study cited concerns the food chain, we all know that fish are what they eat!

‘This work aligns with the holistic One Health concept, recognizing the interdependence of human, animal, and environmental health. The diversity of MPs found in water, feed, and fish tissues, indicates that European seabass uptakes MPs from water and feed. The majority of recovered particles were within the MP size range and were primarily fibres composed of man-made cellulose and PET.’

The truth is that academic study after academic study will tell you that the fishing industry simply don’t yet know enough about the effects of microplastics on fish:

‘Despite occurring in aquatic ecosystems worldwide, the knowledge about MP [micro plastic] presence in different aquaculture systems and their potential impact on seafood products is still limited.’

Both citations above are from: Science of the Total Environment, Occurrence of microplastics and metals in European seabass produced in different aquaculture systems: Implications for human exposure, risk, and food safety.

Most scientific research into the effect of microplastics in the food fed to aquaculture fish raise more questions than they answer:

‘After the microplastics were excreted, exposed fish contained lower amounts of protein and minerals than fish fed the diet with no HDPE added, she said. This could be evidence that the fish’s bodies were not able to break down the microplastics and needed more nutrients than normal to expel them, or the microplastics might have reduced the absorption of these nutrients from their diets. The researchers also found evidence of altered liver function in exposed fish and a change in their gut microorganism community. Like it does in humans, the fish gut microbial community performs essential tasks like food digestion and immune system protection … the study raised more questions than it answered.’

Authors: Ricardo S. Matias a b, Sónia Gomes a b, Luis Gabriel A. Barboza a b, C. Marisa R. Almeida a, António Marques a c, Lúcia Guilhermino a b, Luisa M.P. Valente a b

UWM Report University of Wisconsin and Milwaukee Laura Otto

Study Link

Study Link