Everything below concerns Selank. We keep the language plain, cite what the science says, and separate well-supported claims from open questions.
Last reviewed on 2026-02-24. Where a claim depends on a specific study, the study is described rather than over-claimed.
Quantification in biological matrices relies on liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry with stable-isotope internal standards. Low plasma concentrations and adsorption to container surfaces both complicate measurement. Solid-phase extraction is often needed to reduce matrix interference before injection. Reported limits of quantification differ widely between laboratories, which makes direct comparison of pharmacokinetic results difficult and limits meta-analysis.
Peptide bonds are vulnerable to protease attack, and Selank is no exception. Measured half-life in serum is short, on the order of minutes in several reports, which explains why intranasal administration is the common route described in the literature. Absorption across the nasal mucosa partially bypasses first-pass hepatic metabolism. Quantitative data on human bioavailability remain limited and are difficult to compare across studies.
Lyophilised material kept dry at minus 20 degrees Celsius or colder is the most stable form, and suppliers commonly state a shelf life of two years or more under those conditions. Once dissolved, degradation accelerates through hydrolysis and deamidation, particularly at alkaline pH or elevated temperature. Working solutions are usually divided into single-use aliquots to avoid repeated freeze-thaw cycles. The choice of reconstitution solvent affects both stability and the ionic strength of the final preparation.
Selank is a synthetic heptapeptide developed in Russia during the 1990s. Researchers at the Institute of Molecular Genetics of the Russian Academy of Sciences designed it as a stabilized analog of tuftsin, a naturally occurring immunomodulatory tetrapeptide. The compound has been studied primarily for its reported anxiolytic and nootropic effects. It remains largely unknown in Western pharmacology and is not approved as a medicine by major regulators such as the FDA or the EMA.
The primary structure of Selank is Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg-Pro-Gly-Pro, corresponding to the molecular formula C33H57N11O9 and a monoisotopic mass of roughly 751.9 daltons. The N-terminal threonine and the arginine residue in the fourth position are shared with tuftsin, which carries the sequence Thr-Lys-Pro-Arg. The three additional residues at the C-terminus, Pro-Gly-Pro, extend the chain and are associated with greater resistance to enzymatic degradation. This extension also separates Selank from the shorter parent peptide.
Naming conventions place Selank in the same research family as Semax, another Russian-developed peptide investigated for cognitive effects. The two compounds share a lineage but differ in sequence and in the biological systems proposed as their targets. Semax descends from ACTH fragments, whereas Selank descends from tuftsin. Publications sometimes identify Selank by its full peptide sequence or by laboratory codes rather than one uniform trade name. Because replication outside Russia is limited, reports on its properties are best read alongside the study design and the purity of the material tested.
| Property | Value | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Dry storage temperature | -20 C or below | Sealed, desiccated, protected from light |
| Solution stability | Hours to days at 2-8 C | Depends on buffer and microbial load |
| Preferred pH range | Near neutral to slightly acidic | Alkaline pH accelerates hydrolysis |
| Main degradation routes | Hydrolysis and deamidation | No cysteine or methionine in sequence |
| Identity confirmation | Electrospray mass spectrometry | Observed mass compared with 751.9 Da |
Peptide bonds in selank are susceptible to hydrolysis under strongly acidic or basic conditions, and the terminal proline residues are vulnerable to exopeptidase activity in biological samples. Lyophilized powder stored dry at -20 °C typically remains stable for extended periods, whereas aqueous solutions degrade faster and may lose measurable purity within days to weeks depending on pH, temperature, and microbial load. Repeated freeze-thaw cycles promote aggregation and adsorption to container surfaces. For analytical work, solutions are usually prepared fresh, kept cold, and used within a single working day.
Handling follows standard practice for research peptides. Material is weighed in a low-humidity environment because the powder absorbs atmospheric moisture. Purity is reported as the percentage area of the main peak in a chromatogram, with specifications commonly set at 95 percent or higher; values below that threshold indicate the presence of truncated or modified species. Residual trifluoroacetate from purification is often present and may affect mass balance. Certificates of analysis should state the analytical method, the column and gradient used, and the lot-specific retention time so that results can be compared across suppliers.
Identity and purity of selank are established with reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry. The peptide elutes from C18 columns with acetonitrile gradients in water containing trifluoroacetic acid or formic acid, and detection is usually performed by ultraviolet absorbance near 214 nm. Electrospray ionization in positive mode gives a doubly protonated ion near m/z 377, consistent with a mass of about 752 Da. Amino acid analysis or tandem mass spectrometry of fragment ions confirms the sequence. Because the molecule has no aromatic residues, it lacks a usable 280 nm chromophore, so low-wavelength detection or mass spectrometry is required.
Identity and purity are usually assessed by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography, with mass spectrometry used to confirm molecular mass and sequence information. Amino acid analysis and peptide mapping may supplement these methods. Certified reference standards are scarce, and many commercial lots are sold as research chemicals without a pharmacopoeial monograph. Regulatory treatment differs by country: Selank is a registered prescription medicine in Russia, while in the European Union and the United States it is not an approved drug and may fall under research-chemical or unapproved-product frameworks.
Selank is a hydrophilic peptide and dissolves readily in water and in aqueous buffers. The lyophilised powder is typically a white to off-white solid. Because short peptides are prone to hydrolysis and oxidation, handling benefits from limiting exposure to heat, moisture and strong light. Working solutions are commonly prepared in sterile water or saline, and repeated freeze-thaw cycles are avoided to reduce aggregation and loss of activity. These practices reflect general laboratory convention rather than published stability specifications.
Dry powder is normally held at -20 degrees Celsius or lower, in a sealed container with desiccant and protection from light. Reconstituted solutions are usually kept at 2 to 8 degrees Celsius for short periods and frozen for longer ones. Proline residues at several positions are generally associated with some resistance to peptidase attack, but chemical stability still declines at neutral to alkaline pH and at elevated temperature. Exact shelf-life figures are product-specific and are not standardised across suppliers.
The compound has a calculated molecular weight near 751.9 daltons and carries a net positive charge at physiological pH because of its arginine residue. It dissolves freely in water and in common aqueous buffers, and typically appears as a white or off-white lyophilized powder. The amide backbone makes the molecule susceptible to peptidases, which limits oral use and favors intranasal or parenteral routes. Nomenclature in the literature varies: the substance is also described by the sequence abbreviation TP-7 and by a Russian trade designation.
Regulatory status differs sharply by region. Selank holds a Russian marketing authorization, where it is supplied mainly as nasal drops, while authorities elsewhere have not approved it for medical use. Material sold internationally is therefore usually labeled as a research chemical rather than a medicine. Peer-reviewed publications come predominantly from Russian laboratories, and sample sizes are generally small. Whether the compound produces comparable effects under independent, well-controlled replication remains an open question that the broader literature has not settled.
Hitchens stated, "[an] unborn child seems to me to be a real concept. It's not a growth or an appendix. You can't say the rights question doesn't come up. I don't think a woman should be forced to choose, or even can be", and, "as a materialist, I think it has been demonstrated that an embryo is a separate body and entity". Showing a desire to recognise the unborn as a life, he also affirmed a need for the right to abortion, stating, "the second-best fallback solution, which may sometimes be desirable for other reasons, is termination of pregnancy... all thinking people recognise a painful conflict of rights and interest in this question". Hitchens opposed an overturning of Roe v. Wade and instead hoped for science to develop new solutions to unwanted pregnancies "that will make abortion more like a contraceptive procedure than a surgical one." He strongly criticized the encouragement of sexual abstinence within the anti-abortion movement of the Christian right, and the equating of contraceptives to abortion, as expressed by Mother Teresa and representatives of the Roman Catholic Church.
== Criticism == The concepts of EMT and MET has been criticized for not having clearly defined start and end states, specific molecular changes universal across the categories, and/or over-interpreting the phenotype change in cancer cells.
Whereas most small molecule solutions exhibit only an upper critical solution temperature phase transition (UCST), at which phase separation occurs with cooling, polymer mixtures commonly exhibit a lower critical solution temperature phase transition (LCST), at which phase separation occurs with heating. In dilute solutions, the properties of the polymer are characterized by the interaction between the solvent and the polymer. In a good solvent, the polymer appears swollen and occupies a large volume. In this scenario, intermolecular forces between the solvent and monomer subunits dominate over intramolecular interactions. In a bad solvent or poor solvent, intramolecular forces dominate and the chain contracts. In the theta solvent, or the state of the polymer solution where the value of the second virial coefficient becomes 0, the intermolecular polymer-solvent repulsion balances exactly the intramolecular monomer-monomer attraction. Under the theta condition (also called the Flory condition), the polymer behaves like an ideal random coil. The transition between the states is known as a coil–globule transition.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
=== Industrial production === The hydrolysis of nicotinonitrile is catalysed by the enzyme nitrile hydratase from Rhodococcus rhodochrous J1, producing 3500 tons per annum of nicotinamide for use in animal feed. The enzyme allows for a more selective synthesis as further hydrolysis of the amide to nicotinic acid is avoided. Nicotinamide can also be made from nicotinic acid. According to Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry, worldwide 31,000 tons of nicotinamide were sold in 2014.
Additionally, some monastic orders follow a pescatarian diet, and members of the Eastern Orthodox Church follow a vegan diet during fasts. There is also a strong association between the Quakers and vegetarianism dating back at least to the 18th century. The association grew in prominence during the 19th century, coupled with growing Quaker concerns in connection with alcohol consumption, anti-vivisection and social purity. The association between the Quaker tradition and vegetarianism, however, becomes most significant with the founding of the Friends' Vegetarian Society in 1902 "to spread a kindlier way of living amongst the Society of Friends."
=== Identification of the active compound === While working at the Bureau of Dairy Industry, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Mary Shaw Shorb was assigned work on the bacterial strain Lactobacillus lactis Dorner (LLD), which was used to make yogurt and other cultured dairy products. The culture medium for LLD required liver extract. Shorb knew that the same liver extract was used to treat pernicious anemia (her father-in-law had died from the disease), and concluded that LLD could be developed as an assay method to identify the active compound. While at the University of Maryland, she received a small grant from Merck, and in collaboration with Karl Folkers from that company, developed the LLD assay. This identified "LLD factor" as essential for the bacteria's growth. Shorb, Folker and Alexander R. Todd, at the University of Cambridge, used the LLD assay to extract the anti-pernicious anemia factor from liver extracts, purify it, and name it vitamin B12. In 1955, Todd helped elucidate the structure of the vitamin. The complete chemical structure of the molecule was determined by Dorothy Hodgkin based on crystallographic data and published in 1955 and 1956, for which, and for other crystallographic analyses, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1964. Hodgkin went on to decipher the structure of insulin. George Whipple, George Minot and William Murphy were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1934 for their work on the vitamin. Three other Nobel laureates, Alexander R.
==== Distribution ==== The apparent volume of distribution of modafinil is 0.326 to 0.8 L/kg body weight. The plasma protein binding of modafinil is approximately 60%. It is mostly (90%) bound to albumin. Both armodafinil and esmodafinil are substrates of P-glycoprotein, but the clinical significance of this is unknown.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
{\displaystyle {\begin{aligned}[][a_{0},a_{1},a_{2},a_{3}]&=[0.616634218997,0.108855827811,0.023453835635,0.000449332509]\\[][b_{1},b_{2},b_{3},b_{4},b_{5},b_{6}]&=[1.919948267476,1.635304362591,0.799392556572,0.240278859212,0.043178653945,0.003863334276]\end{aligned}}}
==== Train ==== Amtrak, the national passenger rail system, provides service to Albany from its Albany Station at 10th Avenue SW on two routes. Long-haul train route the Coast Starlight (with service from Los Angeles to Seattle) stops in Albany daily in both directions. Amtrak Cascades commuter trains operate between Vancouver, British Columbia and Eugene, Oregon, and serve Albany several times daily in each direction. The Amtrak Cascades line is the proposed path of the Pacific Northwest Corridor high-speed rail line. The Albany station would be one of many stops along the proposed 466-mile (750 km), 110-mile-per-hour (180 km/h) passenger line. The station itself was constructed in 1909 for the Southern Pacific Railroad and is built of masonry. It is one of the oldest continuously operating passenger rail stations in the U.S. and has one of the best-equipped engine shops in the northwest. Southern Pacific 4449, a steam locomotive which resides at the Oregon Rail Heritage Center in Portland, occasionally visited the shop for repairs when it was residing at the Brooklyn Roundhouse in Portland (before 2012), as did several other locomotives stored at the now-demolished roundhouse. Beginning in 2004, the station and the surrounding area underwent an $11.3 million restoration that was funded with a combination of federal, state, local, and Amtrak money. In 2006 the city received the Award in Downtown Excellence from the Oregon Downtown Development Association for the renovation of the station.
Nickel video from the Periodic Videos series (University of Nottingham) Nickel entry (last reviewed October 30, 2019) in the NIOSH Pocket Guide to Chemical Hazards published by the CDC's National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Toxicological Profile for Nickel (draft for public comment) (PDF) (August 2023) – 422-page report from the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry The metal that brought you cheap flights, BBC News (2015) usgs.gov: Nickel
=== War on Want === From November 1983 to 1987, Galloway was the general secretary of War on Want, a British charity campaigning against poverty worldwide. In this post he travelled widely, and wrote eye-witness accounts of the famine in Eritrea in 1985 which were published in The Sunday Times and The Spectator. His deputy at the charity, Simon Stocker, recalled: "If you went into a fight with George, you knew you would never walk out with a win." On 28 October 1986, the Daily Mirror, in a front-page story by Alastair Campbell, alleged Galloway had spent £20,000 in expenses and had been "enjoying a life of luxury". An internal investigation, and later, an independent auditor, both cleared him of the accusation of any misuse of funds, although he did repay £1,720 in contested expenses. The official history of War on Want comments about Galloway that "even though the problems were not all of his own making, his way of dealing with them heightened tensions".
Nuevas Ideas retained its Legislative Assembly supermajority and, with its allies, won 43 of the country's 44 municipalities. Several news outlets described the election results as a "landslide victory" for Bukele and Nuevas Ideas, and Bukele described his victory as "the record in the entire democratic history of the world". The TSE granted Bukele his presidential credentials on 29 February and his second term began on 1 June. In a 2024 interview with Time, Bukele declined to run for a third term in the next presidential election. In July 2025, the Legislative Assembly passed several constitutional amendments, among them, the abolition of presidential term limits that made Bukele eligible to run for re-election indefinitely. Additionally, the legislature voted to move the date of the next presidential election from 2029 to 2027, reducing the length of Bukele's second term by two years. In December 2025, Bukele told YouTuber TheGrefg that "if it were up to me, I would stay for 10 more years". On 28 June 2026, Bukele registered as a pre-candidate with Nuevas Ideas, seeking a third presidential term; on 12 July, the party formally nominated him as its presidential candidate.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org
Dry powder is best kept sealed, protected from light, and held at minus 20 degrees Celsius or below. Desiccant packaging helps limit moisture uptake because the material is hygroscopic. A sealed vial should be allowed to equilibrate to room temperature before opening to reduce condensation.
Hydrolysis of peptide bonds and deamidation of arginine and proline residues are the main degradation routes. Alkaline pH and higher temperatures accelerate both processes. Buffered, near-neutral solutions stored cold generally degrade more slowly than unbuffered ones.
Reverse-phase chromatography gives the clearest single view of related impurities and truncated sequences. Mass spectrometry then confirms that the main peak carries the expected mass. Neither test detects enantiomeric impurities, which require a separate chiral assay.
Selank is a synthetic heptapeptide designed as a stabilized analog of the natural tetrapeptide tuftsin. It has been investigated mainly for anxiolytic and cognitive effects. It is not an approved pharmaceutical in most countries.