Absorption of Orally Administered Hyaluronan

Kimura M, Maeshima T, Kubota T, Kurihara H, Masuda Y, Nomura Y · Journal of Medicinal Food

Answers what actually happens to swallowed hyaluronan, and the answer is that it does not stay hyaluronan. Intestinal bacteria degrade it to oligosaccharides, which are absorbed in the large intestine; disaccharide, tetrasaccharide and polysaccharide forms then reached the skin. Nothing was absorbed as the intact 300 kDa polymer. That reframes the usual worry about hyaluronan being heat-labile in a stockpot: the gut fragments it regardless of what cooking did first.

Population

Rats given oral hyaluronan

Intervention

Orally administered high-molecular-weight hyaluronan, 300 kDa

Limitations

Rats, and skin rather than a joint. Dose is not stated in the abstract. Establishes the route and the fragmentation, not that any of it reaches cartilage or does anything there.