MOTS-c

Where it comes from

Made in

Muscle and other tissues; found in blood, where it falls with age

Sent out by

Exercise raises it in muscle and blood; glucose restriction raises it in cells

Acts on

• Skeletal muscle (glucose uptake)
• Fat tissue
• The nucleus (stress-response genes)

What it does

• Improves insulin sensitivity and prevents diet-induced obesity in mice ¹
• Lets old mice run longer when injected, and rises in human muscle and blood after a single bout of exercise ²
• A Northeast Asian variant (K14Q, from m.1382A>C) goes with more type 2 diabetes in men but not women across three Japanese cohorts of 27,527 people, and only in the least active third ³

In medicine

• No approved medicine. A MOTS-c analogue (CB4211) completed a phase 1 trial in obese people with fatty liver in 2021: liver enzymes and glucose fell over four weeks, weight did not, and the company merged away from it in 2023
• Blood MOTS-c is a research measurement rather than a test anyone is offered, though it moves with both exercise and age ²

Beyond the body’s own use

• MOTS-c is named on the World Anti-Doping Agency’s Prohibited List as an AMPK activator among the metabolic modulators, banned at all times, in and out of competition ⁴
• It is promoted to athletes and for longevity as a research peptide, and people obtain it outside approval. Unapproved and compounded preparations are not reviewed for safety, effectiveness or quality
• No controlled human evidence supports either claim: the exercise findings are in mice and in muscle biopsies, and the only trial of an analogue in people ran for four weeks ²