Mucuna Pruriens

Herb

Velvet-bean seed preparations naturally containing levodopa alongside other plant constituents. Small Parkinson disease trials demonstrate that defined preparations can deliver pharmacologically meaningful levodopa, but commercial products are not compositionally interchangeable.

Pharmacokinetic model

A route-level PK model for mucuna pruriens is being prepared from published data. Dosing references, studies, and documented interactions are below; the app catalog is updated as models are validated.

Key facts

Category
Herb
Suggested cadence
once daily

Research behind this entry

  1. Mucuna pruriens in Parkinson's disease: a double blind clinical and pharmacological study Katzenschlager R, Evans A, Manson A, Patsalos PN, Ratnaraj N, Watt H, Timmermann L, Van der Giessen R, Lees AJ · Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry, 2004 DOI

    Eight patients completed a randomized double-blind crossover comparison of standard levodopa/carbidopa with 15 g and 30 g of an analyzed Mucuna preparation. The 30 g preparation produced faster onset, higher levodopa…

  2. Mucuna pruriens improves male fertility by its action on the hypothalamus-pituitary-gonadal axis Shukla KK, Mahdi AA, Ahmad MK, Shankhwar SN, Rajender S, Jaiswar SP · Fertility and Sterility, 2009 DOI

    Prospective study compared 75 fertile controls with 75 men undergoing infertility evaluation and reported changes in semen, catecholamine, and reproductive-hormone measures after Mucuna treatment. The design was not a…

2 published studies referenced in the app, each with a plain-language summary.