Peptides: the chaotic frontier

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Abstract. BPC-157, TB-500, CJC-1295, Epithalon, MOTS-c: molecules that biohackers inject at home citing mouse preclinical data and before/after photos, without the trials we would take for granted for any other drug. Here I examine one by one what the literature actually says — the leap from mouse to human, the quality of substances on the grey market, the longevity clinics that exploit regulatory arbitrage to sell in Dubai what FDA and EMA have blocked. Follow-up to Living Forever.

On the biohacker catalogue, peptides occupy a peculiar position: more sophisticated than pharmacy supplements, more accessible than prescription drugs, wrapped in a scientific vocabulary that makes them seem like serious medicine without actually being so — not yet, perhaps never. It is a grey zone populated by real molecules, real literature, and claims that run much faster than the literature.

There are three mirror-image mistakes when discussing peptides. The first is to dismiss them as quackery: many have solid biological foundations, some have interesting preclinical literature, one or two are approaching serious clinical trials. The second is to treat them as finished drugs: none of the peptides on the grey market have the clinical documentation we would take for granted in any other therapeutic context. The third, more insidious, is to confuse mechanistic plausibility with clinical evidence. “It makes sense how it would work” is not the same thing as “we know it does good, in whom, at what doses, for how long, without which risks”. That distinction is everything.

This article tries to stand in that middle ground. To describe what they really are, where the claims come from, where the science stops and the marketing begins, and which peptides — today — have some basis to reason from, and which travel almost exclusively on anecdotes and before-and-after photos.

Living Forever

Wed, 22 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Abstract. Two parallel literatures circulate on longevity: the one from laboratories — slow, full of caveats — and the one from the market, which sells certainties where research offers well-characterised uncertainties. Here I lay out where solid data exist (caloric restriction, sleep, exercise, rapamycin in mice), where there is much marketing with little evidence (peptides, NAD+, premium clinics), and why the promise of an indefinitely upgradable body confuses mechanistic plausibility with biological control. The most dangerous thing is not ignorance: it is certainty.

The longevity industry thrives on a simple promise: that the body, like software, can be upgraded indefinitely. Biology, unfortunately, has other plans.

I have worked with data long enough to know that the most dangerous thing is not ignorance. It is certainty.

Years spent in the lab studying how genetics, epigenetics, and maternal care shape behaviour, stress resilience, and neuropsychiatric vulnerability in animal models teach you one fundamental thing: biological systems cannot be controlled, they have to be negotiated with. You touch one variable and all the others move — often in ways you had not anticipated, sometimes in ways you cannot even measure correctly. Then you step out of the lab, navigate the healthcare system from the other side — as a mother, as a patient, as someone trying to build an overall picture while the system hands you back fragments — and you realise that this complexity does not disappear just because someone has built a two-million-dollar protocol on top of it.

This article is not a defence of the healthcare status quo, which has its own enormous and well-documented failings. It is an invitation to look more honestly at what we actually know — and at what is being sold to us as if we knew it.

Biohacking on noema

Peptides: the chaotic frontier

Living Forever