E
Tier
Pro-apoptotic peptide targeting fat tissue blood supply.
Peptide
WADA Status:
Not listed
Human Trial Scoreboard
Completed human RCTs
None completed
Largest Human Study
Primate data only
Longest exposure
None studied
Most Recent Trial
No completed trial
Description
Adipotide is a peptide designed with an unusually direct mechanism. Fat tissue requires a blood supply, and adipotide was engineered to home in on the blood vessels feeding fat and trigger their destruction, effectively starving the tissue. Research at MD Anderson showed it reduced fat mass in obese rhesus monkeys, which is a striking result. It also produced kidney toxicity in those animals, which is why the story ends there. No completed human trial exists and no development programme survives. It is sometimes confused with beloranib, a different anti-obesity molecule developed by Zafgen that had its own separate and also unsuccessful history.
What Are The Claims
Claims made for this compound: Rapid fat reduction (research)
Evidence
The primate data is the story. Barnhart and colleagues, publishing in Science Translational Medicine in 2011, reported that spontaneously obese rhesus monkeys lost roughly 11 percent of body weight over four weeks. The same paper documented dose-dependent renal proximal tubule toxicity, including elevated serum creatinine and single-cell tubular necrosis. The renal changes were reversible within the study's 28-day recovery window, which is a meaningful qualifier and should be stated alongside the finding rather than omitted in either direction. Weight loss and kidney toxicity emerged from the same experiment. Only one of those two findings tends to appear in marketing copy.
Evidence Strength
Animal/preclinical only (primate nephrotoxicity)
Caveats
Safety
Alternative Measures
Legal Status
US
Not approved
UK
Not approved
EU
Not approved
AU
Not approved
WADA
Not listed
Not approved. Development did not progress meaningfully beyond early studies. A Phase 1 trial in obese patients with prostate cancer was registered in 2012, but no efficacy results were published.
Citations
Barnhart KF et al. (2011). Science Translational Medicine. Primate study; dose-dependent renal proximal tubule toxicity with reversibility over 28-day recovery. DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.3002621.