Energy Drink Ingredients

Its seems energy drink companies are cramming more and more ingredients into their products.

“What do all these ingredients supposedly do to/for my body?”, has become a common question among consumers.

Here is a list of the most common ingredients and their believed effects on the body. While ingredients such as caffeine have been widely studied, others haven’t and are using manly anecdotal evidence as justification of their use.

Caffeine

The most common stimulant, found also in coffee, Coke, and Mountain Dew but usually is found in much higher quantities in energy drinks. Most energy drinks contain between 70 and 200mg. An 8oz cup of coffee contains 110-150mg for drip, 65-125mg for percolated, and 40-80 mg for instant. Dr. Pepper gives you 41mg and a can of Coke provides 34mg. A full can of RockStar has 160mg. Caffeine stimulates the central nervous system giving the body a sense of alertness. It can raise heart rate and blood pressure while dehydrating the body. A lot of people experience side effects above 200mg, which include sleeplessness, heart palpitations, headaches, nausea, and most commonly the jitters.

Caffeine is the most widely used drug on the planet and has been used for centuries for it’s stimulating effects. We also have a huge caffeine content database that reveals the amounts found in most beverages and food in the marketplace.

For other questions about caffeine visit Caffiene FAQ a great resource for scientific caffeine information.

Taurine

Taurine is an amino acid that your body naturally produces. It helps regulate heartbeat, muscle contractions, and energy levels. Usually your body makes enough that you don’t need to supplement. It’s thought, but not proven, that under “stress conditions” like illness, physical exertion, or injury, the body does not create enough and supplements can help. Taurine might be a “mild inhibitory neurotransmitter”, some studies show it helps with excitable brain states. While this isn’t exactly what we want, maybe it helps level us out so we function better with elevated levels of other stimulants. Taurine in the past was banned by some countries from being used as a supplement, but since this ban has been lifted.

Guarana

Guarana comes from plants native to South America. Amazonians have used it for a long time to increase alertness and energy. It’s more dense in caffeine than coffee beans (3-4% vs 1-2%). It’s not just called “caffeine” because it contains a couple other things: theobromine and theophylline. They’re found in coffees and teas and are known stimulants. Marketing will sometimes call this one guaranine, as if it’s something different. It’s not. Some people do respond differently to the version of caffeine in guarana compared with regular caffeine. Some report that guarana works better, while others believe it doesn’t have as good of a stimulating effect.

B Vitamins

These are essentially the things that help you convert food to energy, like sugar which is found in abundance in energy drinks. The jury’s still out on whether or not they increase energy levels via supplementation. Search the interweb for info on proper dosing of the different vitamins. Common names for B vitamins are niacin, riboflavin, cyanocobalamin, and pyridoxine hydrochloride. Vitamins B6 and B12 don’t absorb well when taken orally, so the amounts placed in most energy drinks will likely have little to no effect.

Ginseng

Ginseng, an adaptogenic herb, is known to increase energy, has some anti-fatigue components, supposedly relieves stress, and increase memory. Right now it’s suspected that ginseng helps stimulate the hypothalamic and pituitary glands, which then secrete something called adrenal corticotropic hormone. With a name like that, it can’t possibly be bad. Ginseng is nothing that’s naturally created by your body, so having this in your drink certainly won’t hurt. 200mg/day seems to be the standard dose, but you can safely take up to 2700mg. Rare side effects such as diarrhea and headache have been reported. Usually, the energy drinks that contain Ginseng have small amounts of this herb included.

Ginkgo Biloba

This ingredient is named after the rare tree it originates from. It is believed to help with memory retention, concentration, circulation, acts as an anti-depressant, and even shows signs of helping people with Alzheimer’s. The German government recognizes it as something that helps with memory loss, concentration, and depression. 60mg is a standard supplementation dose, but you can easily take 240mg. It is advised, however, that most energy drinks do not contain enough ginkgo to be of any benefit. People on anti-depressants shouldn’t take ginkgo and some of the other side effects include blood thinning, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, headaches, dizziness, heart palpitations, and restlessness.

L-Carnitine

An amino acid usually created by your liver and kidneys, this stuff helps up your metabolism and energy levels. Because of the way it interacts with your body, it may act as a thermogenic and help increase weight loss and endurance during exercise. The jury’s still out on whether or not you need to supplement unless you have an unusual diet, but you can take 2-6 grams without worry. Make sure you get L-Carnitine, which is the type your body creates and can use. D-Carnitine is “inactive” and may actually hurt endurance levels. Rare side effects include include nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and diarrhea.

Sugars

Glucose is the body’s preferred fuel. That’s why you get hyper with a lot of sugar. Energy drinks contain a ton of sugar. Therefore, energy. It’s a carbohydrate and a lot of exercise regiments suggest a good dose of carbs for workouts lasting more than an hour. However, too much sugar intake has been linked to diabetes and can spike insulin levels which can often lead to a “crash” feeling after about an hour or so. One Rockstar energy drink can have 63 grams of sugar which is the same amount in two regular size Snickers candy bars!  See the sugar in energy drinks database for a sortable table of beverage sugar content.

Antioxidants

Anti-oxidants are things that help your body gracefully recover from the damage of free radicals. Vitamin C is an anti-oxidant, so claiming that your energy drink has a lot of anti-oxidants is like saying you’re buying really expensive orange juice. But they’re good, they help fend off illness and prevent cellular damage. Vitamins C and E, Vitamin A (aka retinol, beta-carotene), and selenium are all anti-oxidants. You wouldn’t want to depend on energy drinks for all of your vitamins as they usually contain small amounts.

Glucuronolactone

Glucuronolactone (DGL) occurs naturally in the human body as glucose is broken down by the liver. All connective tissue contains this compound. DGL is believed to aide in detoxification, freeing hormones and other chemicals, and the biosynthesis of vitamin C. It is placed in energy drinks because it is believed to help with glycogen depletion by preventing other substances from depleting glycogen supplies in the muscles.

Yerba Mate

This substance is derived from leaves of a shrub in the Holly family. It is a natural source of caffeine, but some believe that the form of caffeine in Yerba Mate’ doesn’t produce the negative side affects like the caffeine in coffee and guarana. Over the last couple of years Yerba Mate has been becoming pretty popular in energy drinks, especially the ones that are marketed as “all natural”.

Creatine

Creatine is naturally obtained by eating meat. Creatine helps with supplying energy to the muscles and is usually found in energy drinks and products that are marketed to body builders.

Acai Berry

This ingredient (pronounced ah-sah-ee) is finding its way into more and more energy drinks. Acai berry comes from the Acai Palm tree which is found in South America. The berries are rich in anti-oxidants, but not as much as a concord grape or a blueberry. Most of the acai berry benefits have no scientific basis and are attributed to marketing hype. The amount of acai in energy drinks is actually very little and real acai berry juice no doubt tastes nothing like “acai flavored” beverages as usually other fruit juices and flavors are added.

Milk Thistle

This ingredient mainly found in Rockstar and a few other drinks is used as a liver detoxifying agent. It is placed in energy drinks not really for any energy enhancing properties but as a counter agent to mixing energy drinks with alcohol as milk thistle is supposed to help with hangovers and detoxing the liver from alcohol. However, studies show that the amount put in energy drinks would be of hardly any benefit to consumers.

L-theanine

L-theanine seems to be the new ingredient showing up many new drinks. What is this strange chemical and what does it do or should we say, supposedly do?

L-theanine is an amino acid that according to recent studies has shown to calm the brain to enhance concentration. This amino acid comes simply from tea leaves. Green tea has the highest concentrations.

Tea has been known for centuries for it’s ability to relax its drinkers and many tea cultures (not the USA), have a tea before bed every night.

Manufacturers have just isolated this chemical, concentrated it, and now have begun putting it into energy drinks. They claim that it works well with caffeine because it eases the jitteriness that caffeine can cause with added concentration.

Some of the drinks that have been touting this new ingredient are; Sobe Lifewater, Vitamin Water, Vib, Gatorade Tiger Focus, and Reed’s Natural Energy Elixir.

Inositol

Inositol was once considered a B vitamin, but has since been removed from this classification because the human body is able to produce it’s own supply without the need for supplementation through the diet. It is a type of carbohydrate made from the glucose. Energy Drinks include this ingredient because it aides with the nervous system and serotonin modulation. High doses of inositol has also been given to patients with certain psychiatric conditions because of it’s positive effect on the nervous system. Inositol is found in many foods such as fruits, beans, grains, and nuts. There are no known side effects from ingesting too much and Inositol is considered safe.

Artificial Sweeteners

Many energy drinks contain artificial sweeteners. Even energy drinks that contain high amounts of sugar will include artificial sweeteners to help cover the medicinal taste of the other energy drink ingredients. The debate rages on concerning the safety of artificial sweeteners and some studies have shown that those that consume them, on average, have bigger waistlines than those that don’t. Common sweeteners used are Aspartame, Sucralose, Ace-K, as well as at times some alcohol sugars. Here are more facts about artificial sweeteners and we have popular sugar free energy drinks listed as well.

 

Sources: Kavita M. Babu, MD, Richard James Church, MD, William Lewander, MD. “Energy Drinks: The New Eye-Opener For Adolescents”. Clinical Pediatric Emergency Medicine. 2008

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