The Science of AnnattoActive™

Vitamin E is a family of eight related molecules: four tocopherols (alpha, beta, gamma, delta) and four tocotrienols (alpha, beta, gamma, delta). Both share the same chromanol head, but tocopherols carry a fully saturated phytyl tail, while tocotrienols carry an unsaturated farnesyl tail with three double bonds (see figure below). That structural difference gives tocotrienols greater membrane mobility and, in published in-vitro comparisons, substantially higher antioxidant activity than tocopherols (Müller L. et al., Molecular Nutrition & Food Research, 2010;54:731–742).

Within the tocotrienol family, structures are distinguished by methyl substitution on the chromanol ring (R¹ and R² positions). AnnattoActive™ is enriched in the two most biologically active structure — delta-tocotrienol (R¹=H, R²=H) at approximately 90%, and gamma-tocotrienol (R¹=H, R²=CH₃) at approximately 10% — with only trace alpha- and beta- forms. Delta-tocotrienol is generally regarded in published literature as the homolog with the greatest antioxidant and cell-membrane activity of the group, followed by gamma-tocotrienol.