Nutrition21’s nooLVL ingredient offers cognitive benefits to everyone, not just gamers: SupplySide West 2021 report

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Nutrition 21 (Harrison, NY) has been growing its footprint in the esports dietary supplement market with its nooLVL ingredient for the past several years. The ingredient is a patented complex of bonded arginine silicate and inositol. Back in 2019, the company published a human clinical study¹ done specifically in esport athletes that found that nooLVL significantly improved visual attention, motor speed, and reaction time. At this October’s SupplySide West show, the company unveiled its latest published study², which found that nooLVL can offer gamers not just reaction-time benefits but much more. The study showed nooLVL provides cognitive health benefits that are far more extensive, including enhancing short-term memory, working memory, and concentration. These benefits can also apply to non-gamers.

This latest double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled crossover study was done in 26 male and female gamers. Subjects performed cognitive function tests then took either a single dose of the supplement (1600 mg of nooLVL) or a single dose of the placebo (1600 mg of PLA). Fifteen minutes after supplementation, they repeated the cognitive tests and played a video game for one hour. They repeated the cognitive function tests yet again post-game. Then the crossover began in which they underwent a 7- to 14-day washout period before being given the alternate treatment.

The study was conducted at Texas A&M University. According to a Nutrition21 press release, the study “demonstrated that nooLVL significantly increases cognitive performance in gamers after a single dose and within 15 minutes” and that it “enhanced short-term and working memory, reaction time, and concentration.”

These benefits not only suit esports players, who “rely on quick reactions, focus, memory, and fine motor skills to excel during competition,” the company says. This new study shows that nooLVL can benefit everyday consumers who need enhanced cognitive function and reaction time.

“Demographically, this is so much bigger than gamers,” said Becky Wright, Nutrition21’s media representative, at the SupplySide West show. “At the end of the day, the benefits for this are so much wider and pertain to people who are studying for college exams. It pertains to people like us working very long hours who need to keep the energy and mental endurance going. Those ancillary benefits of being able to help somebody who needs that mental endurance, but in a non-stimulant way, is so universal. So many people can relate to that, so it just makes sense that that’s where this is going.” It’s a direction the company will continue to explore moving forward, she added.

That said, the ingredient’s primary focus is still the esports market, and Nutrition21 emphasizes the fact that its research is done in actual esports subjects.

“This is our second study on nooLVL showing a range of cognitive performance benefits specifically in gamers. This is exciting for Nutrition21 since we were the first to study cognitive function in egamers,” said Danielle Greenberg, PhD, FACN, vice president, scientific affairs, Nutrition21, in a press release. “This latest research allows us to add new cognitive performance claims around short-term and working memory, as well as reinforce the reaction time claims from our first study.”

nooLVL’s usage in the esports supplement market is “exploding,” said Matthew Ruggiero, assistant marketing manager, Nutrition21, at SupplySide West. “It’s really successful. We have a lot of top brands like Ghost Gamer. It was already pretty big pre-COVID, but COVID sent it into the stratosphere. As it’s grown, we’ve seen the products we were in before grow with it.”

More gamers are including supplements as part of their regimen. “They’re training like professional athletes,” said Wright, “so they’re taking a lot of care when it comes to their physical fitness and their health and wellness. Most of them have trainers. They’re lifting, they’re running, they’re clean-eating. The attention to what they put in their bodies is definitely a reality for them. They are not guzzling Red Bull anymore. They’re not doing Monster energy drinks. They’re transitioning a lot to things that are keeping them physically fit but also mentally fit for the long haul.”

Read more of our coverage on the esports market here and here.

References

1. Tartar J et al. “A prospective study evaluating the effects of a nutritional supplement intervention on cognition, mood states, and mental performance in video gamers.” Nutrients, vol. 11, no. 10 (October 1, 2019): 2326
2. Sowinski R et al. “Effects of inositol-enhanced bonded arginine silicate ingestion on cognitive and executive function in gamers.” Nutrients. Published online October 24, 2021.