Advanced physiological roles of guanidinoacetic acid.

Dietary guanidinoacetic acid (GAA) seems to improve cellular bioenergetics by stimulating creatine biosynthesis. However, GAA could have other biological functions that might affect its possible use as a food ingredient in human nutrition. In this paper, we identified several alternative physiological roles of supplemental GAA, including the stimulation of hormonal release and neuromodulation, an alteration of metabolic utilization of arginine, and an adjustment of oxidant-antioxidant status. A better knowledge of how GAA affects human physiology may facilitate its use as an experimental nutritional intervention for novel purposes and conditions.