Vitality Stack across Europe

The Vitality Stack pairs our NAD+ 1000 pen with our GHK-CU 50 pen. These are the two compounds you reach for when what you are looking at is ageing: NAD+ sits under longevity and energy, GHK-Cu under longevity and skin. They are different molecules; what they share is one observation: levels of each are reported to fall with age.

What the two have in common, and what they do not

NAD+ is not a peptide. It is a coenzyme central to cellular energy metabolism, taking part directly in redox reactions rather than binding a receptor (what NAD+ is). GHK-Cu is the tripeptide glycyl-L-histidyl-L-lysine bound to copper(II) as a defined 1:1 complex (what GHK-Cu is). Neither pen is altered for the set: both are the products listed on their own pages, nothing is co-formulated, and we give no guidance on combining or sequencing them. The only scientific link between them is the age-decline observation behind each, and that is an association, not a demonstration that restoring either reverses anything.

NAD+: a human trial record, mostly on the precursors

NAD+ is comparatively large, and poor oral absorption is the standard explanation for its injectable presentation. Its precursors nicotinamide riboside (NR) and nicotinamide mononucleotide (NMN) are smaller and taken orally, which is why most of the human trials are about them. Those trials are clear on one point: supplementation raises blood NAD+. NR and NMN produced dose-dependent increases in cellular NAD+ in humans, and a long-term randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of nicotinamide riboside chloride in healthy overweight adults addressed safety and metabolism over an extended period (Conze D et al. Safety and Metabolism of Long-term Administration of NIAGEN (Nicotinamide Riboside Chloride) in a Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-controlled Clinical Trial of Healthy Overweight Adults. Sci Rep 2019. PMID 31278280).

They are less settled on whether a raised NAD+ level produces a benefit. A meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials of NMN found no significant effect on fasting glucose, fasting insulin, glycated haemoglobin or lipid profile across short-term supplementation in the 250–2000 mg/day range (Chen F et al. Effects of Nicotinamide Mononucleotide on Glucose and Lipid Metabolism in Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Curr Diab Rep 2024. PMID 39531138), while a randomised, dose-dependent trial in healthy middle-aged adults reported improvements in physical performance measures such as six-minute walk distance (Yi L et al. The efficacy and safety of β-nicotinamide mononucleotide (NMN) supplementation in healthy middle-aged adults: a randomized, dose-dependent trial. GeroScience 2023. PMID 36482258). The biomarker moves reliably; the downstream outcomes are inconsistent by endpoint. And that applies to oral precursors, not to an injected coenzyme, which has no comparable trial record of its own.

GHK-Cu: strong cell data, human data that is topical

GHK was isolated from human albumin by Pickart in 1973. It occurs naturally in plasma, and reported levels fall from around 200 ng/ml at age 20 to roughly 80 ng/ml by 60 (Pickart L et al. GHK Peptide as a Natural Modulator of Multiple Cellular Pathways in Skin Regeneration. Biomed Res Int 2015. PMID 26236730). The best-characterised finding is stimulation of collagen synthesis in fibroblast culture, beginning between 10⁻¹² and 10⁻¹¹ M and peaking around 10⁻⁹ M (Maquart FX et al. Stimulation of collagen synthesis in fibroblast cultures by the tripeptide-copper complex GHK-Cu. FEBS Lett 1988. PMID 3169264), and reviews describe GHK modulating both synthesis and breakdown of collagen and glycosaminoglycans (Dou Y et al. The potential of GHK as an anti-aging peptide. Aging Pathobiol Ther 2020. PMID 35083444).

The human record is topical: a multicentre, randomised, evaluator-blinded, placebo-controlled study of a GHK-copper gel on diabetic neuropathic ulcers (Mulder GD et al. Enhanced healing of ulcers in patients with diabetes by topical treatment with glycyl-l-histidyl-l-lysine copper. Wound Repair Regen 1994. PMID 17147644), plus a series of skincare programmes. Those results belong to the formulations they used. A cosmetic serum, a wound gel and an injectable solution are three different products, because the complex’s behaviour depends on pH, concentration and counter-ions, and evidence from one does not transfer to the others; we set that out at GHK-Cu injectable vs topical copper peptides. Natural presence at nanogram concentrations is not a safety argument for a manufactured, far higher-concentration, injected form.

The honest gap

Longevity is the one goal whose endpoint no practical trial can measure; a lifespan study takes decades, and nothing cited here has run for decades. Both compounds are chosen on proxies: a biomarker that responds to supplementation in one case, an age-related decline and a laboratory collagen effect in the other. Whether either proxy stands for more years or better years is the question nobody can answer directly. No published trial has tested these two pens together, and neither compound holds a marketing authorisation as a medicine. The one thing we can document is the pen itself: an independent laboratory checks every batch for identity by mass spectrometry, purity by HPLC and sterility, and your lot’s certificate is a QR scan away or in the index at /coa.

Vitality Stack or Metabolic Reset?

Both stacks contain NAD+ 1000. The difference is the second pen.

Stack	Paired with NAD+	Goal pages it sits under
Vitality Stack	GHK-CU 50	Longevity, skin
Metabolic Reset	MOTS-C 32	Energy, longevity

The Metabolic Reset swaps GHK-Cu for MOTS-c, a 16-amino-acid peptide encoded in mitochondrial rather than nuclear DNA (what MOTS-c is). In mice it prevented age-dependent and diet-induced insulin resistance (Lee C et al. The mitochondrial-derived peptide MOTS-c promotes metabolic homeostasis and reduces obesity and insulin resistance. Cell Metab 2015. PMID 25738459), and it appears in papers asking whether it plays a part in exceptional longevity (Fuku N et al. The mitochondrial-derived peptide MOTS-c: a player in exceptional longevity? Aging Cell 2015. PMID 26289118); that framing is a question, not a finding, because every published result is from cell culture or rodents, with no human efficacy trial.

So the choice is by what you are looking at. If you arrive from the longevity and skin pages and want the compound with collagen data and a topical human record, the Vitality Stack is your set. If you arrive from energy and metabolic pages, prepared for a second pen with no human data at all, the Metabolic Reset is. Either way, both pens ship together under one cold chain from inside the EU.