It is now generally accepted that d-ribose supplementation provides many health benefits, particularly in the area of cellular energy management.
Several recent publications, however, have raised the question of whether d-ribose—because it is a sugar—could possibly contribute to development of harmful advanced glycation endproducts.40-43
The truth seems to be straightforward: Like any sugar, ribose can indeed cause protein glycation, with resulting damage to tissues.42 And when ribose is administered experimentally at the same high dose as glucose, ribose quickly causes the protein cross-linking that is the outcome of glycation.40
But those studies used artificially high doses and concentrations of ribose, levels never found in humans—even after high-dose supplementation.
For example, in a human study of d-ribose supplementation at doses of 20 and 53 grams over a 4-hour period, peak serum ribose levels rose to only 4.8 mg/dL and 81.7 mg/dL, respectively.44
But doses used in the glycation experiments were significantly higher, upto 30 times higher than achievable in human blood!42,43
And in an experiment showing that d-ribose induced glycation and impaired spatial cognition in mice, the ribose concentrations used were equivalent to blood levels of 150 to 750 mg/dL, clearly vastly higher than have been used in human studies.43,44
Researchers seeking to show that ribose-induced glycation could enhance cartilage damage in an animal model of osteoarthritis showed conclusively that even direct injection of ribose into the joint was incapable of triggering sufficient glycation to cause injury!45,46
The doses for d-ribose studies reported in this article—15 to 60 grams per day in divided doses—are incapable of causing serum ribose concentrations high enough to get anywhere near the risk of excessive glycation reported in the lab studies.44
Also, most human studies recommended splitting the total amount into three daily doses; this approach provides even greater assurance that serum d-ribose remains well within safe levels.