NOW Foods D-Mannose

D-Mannose is a simple sugar that occurs naturally in some plants, including cranberries. Although small amounts of D-Mannose are metabolized by the human body, much of it is rapidly excreted in the urine. In the bladder, D-Mannose can adhere to undesirable foreign substances, preventing them from sticking to the lining of the bladder. Because insubstantial amounts of D-Mannose are used by the body, it does not interfere with blood sugar regulation.

• Healthy Urinary Tract
• Washes Away Undesirable Particles

D-Mannose is a simple six-carbon sugar also sold as Seminose or Carubinose. Mannose is a sterioisomer of Glucose and naturally occurs as a monosaccharide in fruits like pineapple and cranberry as well as in the glycoproteins of many plants and fungi.

NOW Foods' pure Mannose is produced by the isomerization of glucose derived from NON-GM corn, white and sweet potatoes. It has a caloric value of 4 calories per gram and is a minimum of 98% pure, the remaining being mostly moisture. The purity and identity have been verified by a third party laboratory using a specific HPLC method to ensure no contamination with other sugars. Microbiological and heavy metal testing are performed to further ensure that this product is completely safe for human consumption. NOW Foods has taken many steps in order to guarantee that its Mannose is the purest product available today.

Studies suggest that Mannose may maintain and support a healthy urinary tract by blocking the adhesion of disease-causing organisms like E. coli to the surface of the host tissue. In most cases, pathogenic bacteria that cause urinary tract infections do so by utilizing tiny hair-like projections on their surface called fimbrium. Protruding from the tips of these fimbrium are glycoproteins called lectins. It is these lectins that bind to certain sugar components like Mannose that are normally present on the surface tissues that line the urinary tract, thereby initiating the bacterial infection process.

When sufficient Mannose is consumed, the excess molecules of this sugar present in the resident urine act as a sacrificial bodyguards that attach themselves to the lectins, thereby blocking the disease-causing E. coli from adhering to the tissues of the bladder and subsequent colonization. The Mannose-saturated E. coli bacteria are subsequently flushed away during urination.

Though Mannose is a simple sugar and is absorbed in the upper gastrointestinal tract, it is absorbed at a slower rate than most sugars and is not readily converted to glycogen for storage. A substantial amount of Mannose is absorbed into the bloodstream mostly unchanged. After passing through the kidneys, it is excreted into the urine and continues its journey through the ureters, bladder and urethra where it performs a valuable service to support and maintain a healthy urinary tract before exiting the body.

NOW's Mission
The NOW mission is - To provide value in products and services that empower people to lead healthier lives. NOW Foods is an award-winning and highly respected manufacturer of vitamins, minerals, dietary supplements and natural foods.

In 1948, with the natural food and supplement industry in its infancy, entrepreneur Paul Richard paid $900 for the purchase of Fearn Soya Foods—a Chicago based manufacturer of grain and legume-based products. This began a six-decade legacy of providing health-seeking consumers with high-quality, affordable nutrition products.

History of NOW
In 1968, NOW Foods was founded under the belief that good health was not a luxury available only to the wealthy. For the past forty years, NOW has made it their life's work to offer health food and nutritional supplements of the highest quality, at prices that are fair and affordable to all those who seek them. Today, NOW Foods is one of the top-selling brands in health foods stores, an award-winning manufacturer, a respected advocate of the natural product industry, and a leader in the fields of nutritional science and methods development. And while NOW has grown considerably over the past four decades, one thing has never changed – NOW's commitment to providing products and services that empower people to lead healthier lives.

NOW Commitments

• Customer Focused and Information Driven - NOW believes that their products, services, and the decisions they make should be primarily influenced by the desires and needs of NOW customers. The decisions that NOW makes should be based on accurate information and therefore NOW places a high value on knowledge and learning within their organization.
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• Natural is Better - NOW is convinced that natural products are better than their synthetic counterparts and produce better results in human health. Therefore, wherever possible, NOW strives to provide products that contain natural ingredients because they are better for their customers.

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NOW's experienced professional and technical staff formulates their products to be of the highest quality. NOW has a group of biochemists, chemists, nutritionists, and food technologists who review current science and nutritional parameters, and formulate our products to be effective for the intended use. NOW's structure/function claims are based on science for active ingredients, and on nutritional science for nutritional content. Serving sizes are based on doses from clinical studies and other published data. NOW's contemporary formulas are designed to meet the health and wellness needs of today’s consumers. NOW uses ingredients that have been tested for effectiveness in clinical trials and laboratory studies. The heart of NOW science is third party independent research. NOW investigates and review clinical studies and other lab studies conducted on their ingredients and their formulas. Best science is used to support best formulations which lead to best quality. NOW products are constantly being tested in clinical trials conducted at top universities and research centers around the country and in various parts of the world. NOW products are being tested to determine such things as effectiveness for joint support, quality of life for cancer patients, cardiovascular support, and athletic endurance. Effective products mean health and wellness benefits, which mean quality.

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NOW’s GMP certification covers standard operating procedures, employee training, product specifications, expiration dating, vendor certifications and much more. Standard operating procedures include sampling and testing incoming materials according to NOW Foods specifications, inspecting manufacturing processes, and testing finished products to specifications. Tests include organoleptic evaluation (human senses such as sight, taste, smell), physical testing of tablets and capsules, chemical identity of ingredients, potency and contamination testing by the company’s in-house state-of-the-art analytical testing lab, as well as microbiological testing by NOW Foods’ in-house rapid analysis microbiological lab.