The king of anti-aging ingredients is back! Is the future billion dollar race track here for ergot sulfur, which has transformed from a "sky high priced raw material" to a "universal consumption" through biological fermentation?

At the domestic regulatory level, a certain ingredient has been accepted as a new food ingredient application (expected to be approved in 2026), which will completely unlock its legal applications in food additives, functional foods, and other fields.

Referring to the development path of similar components, the market size is expected to grow exponentially after policy liberalization, and it is expected that the terminal market size will exceed 10 billion yuan in the next five years.

In the international market, this ingredient has passed the GRAS certification of the US FDA (safe daily intake for adults ≤ 560mg), and mature markets such as the EU and Japan are also open for use, laying the foundation for global layout.

The maturity of biological fermentation technology has caused the raw material cost of this ingredient to plummet from the "sky high" price in the early days to the level of thousands of yuan/kg, significantly improving the scale production capacity.

By optimizing strains through gene editing, high-density fermentation processes (such as 20-30 ton fermentation tanks), and digital control, monthly production capacity of several tons can be achieved, with purity generally reaching over 99%.

Technological iteration has also addressed application pain points, such as increasing bioavailability to over 90% through microencapsulation technology, and improving taste and stability through liposome technology, providing support for the development of multiple dosage forms such as gummies, beverages, and capsules.

Oral anti-aging products: Oral capsules, tablets, and other products with "antioxidant and anti-aging" as their core selling points, compounded with other anti-aging ingredients (such as NAD+precursors and collagen).

Functional products: fatigue recovery products developed for the sports population, cognitive health products for the middle-aged and elderly population, etc., some of which have entered the clinical validation stage.   

Functional beverages and nutritional foods: Their potential applications in energy drinks and sports nutrition drinks are enormous, with a focus on "efficient anti fatigue and improving physical fitness".   

Special medical use food: In fields such as postoperative recovery and chronic disease management, this ingredient has the potential to be combined with other nutrients in special medical food, such as accelerating liver cell repair and enhancing immunity.