(Inonotus obliquus)

The Premier Medicinal Mushroom

Also known as: The Gift from God and King of Medicinal Herbs 

A Dynamic  Anti-Aging  Longevity Food Supplement         

Definition: Adaptogen  

The primary active compounds discovered in Siberian Chaga are a variety of triterpenes and sterols including Lanosterol, Ergosterol, Inotodiols, Saponins, and Polysaccharides.

Siberian Chaga, unlike the other medicinal mushrooms has an exceptional amount of Betulinic acid and SOD (Super Oxide Dismutase) content. SOD is an extremely potent antioxidant enzyme that fights cellular damage from reactive singlet oxygen molecules, also known as free radicals. Research suggests that SOD may be the most important enzyme in our body for the control of free radicals, keeping our cell membranes young, supple, and healthy. SOD is one of the most important anti oxidants in our body. Chaga has far more SOD than vitamin C, E and foods like barley grass seaweed prunes, fish oils, many aromatherpy.

The Chaga mushroom (Inonotus obliquus) is claimed to have beneficial properties for human health such as anti-bacterial, anti-allergic, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities. The antioxidant effects of the mushroom may be partly explained by protection of cell components against free radicals.

The anti-cancer properties of betulin or betulinic acid, a chemical isolated from birch trees is now being studied for use as a chemotherapeutic agent.  Chaga contains large amounts of betulinic acid in a form that can be ingested orally, and it also contains the full spectrum of immune-stimulating phytochemicals found in other medicinal mushrooms such as maitake mushroom and shiitake mushroom. 

Chaga also has melanin compounds that nourish the skin and hair.

Consumption: 10 drops twice daily, increase as need for wellness increases. Mix with beverage of choice or sprinkle on food.

Bottle size: 1.7 ounces

Drops per bottle: 600

Duration of bottle: 1 month if taken daily as suggested

Expectations: Almost every person who uses Chaga for any extended period of time will experience benefits. In some cases the benefits may be almost instantaneous and profound, while others the influence may be subtle at first, with cumulative effects developing over time.

Duration of Usage: Chaga by its very nature is safe and may be used for a lifetime to reinforce our health.

Chaga has even been classified as a medicinal mushroom under World Trade Organization (WTO) codes and has been granted GRAS (Generally Recognized As Safe) status from the WHO (World Health Organization).

 SiberianChaga

FDA Classification: Food

Safety Issues: None known

Toxicity: None known

Drug Contradictions: None known

Taste: None

Odor: None

Refrigeration: None

Shelf Life: Indefinite

Scientific Classification: Kingdom: Fungi

                                   Subkingdom: Dikarya

                                   Phylum: Basidiomycota

                                   SubPhylum: Agaricomycotina

                                   Class: Agaricomycetes

                                   Order: Hymenochaetales

                                   Family: Hymenohcaetaceae

                                   Genus: Inonotus

                                   Species: I. Obliquus

Scientific Advisor: Dr. Karl Maret 

President of the Dove Health Alliance, a nonprofit foundation based in Aptos, California, focused on the creation and promotion of global research and education in energy medicine. He practices complementary and alternative medical modalities including nutrition, functional medicine and energy medicine at the Dove Center for Integral Medicine in Aptos, CA. Trained in both electrical and biomedical engineering before his medical studies in Canada, he also completed a 4 year post-doctoral research fellowship at UCSD, where he developed all the instrumentation for the successful American Medical Research Expedition to Mt. Everest in 1981.

CI's State-of-the-Art Processing Plant:  designed and built by Mr. James Osugi, applies a proprietary low-pressure aqueous extraction technique that optimizes the active enzymes, dietary fiber, and other nutrients to create one of the most potent antioxidant available. We use a low-pressure aqueous extraction technique to ensure the preservation of the active compounds of the Chaga mushroom. This pure extract is blended in a proprietary mineral water formulation that yields a molecular structure uniquely suited to rapid absorption into the blood stream and cellular membranes. The crystalline mineral water is uniquely suited to preserve the antioxidant value of the Chaga extract throughout the bottling process until consumption by the end-consumer. We further enhance our formula with mineral compounds to facilitate delivery of health-giving compounds to the cells upon digestion.

Other known Chaga forms:  Powder and Alcohol based tincture, both inferior and with respective problems. Powder form can contain harmful molds. Alcohol damages the life energy of Chaga. These forms do not yield satisfactory results.

Major Publications: PubMed.com, Medscape.com, Life Science

NaturalNews.com - Natural Pedia Medicinal Mushrooms: An Exploration of Tradition, Healing, & Culture

 Siberian Chaga ongoing studies include:

- Tumor research in various cell lines 
- HIV and Immune compromised diseases
- Gastrointestinal imbalances 
- Cardiovascular Diseases 
- Lung Disorders
- Natural Antioxidant levels 

Why Take Medicinal Mushrooms?

•    They provide support to nearly all the body's systems and regulatory functions.
•    They are veritable powerhouses of pharmaceutical compounds, including an array of water-   soluble polysaccharides (complex sugars) that have shown remarkable anti-cancer, immuno-  enhancing and overall healing properties.   
•    They assist the body in adapting to internal and external stress.
•    They have a very long history of use in Eastern and Western medical traditions.
•    Their medical use has the backing of current, peer-reviewed scientific research.
•    They produce no negative side effects and are proven to be non-toxic.

Chaga (Inonotus obliquus)

•   Extracts of Chaga were approved as an anticancer drug (befungin) in Russia as early as 1955, and have been reported to be successful in treating breast, lung, cervical, and stomach cancers.
•    Chaga concentrates betulin from the bark of birch trees, which has shown promise in treating malignant melanoma, completely inhibiting tumors implanted in mice and causing apoptosis of cancerous cells. 
•    Chaga extracts also show antibacterial, antiviral, and anti-inflammatory activity, and is known to be a liver tonic and an immune enhancer
•    Chaga has recently shown to be a powerful antioxidant.
•    Chaga is dark and rich, almost like molasses. 

•    Herbal support for the immune system.
•    Anti-microbial properties
•    Traditionally used for liver support and as a blood-purifying tonic.
•    Only common herb used in both the Essiac and Hoxsey anti-cancer formulas.

Product ships to: All countries.

Siberian Chaga is a superior grade medicinal mushroom containing over 215 phytonutrients, including:

- Polysaccharides to enhance the immune system treat cancer, HIV virus, and other anti-bacterial and viral infections.

- Betulinic acid to counter viral infections and tumors.

- Triterpenes to lower cholesterol, improve digestion, detoxify the liver, treat hepatitis, chronic bronchitis, coughs and asthma.

- Germanium to cleanse the blood, normalize blood pressure and prevent tumors.

- Other nucleosides, phytonutrients, minerals and amino acids such as Saponin, Iron,  Magnesium, Chromium, Betaglucan, Inotodiol, Isoprenoid and others.

Siberian Chaga contains an extraordinary amount of SOD (Super oxide dismutase) antioxidants that absorb free radicals and neutralize them before they can damage body tissue cells. Chaga contains 25-50 times more SOD antioxidants than other medicinal mushrooms.

SOD (Super oxide dismutase) units per gram:

Documented as early as 4600 years ago, ancient Asian folk medicine practitioners relied upon Chaga, a medicinal mushroom, to maintain a healthy life energy balance (“Chi”) or Life Force as we'd put it here, to preserve youth, promote longevity, and boost the body’s immune system to fight viral, bacterial, fungal and parasitic maladies. As a folk medicine, Chaga was ingested by the local people of the Siberian mountain regions in tea or powder form, inhaled from smoke, and applied to the skin for healing of injury or rash. Indigenous people from that area have been documented to live beyond 100 years of age.

The Chinese Monk Shen Nong, in his work Shen Nong Ben Cao Jin, the first of the three ancient medical books that serve as the foundation of Traditional Chinese Medicine, proclaimed Chaga as a superior class medicinal herb, for its diverse and complete homeopathic properties . Since then, Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners have applied Chaga as a remedy for serious human virus and disease, including anti-viral applications such as influenza, anti-inflammatory treatment of stomach ulcers, the arrest and reversal of tumor growth, balancing the endocrine system in the treatment of diabetes, anti-oxidant uses in detoxifying the body, and as a daily supplement for the overall balancing of the body’s immune system and genoprotective properties increasing longevity.

Siberian Chaga, Inonotus Obliquus, naturally found in the black birch forests of the Siberian mountain regions is the most potent of all the varieties of Chaga mushrooms. Chaga is a parasitic carpophore that enters a wound on a mature tree then grows under the bark until it blisters through the bark forming a grotesque black charcoal-like conk on the tree trunk, hence the Latin epithet “Obliquus”. The Chaga conk grows with the tree over a 5 to 7 year period, thriving in the harsh Siberian winter environment, absorbing life-sustaining nutrients from the black birch tree, until the conk flower fully ripens, falling to the forest floor, followed shortly by the death of the host tree, completing a 20 year micro-ecological cycle.

Russian culture has embraced the medicinal uses of Siberian Chaga, and its uses have spread westward to the Urals and Baltic regions of the European continent. In the 12th Century Tsar Vladimir Monamah was treated with Chaga (for symptoms most probably of lip cancer). Nobel Laureate Alexander Solzhenitsyn was awed by the healing powers of Chaga to treat cancer during the 1950s in his investigative research of patient treatment in provincial Siberian hospitals in his famous work, The Cancer Ward. Today, Chaga tea is commonly used in Russian cultures as a family cupboard remedy to support a healthy immune system and as a powerful antioxidant.

The post-antibiotic world of Western Medicine is now beginning to study, evaluate, and test Chaga for the active compounds underlying its historically understood homeopathic benefits. As with many other natural medicinal foods and herbs, the modern medical and scientific community is coming to understand that whole supplements like Chaga, offer a complex balance of active compounds, delivery mineral structures, and co-agents, more effective to sustaining a healthy immune balance than isolated compounds synthesized from these natural products.

The primary active compounds discovered in Siberian Chaga are a variety of triterpenes and sterols, including Lanosterol, Ergosterol Inotodials, Saponins, and Polysaccharides. Modern research is now beginning to demonstrate that these compounds are effective for human maladies treated by folk medicine practitioners with natural products, without toxic side-effect, for millennia.

After being ignored for hundreds of years by western pharmacologists, Chaga is currently enjoying a resurgence as a possible treatment for a wide variety of diseases and health problems, including chronic fatigue syndrome, the flu, stomach problems, and even HIV and certain types of cancer. Recent studies in the U.S., Russia, and other countries have shown Chaga to have anti-tumor benefits related to the mammary glands and female sex organs; studies in Finland have demonstrated that inotodial, one of the most active ingredients in Chaga, was effective against influenza virus and various cancer cells; and Japanese research not only found similar antiviral activity, but also discovered that Chaga shows activity against HIV (protease inhibition).

Chaga has even been classified as a medicinal mushroom under World Trade Organization (WTO) codes.

Arguably, the most well known western research conducted on the use of Chaga has been performed by Dr. Kirsti Kahlos and her team at School of Pharmacology, at the University of Helsinki, Finland. Dr. Kahlos’ team conducted studies validating the immuno-modulating impact of Lanosterol-linked triterpenes effective as a flu-vaccination and for anti-tumor applications.

The following article was published by the NCBI (National Center for Biotechnology Information) a joint venture by the National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.

Established in 1988 as a national resource for molecular biology information, NCBI creates public databases, conducts research in computational biology, develops software tools for analyzing genome data, and disseminates biomedical information - all for the better understanding of molecular processes affecting human health and disease

Chaga mushroom extract inhibits oxidative DNA damage in human lymphocytes as assessed by comet assay.

The Chaga mushroom (Inonotus obliquus) is claimed to have beneficial properties for human health, such as anti-bacterial, anti-allergic, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities. The antioxidant effects of the mushroom may be partly explained by protection of cell components against free radicals.

We evaluated the effect of aqueous Chaga mushroom extracts for their potential for protecting against oxidative damage to DNA in human lymphocytes. Cells were pretreated with various concentrations (10, 50, 100 and 500 microg/mL) of the extract for 1 h at 37 degrees C. Cells were then treated with 100 microM of H2O2 (Hydrogen Peroxide) for 5 min as an oxidative stress. Evaluation of oxidative damage was performed using single-cell gel electrophoresis for DNA fragmentation (Comet assay). Using image analysis, the degree of DNA damage was evaluated as the DNA tail moment.

Cells pretreated with Chaga extract showed over 40% reduction in DNA fragmentation compared with the positive control (100 micromol H2O2 treatment). Thus, Chaga mushroom treatment affords cellular protection against endogenous DNA damage.