This page shows what was measured, who it was measured in, and what that does not settle.
What Semax does in the body
A Russian stroke and thinking peptide sold elsewhere without approval.
Semax is a piece of a hormone the body already makes. Adrenocorticotropic hormone controls the stress axis, but a short stretch in the middle of it — residues 4 to 10 — has effects on attention, memory and nerve survival that have nothing to do with cortisol. Semax takes four of those residues and adds a three-residue tail, proline-glycine-proline, which acts as armour: peptidases that would chew the peptide up in seconds cannot get past it. Given as a nasal spray, enough survives to reach the brain. What happens there is not a receptor being switched on. In rat stroke models it shifts the expression of hundreds of genes at once, including those for neurotrophic factors and for the inflammatory response, which is a description of an effect rather than of a mechanism.
What happened in people
Rat stroke studies found broad changes in immune, inflammation and brain-signal genes.
✓ Reviewed first-read answer
Where this came from
A person wrote this and a reviewer approved it against this exact record. It carries no effect size.
A reviewer approved this against this record. The reviewed-claim record carrying the exact population and effect size does not exist yet.
No source is stored against this line.
The limit that matters most
Human stroke reports are largely in Russian journals and were not registered in advance.
Where it acts
Cortex, hippocampus and striatum; in the stroke models, the ischaemic penumbra surrounding the infarct
Kind of result
Living longer, or avoiding a major event
Supervision
RNAWiki has not recorded a supervision or regulatory status for this substance.
What the registries record it as
The substance registry classes this as chemical.
FDA substance registry · I5FAL2585H · read 2026-08-29
Its recorded molecular formula is C37H51N9O10S, weighing 813.9.
PubChem record · 9811102 · read 2026-08-29
Where each sentence above came from
No recorded sentence describes the change this makes in a way that stands on its own. The page opens with what it is taken for instead, and the recorded explanation follows below.
Shown as the opening line on this page.
The limit a reviewer approved as the one that matters most here.
The four opening statements run to 155 words.
Words this page uses
Four words worth knowing first
Chosen from what this page shows, with each one explained before the word it depends on.
Protein
A protein is a folded chain your body builds to do a specific job.
A picture of it, and where the picture fails
A protein is like a tool bent into one shape for one task.
Where that stops being true. A tool keeps its shape. A protein can change shape and stop working.
What people get wrong. Protein in food and a protein in the body are related but not the same thing.
A polymer of amino acids folded into a defined structure that determines its function.
Enzyme
An enzyme is a protein that speeds up one chemical change.
A picture of it, and where the picture fails
An enzyme is like a machine on a production line doing one cut.
Where that stops being true. A machine is switched on and off by a person. Enzymes are controlled by the cell.
What people get wrong. Enzymes are thought to be used up. They are not; they work again and again.
A catalytic protein that lowers the activation energy of a specific reaction.
Receptor
A receptor is a part of a cell that a signal fits into.
A picture of it, and where the picture fails
A receptor is like a lock waiting for one key.
Where that stops being true. A lock either opens or does not. A receptor can be half-triggered, or worn out.
What people get wrong. Fitting a receptor is read as causing a benefit. It causes a step, and nothing more.
A protein that binds a specific ligand and converts that binding into a cellular response.
Pathway
A pathway is a chain of steps inside a cell, each one setting off the next.
A picture of it, and where the picture fails
A pathway is like a row of dominoes.
Where that stops being true. Dominoes fall one way. Pathways loop back and can switch themselves off.
What people get wrong. Changing one step is read as changing the outcome. Other steps often absorb it.
An ordered series of molecular interactions producing a defined cellular change.
What happened in people◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
What happened in people
Each card is one study: the exact question it asked, who was in it, and whether it showed what it set out to show.
Neurological outcome at different stages of ischaemic stroke
✓ The study showed what it set out to show
Who was studied
Russian clinical reports in ischaemic stroke
How many people
0
Study design
Clinical reports published in Russian-language journals, unregistered
Compared against
Not recorded for this study
Kind of result
A number that stands in for health
What was found
Reported as favourable in the source publications. No protocol registration, no published statistical analysis plan, and no replication outside the Commonwealth of Independent States
Repeated elsewhere
Unreplicated
What this does not prove. Meeting one endpoint in one population does not carry to other goals or other people.
The limits of this study, and where it came from
Main limit. A Belgian national medicines control laboratory analysing seized semax preparations recorded that to its knowledge the peptide has not completed any clinical trials.
How far it carries. This study is recorded from the curated record, not from the registry match.
Form and route. Intranasal drops or spray in the Russian registered product; lyophilised powder for injection and nasal sprays elsewhere
Interval reported. Not recorded in this summary
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim.
Differential gene and protein expression in cortex and subcortex, by degree of ischaemic damage
✓ The study showed what it set out to show
Who was studied
Rat transient middle cerebral artery occlusion transcriptomics programme
How many people
0
Study design
Preclinical, rat focal cerebral ischaemia, multiple studies 2017-2025
Compared against
Not recorded for this study
Kind of result
A number that stands in for health
What was found
Consistent suppression of proinflammatory transcripts and partial compensation of the ischaemia-disrupted expression profile at 24 hours, confirmed at the protein level
Repeated elsewhere
Partially Replicated
What this does not prove. Meeting one endpoint in one population does not carry to other goals or other people.
The limits of this study, and where it came from
Main limit. The programme is almost entirely from one institutional group, and reports transcriptional and proteomic endpoints rather than infarct volume or functional recovery as the primary outcome.
How far it carries. This study is recorded from the curated record, not from the registry match.
Form and route. Intranasal drops or spray in the Russian registered product; lyophilised powder for injection and nasal sprays elsewhere
Interval reported. Not recorded in this summary
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim.
RNAWiki holds 3 written-up human studies for this substance, each with the question it asked.
How we know it
Each card names the study, the number of people and what the study set out to measure.
What this does not prove
These summaries were written by a person and have not been signed off as reviewed claims.
Why it matters
A study that failed is as informative as one that worked, and both are here.
What we still do not know
No reviewed claim exists, so no exact population, effect size or interval is published yet.
What happened in people◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
How close this is to real life
The top step is something a person would feel or care about. The bottom is a guess from software. Filled steps are where evidence exists for this substance.
□Living longer, or avoiding a major eventNo evidence recorded. Death, a heart attack, a stroke, a hospital stay.No registered study measures this.
□What a body can do day to dayNo evidence recorded. Walking, dressing, breathing, recovering.No registered study measures this.
□Measured performanceNo evidence recorded. How much was lifted, how far was run, how fast.No registered study measures this.
□Symptoms and quality of lifeNo evidence recorded. Pain, tiredness, mood, sleep, as the person rated it.No registered study measures this.
□A number that stands in for healthNo evidence recorded. Cholesterol, blood sugar, bone density. A stand-in, not the thing itself.No registered study measures this.
□A step measured inside a personNo evidence recorded. Something measured in human tissue or human cells.No registered study measures this.
■AnimalsEvidence recorded. Mice, rats, dogs. Useful for ideas, not proof about people.Stored records in Mouse, Rat. A result in animals says what to test next. It does not say what happens in people.
□Cells in a dishNo evidence recorded. Cells or chemistry on a bench, far from a whole body.No cell or bench record is stored.
□A guess from softwareNo evidence recorded. Nobody measured it. RNAWiki never publishes one as a finding.RNAWiki stores no prediction for this record. Software can suggest a link. RNAWiki does not publish one as a finding.
Higher on these steps means closer to something a person would feel. It does not mean better done.
What it changes in the body◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
The path through the body
From what a person takes to what changes. A solid line is a step measured in people. A dashed line is a step nobody has measured that way.
Start
Semax
What a person takes: Intranasal drops or spray in the Russian registered product; lyophilised powder for injection and nasal sprays elsewhere.
The measurement behind this step
The registered route is intranasal, chosen because the peptide is cleared from plasma within minutes and nasal delivery provides a route to brain tissue that bypasses that. Outside Russia the same peptide is sold as a nasal spray and as a lyophilised powder for reconstitution and injection, a route the registered product does not use and for which no human data exist.
Getting in
Given as a nasal spray
The usual route is drops or spray into the nose, which puts the peptide close to the brain without an injection.
──Measured in people. Written by a person from the study named beside the step. Not signed off as a reviewed claim.
The measurement behind this step
Intranasal administration is the route used in the Russian registered product and in most of the experimental work. Nasal delivery exploits olfactory and trigeminal pathways to reach brain tissue, which for a peptide with a plasma half-life of minutes is the practical reason the route was chosen.
The proline tail keeps it intact long enough to matter
Three extra amino acids on the end block the enzymes that would otherwise destroy it within seconds.
╌╌Described, with no measurement named. No measurement is named for this step, so it is drawn as an unconfirmed link.
The measurement behind this step
The C-terminal Pro-Gly-Pro resists aminopeptidase and carboxypeptidase cleavage, extending the half-life from seconds to minutes. The same tail is used in Selank, and glyproline peptides have measurable transcriptional activity on their own, which complicates attribution of the semax effect to the ACTH fragment alone.
Unlike almost every other drug on this site, nobody has identified what semax binds to.
╌╌Measured in animals. A result in animals says what to test next. It does not say what happens in people.
The measurement behind this step
Semax has no ACTH hormonal activity and no identified receptor. Reported proximate effects include changes in intracellular calcium dynamics in acutely isolated rat brain neurons and, in a 2025 report from an independent group, action on the mu opioid receptor gene Oprm1 promoting deubiquitination after spinal cord injury in mice.
Large-scale transcriptional change in injured brain
After an experimental stroke in rats, it shifts the activity of many genes at once, particularly immune and inflammatory ones.
╌╌Measured in animals. A result in animals says what to test next. It does not say what happens in people.
The measurement behind this step
In rat transient middle cerebral artery occlusion, semax suppresses transcripts encoding proinflammatory mediators, modulates immune response genes, and partly compensates the ischaemia-disrupted expression profile a day after stroke, with corresponding changes at the protein level. The response differs between brain regions according to the degree of ischaemic damage.
A strong preclinical case and an unverifiable clinical one
The rat evidence is detailed and published in English. The human evidence is in Russian, unregistered, and — according to the analysts who looked — not from completed trials.
╌╌Described, with no measurement named. No measurement is named for this step, so it is drawn as an unconfirmed link.
The measurement behind this step
No registered clinical trial of semax exists on any international registry. The Belgian national control laboratory that identified semax in seized preparations stated that to its knowledge the peptide has not completed any clinical trials. The Russian registration covers ischaemic stroke and related indications on evidence published in Russian-language journals.
No suggested links are held for this record, so nothing is hidden from this path.
What we know
The record describes 5 steps from taking it to an effect in a person.
How we know it
Each step names the study behind it in the technical detail beside it.
What this does not prove
A change inside the body is a reason to look. It is not a result in a person.
Why it matters
A reader can see exactly where the chain stops being measured in people.
What we still do not know
No reviewed claim binds any of these steps to a named population.
What is missing or unclear◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
Were people like you studied?
RNAWiki cannot tell whether a study fits you. It can show who was in it, and where the result stops carrying.
Who was studied
People similar to this profile were included.
In Russia, patients treated for ischaemic stroke and related conditions. Elsewhere, people using nasal sprays and reconstituted lyophilised powder bought online, and — as Belgian medicines controllers documented — whoever receives the suspicious preparations that turn up at customs.
Who is missing from the studies
Which groups were under-represented in the studies has not been recorded for this substance. Pregnancy, breastfeeding, children, older adults, and people with liver or kidney conditions are commonly excluded from trials; nothing here says whether they were.
Where the result stopped carrying
No clinical trial of semax has been registered on any international trial registry
No receptor has been identified for the peptide in more than three decades of work
This is a scope explorer, not a diagnosis engine.
It shows who was studied so you can see whether people similar to you were included.
RNAWiki cannot tell whether a study fits you. It can show who was in it.
What it would be like to take◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
Why it might seem to do nothing
A real effect and a noticed effect are different things. These are the recorded reasons the two come apart.
It was studied in different people
The people in the studies were not much like the reader.
On this record: Which groups were under-represented in the studies has not been recorded for this substance. Pregnancy, breastfeeding, children, older adults, and people with liver or kidney conditions are commonly excluded from trials; nothing here says whether they were.
The evidence may simply be wrong
Small early studies often do not hold up.
On this record: RNAWiki has not yet published a reviewed conclusion for this use.
Other reasons RNAWiki checked and found nothing for (11)
It was studied for a different goal
The studies measured something else entirely. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
A different form was studied
The studied form is not the form on the shelf. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
There was nothing to correct
Where a level is already normal, topping it up may change nothing. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
Something else had to happen too
In the studies it was paired with training, a diet or another treatment. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
The change is too small to feel
A real change can still sit below what a person notices. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
Day-to-day swing hides it
Sleep, food, stress and time of day move most numbers more than this would. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
Not enough time yet
The studies ran longer than the person has waited. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
It was not taken as studied
Missed days change the result, and studies count them. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
Something else changed at the same time
Two changes at once cannot be told apart afterwards. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
The product may not be what it says
Contents of a sold product are not always what the label states. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
No recorded reason
RNAWiki has nothing stored that would explain it. Nothing in this record points to this reason.
None of these is a reason to take more. Taking more is not a step this page ever suggests.
What it would be like to take◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
What taking it involves
The recorded facts about getting hold of it and using it. Nothing here is a suggestion about what you should do.
How it is supplied
Varies by country
❝ Quoted from a source
Where this came from
Copied from a source RNAWiki stored, with the source named.
Read from the recorded approval status.
No source is stored against this line.
Form and route
Intranasal drops or spray in the Russian registered product; lyophilised powder for injection and nasal sprays elsewhere
✎ Source-linked record
Where this came from
A person wrote this into the record with the study named beside it. No reviewer has signed it off.
The form and route recorded on this substance.
No source is stored against this line.
Who oversees it
RNAWiki has not recorded a supervision or regulatory status for this substance.
❝ Quoted from a source
Where this came from
Copied from a source RNAWiki stored, with the source named.
No register row and no identity class settled the question.
No source is stored against this line.
What is in the pack
The registered route is intranasal, chosen because the peptide is cleared from plasma within minutes and nasal delivery provides a route to brain tissue that bypasses that.
✎ Source-linked record
Where this came from
A person wrote this into the record with the study named beside it. No reviewer has signed it off.
Recorded notes on how this is sold. The rest of the recorded wording: Outside Russia the same peptide is sold as a nasal spray and as a lyophilised powder for reconstitution and injection, a route the registered product does not use and for which no human data exist.
No source is stored against this line.
Where it is registered
Regulatory records are listed in the technical disclosure at the foot of this page.
# Counted from records
Where this came from
A count of rows RNAWiki holds. It describes our records, not your body.
Register entries are stored per jurisdiction and shown with their dates.
No source is stored against this line.
Why people stop
Not recorded.
∅ Nothing recorded
Where this came from
RNAWiki holds nothing here and says so rather than guessing.
No record of why people stopped taking it is stored for this substance.
No source is stored against this line.
What it would be like to take◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
What can go wrong
Sorted by where each line came from. A regulator's label and a report somebody sent in are not the same kind of fact.
·Worth asking a clinician aboutWritten into the record from the studies named on this page
No controlled human safety dataset is available outside the Russian registration file. Semax has no ACTH hormonal activity, which removes the obvious concern about a corticotropin fragment. Beyond that, the absence of a receptor, of human pharmacokinetics and of registered trials means there is no basis for a safety statement in either direction, and this page does not offer one. The documented hazard is the supply chain: preparations of unknown origin and unknown content, identified as such by a national control laboratory.
Nobody counted how many people took this and were fine, so this cannot be turned into a rate.
Over a long time. No completed tested study window is recorded, so long-term effects are not established by the registry record.
Groups the studies covered thinly. Which groups were under-represented in the studies has not been recorded for this substance. Pregnancy, breastfeeding, children, older adults, and people with liver or kidney conditions are commonly excluded from trials; nothing here says whether they were.
What is missing or unclear◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
Does the exact form matter?
Evidence belongs to the exact thing that was tested. A different salt, a different mixture or a different preparation is a different question.
The form that was studied
Intranasal drops or spray in the Russian registered product; lyophilised powder for injection and nasal sprays elsewhere
✎ Source-linked record
Where this came from
A person wrote this into the record with the study named beside it. No reviewer has signed it off.
The form used in the studies cited on this page.
No source is stored against this line.
What is sold
A recorded note compares this form with the others that are sold. It is kept below, word for word.
§ A fixed RNAWiki sentence
Where this came from
Wording RNAWiki always uses, not a finding about this substance.
The recorded note, unchanged: Outside Russia the same peptide is sold as a nasal spray and as a lyophilised powder for reconstitution and injection, a route the registered product does not use and for which no human data exist.
No source is stored against this line.
What is recorded as being sold
12 products list this as an active ingredient in the United States drug directory. 12 of them contain it and nothing else.
FDA National Drug Code directory · 87370-014 · read 2026-08-29
They are sold as powder.
FDA National Drug Code directory · 87370-014 · read 2026-08-29
Evidence carries across two names for one substance. It does not carry across a salt, a mirror form or a mixture.
What it would be like to take◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
What you could measure
This one is decided with a clinician, so this section holds questions to ask rather than a plan to run.
RNAWiki could not confidently classify this substance, so no self-experiment plan is offered.
Questions worth asking
Which of the trials of Semax studied people like me?
What was measured, and for how long?
Was the result a laboratory value or a health outcome?
What would we watch for, and when would we stop?
Tracking can show whether something changed for you. It cannot show what caused it.
RNAWiki records evidence. It does not say whether this substance is right for you.
What is missing or unclear◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
Claims that go past the evidence
Things said about this substance that sound reasonable, and the exact step that is missing between the evidence and the claim.
✗Goes past the evidence
That a rodent transcriptomic protective signal establishes clinical benefit in human stroke
Why it sounds right. It follows from something real on this page: a body step, an animal result or a related finding.
The missing step. Nobody measured this in people for this use, or the study that did measure it did not show it.
What would change this
A study in people, for this exact use, measuring this exact thing, that a reviewer signs off.
RNAWiki has not yet published a reviewed conclusion for this use.
✗Goes past the evidence
That the Russian marketing authorisation rests on evidence a reader elsewhere can find and evaluate
Why it sounds right. It follows from something real on this page: a body step, an animal result or a related finding.
The missing step. Nobody measured this in people for this use, or the study that did measure it did not show it.
What would change this
A study in people, for this exact use, measuring this exact thing, that a reviewer signs off.
RNAWiki has not yet published a reviewed conclusion for this use.
✗Goes past the evidence
That the whole effect belongs to the ACTH fragment, when the added Pro-Gly-Pro tail has activity of its own
Why it sounds right. It follows from something real on this page: a body step, an animal result or a related finding.
The missing step. Nobody measured this in people for this use, or the study that did measure it did not show it.
What would change this
A study in people, for this exact use, measuring this exact thing, that a reviewer signs off.
RNAWiki has not yet published a reviewed conclusion for this use.
✗Goes past the evidence
That a vendor nasal spray concentration corresponds to a known human exposure, when no human pharmacokinetic study exists
Why it sounds right. It follows from something real on this page: a body step, an animal result or a related finding.
The missing step. Nobody measured this in people for this use, or the study that did measure it did not show it.
What would change this
A study in people, for this exact use, measuring this exact thing, that a reviewer signs off.
RNAWiki has not yet published a reviewed conclusion for this use.
What is missing or unclear◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
What nobody knows yet
Open questions, each with why it is open and what would close it.
How much did people take in the studies?
The sources RNAWiki checked hold nothing for this field.
Why it matters. A result belongs to an amount. Without the amount the result floats free.
What would answer it
A stored source that records it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
How fast does the body clear it?
The sources RNAWiki checked hold nothing for this field.
Why it matters. Without this, nothing on this page can say how long anything lasts.
What would answer it
A stored source that records it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
Missing populations
Which groups were under-represented in the studies has not been recorded.
Why it matters. Recorded by the evidence model as a gap on this record.
What would answer it
A study that measures it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
Missing long-term data
No completed tested study window is recorded.
Why it matters. Recorded by the evidence model as a gap on this record.
What would answer it
A study that measures it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
No reviewed conclusion
RNAWiki has not yet published a reviewed conclusion for this use.
Why it matters. Recorded by the evidence model as a gap on this record.
What would answer it
A study that measures it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
Missing interaction studies
No interaction was found in the registers checked. Not finding one is not the same as showing there is none.
Why it matters. Recorded by the evidence model as a gap on this record.
What would answer it
A study that measures it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
Formulation uncertainty
Several salts, forms or products of Semax are recorded. Results from one form may not transfer to another.
Why it matters. Recorded by the evidence model as a gap on this record.
What would answer it
A study that measures it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
Mechanism not reviewed
No reviewed mechanism story exists for this substance.
Why it matters. Recorded by the evidence model as a gap on this record.
What would answer it
A study that measures it, and a reviewer to sign it off.
Last checked 2026-09-04. Searched: The sources listed in the receipts at the foot of this page.
What happened in people◇Read from sources, not yet reviewed
Check any of this yourself
Every line above traced back to the study it came from. This is the technical layer, and the vocabulary changes here.
Every line above can be traced to the study named beside it. Follow the link and read it.
It shifts hundreds of genes in ischaemic rat brain
In plain words
In rat stroke models, semax changed the expression of large sets of immune, inflammatory and neurosignalling genes, and partly restored the pattern that ischaemia had disrupted.
What was measured
Differential gene and protein expression in rat cortex and subcortex after transient middle cerebral artery occlusion with and without semax
Effect estimate
No reviewed effect estimate exists for this record.
Limits
See the technical detail.
From the source
A sustained programme from the Institute of Molecular Genetics has characterised the transcriptional response to semax after transient middle cerebral artery occlusion in rats. Published findings include regulation of immune response gene expression during ischaemic brain injury, suppression of mRNA transcripts encoding proinflammatory mediators after reversible ischaemia, transcriptome-level protective changes, confirmation at the brain protein expression level, compensation of the ischaemia-disrupted gene expression profile a day after experimental stroke, and identification of genes associated with the action of ACTH-like peptides in brain regions with differing degrees of ischaemic damage. The work is technically detailed, published in indexed English-language journals, and internally consistent across a decade. It is also entirely in rats, entirely from one institutional group, and describes transcriptional changes rather than a mechanism.
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim
Analysts who looked for the clinical trials could not find completed ones
In plain words
A Belgian medicines control laboratory identified semax in two unknown seized preparations and stated that, to its knowledge, the peptide has not completed any clinical trials.
What was measured
That a Russian marketing authorisation implies a completed clinical trial programme that an outside analyst can find and read
Effect estimate
No reviewed effect estimate exists for this record.
Limits
See the technical detail.
From the source
Vanhee et al. at Sciensano, the Belgian national public health institute, encountered two unknown suspicious preparations at the end of 2017 and 2018 and subjected them to a battery of analyses. Both contained what they describe as the assumedly cognitive-enhancing research peptides Selank and Semax, which, in their words, to their knowledge have not completed any clinical trials. An online search excluding the dark web showed these research peptides freely available either as lyophilised powder for injection or in nasal sprays. The finding prompted development of a combined LC-MS/MS method covering ten putative cognitive-enhancing polypeptides sold online, validated across matrices to ISO 17025 and complying with the European OMCL network recommendation on interpreting unknown-peptide screening results. That assessment is from a national control laboratory doing exactly the job of establishing what a compound is and whether it has been tested.
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim
The stroke efficacy claim rests on Russian-language reports
In plain words
Semax is used in Russia for ischaemic stroke. The clinical reports supporting that are published in Russian journals and are not registered on any trial registry.
What was measured
That a rodent transcriptomic protective signal plus unregistered Russian clinical reports establishes efficacy in human stroke
Effect estimate
No reviewed effect estimate exists for this record.
Limits
See the technical detail.
From the source
The clinical literature on semax in ischaemic stroke — including a 2018 report on its efficacy at different stages of ischaemic stroke in Zhurnal Nevrologii i Psikhiatrii imeni S.S. Korsakova — is published in Russian-language journals, generally without a registered protocol, without a published statistical analysis plan, and without independent replication outside the Commonwealth of Independent States. A 2026 analysis of nootropic regulatory positions across CIS countries treats this pattern as characteristic of the whole class. The transcriptomic case for semax in stroke is genuinely strong preclinically; the clinical case is not accessible for independent evaluation, and this page states the difference rather than collapsing it in either direction.
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim
A peptide made durable by three added residues
In plain words
The active part is four amino acids from a hormone. The three-residue tail added to the end is what stops enzymes destroying it before it can act.
What was measured
Contribution of the Pro-Gly-Pro extension to peptidase resistance and to the transcriptional response
Effect estimate
No reviewed effect estimate exists for this record.
Limits
See the technical detail.
From the source
Semax is Met-Glu-His-Phe — residues 4 to 7 of adrenocorticotropic hormone — with a C-terminal Pro-Gly-Pro. The glyproline tail is not decorative: proline-flanked bonds resist both aminopeptidase and carboxypeptidase attack, and the same Pro-Gly-Pro strategy is used in Selank. Work on glyproline peptides in cerebral ischaemia has examined the tail on its own, finding it modulates inflammatory and neurosignalling gene responses, which raises the question of how much of the semax effect belongs to the ACTH fragment and how much to the tail. Independent work outside Russia has begun to appear, including a 2025 report that semax targets the mu opioid receptor gene Oprm1 to promote deubiquitination and functional recovery after spinal cord injury in female mice.
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim
No receptor, no pharmacokinetics in humans, no dose rationale outside Russia
In plain words
There is no identified binding site, no published human pharmacokinetic study, and no basis outside the Russian label for the doses used.
What was measured
That a vendor-specified nasal spray concentration corresponds to a characterised human exposure
Effect estimate
No reviewed effect estimate exists for this record.
Limits
See the technical detail.
From the source
Semax has no identified receptor. Its documented actions are downstream: intracellular calcium dynamics in rat brain neurons, transcriptional modulation, and protein expression change. No human pharmacokinetic study of semax appears in the indexed literature, so intranasal bioavailability, brain penetration and half-life in a person are not established quantities. Products sold outside Russia specify concentrations chosen by vendors. For a peptide with a half-life measured in minutes and no receptor to titrate against, that is a dose with nothing behind it.
Written into the record, not signed off as a reviewed claim
Sold as an injectable powder and a nasal spray, with no manufacturer of record
In plain words
An online survey by the Belgian control laboratory found these research peptides freely available as lyophilised powder for injection and as nasal sprays.
What was measured
Presentation and availability of research peptides in online and seized samples across two control-laboratory studies
Effect estimate
No reviewed effect estimate exists for this record.
Limits
See the technical detail.
From the source
The Sciensano investigation documented that nootropic research peptides of this type are freely available online, excluding the dark web, either as lyophilised powder for injection purposes or in nasal sprays. The laboratory developed and validated a screening method covering ten such polypeptides currently sold online, noting that controlling laboratories need to anticipate the rise of these molecules and be able to identify them. A separate four-year multinational surveillance study across twelve official medicines control laboratories found 34 distinct unauthorised nootropic molecules across 159 samples, 69% from the illegal market, with 49% presented as dietary supplements and 32% as medicines.
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What is not here
6 questions this page could not answer
These sections were prepared and left out because there was nothing to put in them. They are listed rather than hidden, so the gaps in this record are visible.
What was measured, goal by goal — found nothing in the sources checked.
Felt, measured, or meaningful — found nothing in the sources checked.
How long anything takes — found nothing in the sources checked.
What it may clash with — found nothing in the sources checked.
Other ways to the same goal — found nothing in the sources checked.
What changed on this page — found nothing in the sources checked.
The record as stored
The full record, for auditing
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The older medicine-wide conclusion held in this record
Written for a clinical reader, and about the medicine as a whole rather than about one indication, population and set of trials. RNAWiki does not treat it as a programme conclusion and no reviewer has signed it off in that form. It is here word for word because it is what the record holds.
A seven-residue ACTH fragment with a substantial and technically strong rodent stroke transcriptomics literature in English, a clinical evidence base published almost entirely in Russian and unregistered anywhere, and a documented presence in unidentified preparations seized in Belgium.
ClinicalTrials.gov — US Government work · Europe PMC — metadata only, under the recorded legal gate · derived from this page's own recorded fields; no external licence
✗ required summary fields resolved: 4 required field(s) not terminal: Why people use it, Best-supported result, Biggest unanswered question, Human evidence
✓ public claims reviewed: 0 reviewed claim(s); drafts are never rendered
✓ source coverage passed: 2 source rows
✓ no critical contamination: no quarantine open
✓ canonical metadata passed: slug and display name present
✓ no raw internal fields: enforced by the copy-contract test over the rendered page
This is a record of evidence. It is not medical advice, and it does not say this substance suits you. Nothing here says any substance on RNAWiki is appropriate for a child.