- This is a really good question.
Now, the challenging,
and for some people maybe frustrating thing,
is that we don't know everything yet
about Vitamin K2.
There's still a great deal of research
that needs to be done for the world
to have a full understanding of all the intricacies
of what's going on here.
So I'll tell you what we know so far, right?
So for those who are just catching up to this,
with vitamin K, you have two basic forms.
You have K1, which you would get in like kale, for example,
and which doesn't really do that much for you.
And then you have the much more impactful vitamin K2,
which has a number of functions.
Some which are relating to dental health development,
some which are guiding calcium from the body
into the bones for bone health.
Prevention of osteoporosis and things of that nature.
And then, so within this category of K2,
you have different forms.
You have MK-4 and you have MK-7.
Now MK-4 is generally found in meat, eggs,
and dairy products.
This is coming from the animal world.
And the majority of the research
that's been done on vitamin K2,
has been done on MK-4, not MK-7.
And so most supplement products you see
will be MK-7 and they make the claims of,
they make claims based on the research done on MK-4,
but it's not necessarily the exact same kind.
So is it going to apply and work?
Maybe.
So the other kind, MK-7,
this is found in fermented foods,
especially found in Natto.
So you have,
that's basically plant fermented foods, is MK-7,
animal foods, MK-4.
That's the breakup.
Now, even once we eventually understand
more about MK-4 and MK-7,
we're not gonna be done.
You know why?
There's more kinds.
There's MK-8, MK-9, MK-10, MK-11, MK-12, MK-13 and MK-14,
and we don't know anything about those,
except that they exist.
So it just shows you,
we're never gonna run out of stuff to talk about here
in the Instagram stories,
because we're learning more is being discovered
about nutrition as the years go by.
So that's fascinating stuff.
Now, even when we look at MK-7,
this comes in multiple forms, right?
But,
it's just like,
it's like peeling back layers of an onion.
You just keep going off different paths here
where there's multiple forms of everything.
So what you see with MK-7
is that there's two main forms.
I'll put up a graphic of them here.
You have the CIS form and the TRANS form.
TRANS form is what is found in nature.
The CIS form is not found in nature.
Now most MK-7 forms are gonna be some mix of these two.
The great ones would be
where you're gonna have obviously more
of the TRANS MK-7, as opposed to the CIS MK-7.
But ultimately there is indications
that it's a good idea to have both MK-4 and MK-7
coming into your body on a regular basis.
Especially if someone is pregnant or breastfeeding.
MK-4, you definitely wanna make sure you have that
because this is the form that is able to cross the placenta
and is found in breast milk.
You don't see MK-7 crossing the placenta.
You don't see MK-7 in breast milk.
So, this is something to really think about
for people who are religiously dedicated
to veganism and vegetarianism
that there's something missing there.
MK-7 is not the same as MK-4.
MK-7 certainly has its place,
but it's, you wouldn't look at like,
Omega six and Omega three
and say oh, I get lots of omegas.
They're just all Omega six.
I don't need Omega threes.
It's not how it works.
So it's just food for thought, I would say.
And I wanna thank you for asking this great question
to open up something that nobody ever really talks about.