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Many health-conscious people start their day by taking supplements and vitamins as part of their morning routine, right alongside breakfast or a cup of coffee. They do it to boost energy, immunity, bone strength, or overall wellness.
Creatine is one such supplement that has become a common staple in supplement aisles. It has reputation of being something only necessary for people who work out heavily.
Athletes use it to sprint harder, lift heavier, and recover faster, so plenty of people treat it as a “gym thing.” In simple terms, creatine acts like a quick-charge backup system for cells that burn through energy fast.
Creatine and cellular energy
Cells run on energy every second of every day, then they spend it in a form called Adenosine triphosphate (ATP).
ATP works as the main “spendable” energy molecule, but cells burn through it quickly during intense exercise, illness, missed sleep, or other high-demand stress.
Creatine helps by storing energy in phosphocreatine, which can help rebuild ATP when demand spikes. This setup works as a “quick-recharge system.”
One report also links this backup to cell protection during metabolic stress, when tissues need fast energy support to stay stable.
Creatine, energy, and safety
People still ask, “Is creatine safe?” A major safety analysis led by a long-time creatine researcher focuses on results from controlled scientific studies instead of word-of-mouth warnings.
According to Dr. Richard Kreider, a professor and director of the Exercise & Sport Nutrition Lab at Texas A&M University, creatine is crucial for human bodies to function at full capacity.
“When the body is stressed, like in exercise or under metabolic conditions like some diseases, creatine phosphate is needed to maintain energy in the cell, and therefore has a lot of protective and health benefits, in addition to the exercise performance effects that have been seen,” explained Kreider, who has spent more than 30 years studying creatine.
In a comprehensive study, Kreider’s team reviewed hundreds of clinical trials and compared side effects in people who took creatine with people who took a placebo. They did not see meaningful differences in side-effect rates between the groups.
Many of the loudest claims of side effects come as personal stories: “My friend felt bloated,” “Someone online said it hurt kidneys,” “A coach warned me about cramps.”
Kreider’s study refutes those claims, showing that creatine can actually help the body hold onto more fluid, and that may reduce cramping in some situations. People vary, but the strongest evidence does not match the most common fears.
Food vs. supplements
Your body can make creatine from amino acids and move it through the bloodstream to tissues that need quick energy support. Kreider’s study puts that internal production at about one gram each day.
However, the recommended daily amount is to get two to four grams of creatine per day, depending on muscle mass and activity levels.
“You only get about a gram of creatine per pound of red meat or fish, like salmon, so it’s expensive and takes a lot of calories to get a gram,” Kreider noted.
That is a lot of food if your main goal is simply to raise creatine intake, which helps explain why creatine supplements exist.
Vegetarians and vegans often start with lower creatine stores because they get little creatine through diet, so they may see a more noticeable benefit when they supplement.
Studying creatine and the brain
A separate study from Virginia Tech explains that creatine plays a vital role in the brain’s energy system, but it also points to effects beyond “energy.”
“Creatine is very crucial for energy-consuming cells in skeletal muscle throughout the body, but also in the brain and in the heart,” said Chin-Yi Chen, a research scientist at Virginia Tech’s Fralin Biomedical Research Institute.
Chen is working with a research team that is developing a new way to send creatine directly into the brain using focused ultrasound.
The project takes place in the lab of Cheng-Chia “Fred” Wu, an assistant professor at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute.
Creatine and brain function
The human brain works nonstop. Neurons fire, support cells keep the chemical environment steady, and energy demand stays high from morning to night.
Creatine can influence neurotransmitter systems, especially pathways involving GABA, a major inhibitory neurotransmitter that helps prevent neurons from becoming overly excitable.
This fact is important because brain function depends on both steady fuel and balanced signaling. When neurons lose either one, circuits can misfire or struggle to adapt.
That helps explain why many studies associate creatine with learning, memory, brain development, and seizure control.
Blood-brain barrier
The brain sits behind the blood-brain barrier, a tight filter built from cells that line brain blood vessels. It blocks many toxins and pathogens from reaching brain tissue, and that protection saves lives. It can also limit access for helpful compounds.
Wu’s study at Virginia Tech describes people with creatine deficiency disorders who can improve muscle mass and body weight with supplements, yet still struggle with neurodevelopmental challenges.
These include difficulties with speech, reading, or writing because the brain does not receive enough creatine through normal routes.
That challenge puts the creatine delivery system at the center of their work. The researchers describe a project that uses therapeutic focused ultrasound to temporarily open access across the blood-brain barrier in a precise, targeted way.
Focused ultrasound uses carefully aimed sound waves to create a short window that can let treatments reach specific brain areas without damaging nearby healthy tissue.
The report notes that the lab has explored focused ultrasound approaches in other contexts, such as pediatric brain cancer, and now sees potential for creatine deficiency conditions as well.
Creatine, energy, and brain function
Despite strong scientific evidence, Kreider says people have misunderstood creatine for years and often spread false claims about it.
He is one of the members of the International Society of Sports Nutrition who recently signed a letter stating that creatine is safe and effective and calling on policymakers not to limit public access to it.
“There’s absolutely no data supporting any negative side effect anecdotally reported about creatine on the internet and in the media,” Kreider enthused. “Creatine is safe, and it’s important for everybody, not just bodybuilders and athletes.”
The work keeps moving from “Does it work?” to “Can we deliver it where it’s needed most?” That question changes the discussion from sports performance to medical delivery, where the details of human biology decide what happens next.
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