Naming conventions for research peptides and the confusion they cause — one year on

Naming conventions for research peptides and the confusion they cause — one year on — setting out what I have, and where I think it stops being reliable.

I have seen SURMOUNT-2 (Lancet, 2023) cited in support of a claim I do not think it supports, twice this month, so I would like to work through what it actually shows.

My reading is that the trial is sound for its own question and is being stretched to answer a different one. I might be wrong about that, which is why this is a topic rather than a correction.

What I would like from this discussion: someone who disagrees with me to say why, with the section of the paper they are relying on.

Thank you for the correction. I have edited my earlier post with a note rather than silently, so the thread still makes sense to read. The error was mine and it was the kind that comes from remembering a figure instead of looking it up.

This subcategory exists because some people will research compounds outside the main groups discussed here. The standard of evidence and honesty about its limits applies to everything discussed, not just to approved drugs.

the opening post is right about the mechanism and I think understates the practical bit.

When "no data" is the complete and final answer: if there is no published human data on a compound, that is the state of knowledge. Hope is not a substitute and reasoning from theory is not a substitute. That is not a reason for shame; it is the honest epistemic position.

Why catalogue breadth is not evidence of anything: a supplier listing 500 compounds does not make the 450 untested ones likely to work. It makes them untested compounds with supplier pages.

AOD-9604 is a fragment of human growth hormone and has been discussed as a potential weight-loss agent based on theoretical mechanism. The fragment hypothesis — that the fragment retains a specific property of the intact hormone — is not settled for this compound.