Chemical structure of Vitamin B1 (Thiamine)

Vitamin B1 (Thiamine)

Vitamin B1 (thiamine) is an essential water-soluble B vitamin required for carbohydrate energy metabolism and normal nerve function.

Sources · 6

Where Does It Come From?

Also found in
Brewer's yeast Monograph coming soon
Pine pollen Monograph coming soon
Whole grains and legumes Monograph coming soon

Concentration

Content by Source

Reported concentrations across the plants that contain vitamin B1 (Thiamine) — the bar marks the typical level, the line shows the reported range.

Typical level Reported range mg/100 g
Pine (Pinus spp.) pollen 2.42 [1]
Camu-camu (Myrciaria dubia) fruit pulp 0.14 [2]

Literature figures for varying plant parts and preparations. Read them as a comparative guide, not exact assays.

Vitamin B1 (Thiamine) at a Glance

Thiamine was the first B vitamin identified, and it was found the way most were — by working backwards from a disease. Beriberi swept through populations that had switched to polished white rice, because the milling that removes the bran also removes essentially all the thiamine. That history is worth keeping, because it explains why thiamine deficiency is still fundamentally a disease of refined carbohydrate and of alcohol: both raise the demand for thiamine while supplying little or none of it.

Biochemically it is a cofactor with a narrow, critical job. Converted in the body to thiamine pyrophosphate, it enables the enzymes that let carbohydrate enter aerobic metabolism — pyruvate dehydrogenase at the gateway to the citric-acid cycle, alpha-ketoglutarate dehydrogenase inside it, and transketolase in the pentose phosphate pathway. Take thiamine away and glucose cannot be fully burned. Tissues that run hardest on glucose and have the least reserve — brain and heart — fail first, which is exactly the clinical picture: the neuropathy and heart failure of beriberi, and the acute confusion, eye-movement abnormalities and ataxia of Wernicke’s encephalopathy.

As a supplement for people who are not deficient, the case is thinner. Requirements are small, deficiency is rare in fortified food systems, and the “energy” branding attaches to a molecule that is required for energy metabolism rather than one that accelerates it. The compelling uses are all repletion.

What It’s Used For

Who is actually at risk of deficiency: heavy alcohol use (which impairs absorption, storage and activation simultaneously), after bariatric surgery, in prolonged vomiting or hyperemesis, in malabsorption, in chronic diuretic use, and on diets built on refined carbohydrate.

The claim to discount is the one on the front of the bottle: “energy” and cognitive benefit in people who are not deficient. No citable trial supports it. Thiamine is required for energy metabolism the way a spark plug is required for an engine — necessary, and not improved by adding more.

How It Works

Absorbed thiamine is phosphorylated to thiamine pyrophosphate (TPP), the form that actually does the work. TPP sits in the active site of three enzyme systems, and each failure point maps onto a symptom.

Pyruvate dehydrogenase converts pyruvate — the end product of glycolysis — into acetyl-CoA, the molecule that enters the citric-acid cycle. Without TPP that conversion stalls, glucose cannot be aerobically oxidised, and pyruvate backs up as lactate. Alpha-ketoglutarate dehydrogenase performs an analogous step inside the cycle itself. Transketolase runs the pentose phosphate pathway, which supplies the ribose for nucleotides and the NADPH for reductive biosynthesis — and because transketolase activity in red cells falls quickly when thiamine is short, it is the classic laboratory measure of thiamine status.

Two features explain the shape of thiamine deficiency. First, body stores are small — on the order of weeks, not months — so deficiency can appear fast under stress. Second, intestinal absorption is saturable: a specific transporter handles physiological amounts, and beyond roughly 5 mg per dose, uptake becomes inefficient passive diffusion. That is why large oral doses give diminishing returns, why severe deficiency is treated parenterally, and why lipid-soluble derivatives such as benfotiamine exist to bypass the transporter.

One clinically important consequence: giving glucose to a thiamine-depleted person increases demand for the very cofactor they lack, and can precipitate acute Wernicke’s encephalopathy. In hospital practice thiamine goes in first.

The full trial record is in Pharmacology & Research below.

Pharmacology & Research

Thiamine (vitamin B1) is an essential, water-soluble B vitamin that works entirely as a coenzyme: absorbed thiamine is phosphorylated to thiamine pyrophosphate (TPP), the cofactor for three enzymes that let carbohydrate enter aerobic metabolism. Because that role is permissive rather than accelerating, the honest reading of the evidence splits cleanly in two — correcting a deficiency (beriberi, Wernicke–Korsakoff syndrome, and the alcohol/refined-carbohydrate/diuretic contexts that cause it) is a real and sometimes urgent indication, whereas taking extra thiamine on top of an already-adequate intake has thin support. Two features shape everything downstream: body stores are small (weeks, not months), and intestinal absorption saturates near ~5 mg per dose, so large oral doses give diminishing returns 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →.

That saturable transport is also why lipid-soluble derivatives such as benfotiamine exist, and why the strongest “beyond-deficiency” signals attach to that form rather than to plain thiamine 8,15Reference 8Ziegler D et al. · 2026RCTEffects of benfotiamine treatment over 12 months on morphometric, neurophysiological and clinical measures in diabetic sensorimotor polyneuropathy — randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase II trial. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41571333/View study →Reference 15Xie F et al. · 2014RCTPharmacokinetic study of benfotiamine and bioavailability assessment compared to thiamine hydrochloride — randomised trialView study →.

Best-supported:correcting established deficiency — beriberi and Wernicke–Korsakoff syndrome — where thiamine has been standard treatment for over 50 years, and setting the RDA at 1.1–1.2 mg/day 1,2Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →Reference 2Day E et al. · 2013Systematic reviewThiamine for prevention and treatment of Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome in people who abuse alcohol — Cochrane systematic reviewView study →.
Emerging / cautiously endorsed:benfotiamine for diabetic peripheral neuropathy (a statistically positive meta-analytic signal, though often below the clinically-important threshold) 6,8Reference 6Mandra EV et al. · 2026Meta-analysisVitamin B supplementation for diabetic peripheral neuropathy: a review and meta-analysis of 13 RCTs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/42452619/View study →Reference 8Ziegler D et al. · 2026RCTEffects of benfotiamine treatment over 12 months on morphometric, neurophysiological and clinical measures in diabetic sensorimotor polyneuropathy — randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase II trial. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41571333/View study →, and a renal-protective signal for intravenous thiamine in septic shock 12Reference 12Wang G et al. · 2025Meta-analysisThiamin supplementation on mitigating kidney injury and mortality in patients with septic shock — systematic review and meta-analysis of 6 RCTs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41277404/View study →.
Popular but thin / overhyped:“energy” and cognitive benefit in people who are not deficient — no citable trial supports it; glycaemic and diabetic-nephropathy claims rest on small trials whose authors did not establish clinical significance 3,4Reference 3Alaei Shahmiri F et al. · 2013RCTHigh-dose thiamine supplementation improves glucose tolerance in hyperglycemic individuals — randomised crossover trialView study →Reference 4Rabbani N et al. · 2009RCTHigh-dose thiamine therapy for patients with type 2 diabetes and microalbuminuria — randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot trialView study →.
The honest miss / caveat:the 2024 updated meta-analysis of chronic heart failure found no significant effect on ejection fraction 9Reference 9He S et al. · 2024Meta-analysisRole of thiamine supplementation in the treatment of chronic heart failure: an updated meta-analysis of 7 RCTs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38940395/View study →, and high-dose thiamine did not improve blood pressure or lipids in impaired glucose tolerance 16Reference 16Alaei-Shahmiri F et al. · 2015RCTThe impact of thiamine supplementation on blood pressure, serum lipids and C-reactive protein in impaired glucose metabolism — double-blind randomised crossover trialView study →. Nearly every credible benefit is repletion in someone who was short to begin with.
Evidence by IndicationStrength of support · Beta

Support is an experimental score I’m building — a composite weighted by study type (human > animal > in vitro > review) and study volume, then tempered for consistency, form/bioavailability, and how much the effect depends on the person being deficient. It’s a beta: a fast way to rank strength of evidence at a glance, not a validated metric. Each application links down to its write-up.

Mechanisms

Target / pathwayEffectRelevant to
Thiamine pyrophosphate (TPP) formationThe active coenzyme, generated by intracellular phosphorylation
All applications — the functional form of the vitamin
Pyruvate dehydrogenaseCofactor; enables pyruvate → acetyl-CoA, the entry to the citric-acid cycle
Deficiency (beriberiWKS)lactate handling in sepsis
Alpha-ketoglutarate dehydrogenaseCofactor within the citric-acid cycle
Energy metabolism; neuronal vulnerability in deficiency
Transketolase (pentose-phosphate pathway)Cofactor; diverts triose phosphates, supplies NADPH and ribose
Diabetic neuropathy and nephropathy — the benfotiamine rationale
Erythrocyte transketolase activityFalls early in deficiency
The classic laboratory marker of thiamine status

Pharmacokinetics

Oral thiamine is absorbed by a saturable active transporter: beyond roughly 5 mg per dose, uptake shifts to inefficient passive diffusion, so fractional absorption falls sharply as dose rises and very large single doses are wasteful 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →. Body stores are small — around 25–30 mg, with a turnover of weeks — which is why deficiency can appear quickly under metabolic stress and why severe deficiency is corrected parenterally. Surplus is cleared in the urine.

Lipid-soluble derivatives were designed to defeat the transporter ceiling: benfotiamine produces substantially higher plasma thiamine and thiamine-diphosphate levels than equivalent oral thiamine hydrochloride 15Reference 15Xie F et al. · 2014RCTPharmacokinetic study of benfotiamine and bioavailability assessment compared to thiamine hydrochloride — randomised trialView study →, and comparative pharmacokinetic work ranks lipophilic derivatives well above water-soluble salts for bioavailability 18Reference 18Lee MJ et al. · 2016RCTComparative pharmacokinetic analysis of thiamine and its phosphorylated metabolites administered as lipophilic derivatives — randomised crossover PK studyView study →. For plain thiamine, the practical implication is to split doses rather than take one large one.

Clinical trials

Thiamine is an off-patent essential nutrient, so most trial activity is investigator-initiated and small, concentrated in three areas: critical care (septic shock), diabetic complications (largely benfotiamine), and heart failure. There is little large-scale industry-funded trial activity, and the biggest questions — optimal dose and route for Wernicke–Korsakoff — have never been settled by RCT.

CompletedPlannedTerminatedPreclinical
~30+Several(benfotiamine, critical care)FewExtensive

Last checked: August 2026.

Dietary Sources

Thiamine is widely available but concentrated in parts of foods that processing tends to remove — which is the whole history of the vitamin.

SourceNotes
PorkThe standout among common foods
Fortified cereals, bread and flourA major contributor wherever enrichment is mandated
Whole grains, brown riceRich in the bran and germ — the fractions milling strips out
Legumes, sunflower seeds, nutsGood plant sources
Fish, particularly trout and tunaModerate

Thiamine is fragile: it is destroyed by prolonged heat, leaches into cooking water, and is degraded by sulphites used as preservatives. Raw fish and shellfish contain thiaminases that break it down, which matters for diets built heavily around them. And a high-carbohydrate, low-nutrient-density diet raises requirement while lowering supply — the same double bind, in modern form, that caused beriberi.

Herbal Sources

Herbal sources of thiamine are minor on any absolute scale. Pine pollen is the highest measured, at about 2.4 mg per 100 g by HPLC 19Reference 19Tuychiev GU et al. · 2024Analysis of vitamins in pine pollen and plants of eastern biota — HPLC determination — [analytical study]View study → — roughly twice an adult daily requirement per 100 g of pollen, which is far more pollen than anyone consumes. Camu-camu pulp carries about 0.14 mg per 100 g 20Reference 20Instituto Nacional de Salud (Peru)Tablas peruanas de composición de alimentos — camu-camu — [food-composition table].

Neither is a practical source of B1 against grains, legumes or yeast. The figures are worth recording because they set the scale: when a monograph says a herb contains B vitamins, this is the order of magnitude meant.

Dosage

These are doses studied in research, not a personal recommendation.

  • RDA: 1.2 mg/day for adult men, 1.1 mg/day for adult women; 1.4 mg/day in pregnancy and lactation 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →.
  • No Tolerable Upper Intake Level has been set — the Food and Nutrition Board found no reports of adverse effects from high intakes 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →. Absence of a UL is not proof that unlimited intake is safe.
  • Therapeutic repletion doses are far higher and are a clinical decision — oral regimens for mild deficiency, parenteral thiamine for severe deficiency or suspected Wernicke’s.
  • Absorption saturates at roughly 5 mg per dose, so very large single oral doses are inefficient. This is the rationale behind lipid-soluble derivatives such as benfotiamine, which bypass the transporter.
  • Give thiamine before glucose in anyone at risk of deficiency — a carbohydrate load can precipitate acute Wernicke’s in a depleted person.

Safety

Thiamine is among the most benign substances here. The safety discussion is short because there is very little to say.

Safety at a Glance
Low / no toxicity
  • Very low toxicity. Excess is excreted in urine, and oral absorption is self-limiting above a few milligrams.
  • No Upper Limit established — the Food and Nutrition Board found no reports of harm from high intakes 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →.
  • Safe at reference intakes in pregnancy and lactation, where requirements rise slightly to 1.4 mg/day.
  • Deficiency is the emergency, not excess. Suspected Wernicke’s encephalopathy needs parenteral thiamine urgently, not an oral supplement.
  • Interactions not fully assessed in this pass — see the box below.
Full Safety & Interactions Detail

Thiamine has very low toxicity. The body excretes surplus in the urine, and intestinal uptake beyond physiological amounts is inefficient, so there is no ready route to accumulation. On that basis the Food and Nutrition Board did not establish a tolerable upper intake level 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →. Rare hypersensitivity reactions have been reported with intravenous administration, which is a clinical-setting consideration rather than a supplement one.

  • Specific drug interactions were not fully assessed in this pass 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →. The ones with mechanistic support are loop diuretics, which increase urinary thiamine loss (relevant in heart failure, where both are common), chronic alcohol use, which impairs absorption, storage and activation together, and metformin, which has been reported to interfere with thiamine transport.
  • Who is actually at risk: people with heavy alcohol use, after bariatric surgery, with prolonged vomiting or hyperemesis, with malabsorption, on long-term diuretics, and on refined-carbohydrate-dominant diets.
  • The practical safety point runs the other way from most supplements: the risk here is under-treating a deficiency, not over-treating a healthy person.
Pregnancy & Lactation
Safe in pregnancy Safe while breastfeeding

Safe at reference intakes. Thiamine requirements rise modestly in pregnancy and lactation, to 1.4 mg/day, and intake at that level is a standard part of prenatal nutrition 1Reference 1National Institutes of HealthThiamin — Health Professional Fact SheetView study →. Thiamine deficiency in pregnancy is a genuine concern in hyperemesis gravidarum, where prolonged vomiting can deplete stores quickly — that is a clinical situation requiring medical management rather than a supplement decision.

References

  1. National Institutes of Health, Office of Dietary Supplements. Thiamin — Health Professional Fact Sheet. https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Thiamin-HealthProfessional/
  2. Day E, Bentham PW, Callaghan R, et al. (2013). Thiamine for prevention and treatment of Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome in people who abuse alcohol — Cochrane systematic review. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23818100/
  3. Alaei Shahmiri F, et al. (2013). High-dose thiamine supplementation improves glucose tolerance in hyperglycemic individuals — randomised crossover trial. European Journal of Nutrition. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23715873/
  4. Rabbani N, et al. (2009). High-dose thiamine therapy for patients with type 2 diabetes and microalbuminuria — randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot trial. Diabetologia. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19057893/
  5. Raval AD, Thakker D, Rangoonwala AN, et al. (2015). Vitamin B and its derivatives for diabetic kidney disease — Cochrane systematic review. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25579852/
  6. Mandra EV, Parfenov VA, Stupin VA, et al. (2026). Vitamin B supplementation for diabetic peripheral neuropathy: a review and meta-analysis of 13 RCTs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/42452619/
  7. Bönhof GJ, Sipola G, Strom A, et al. (2022). BOND study: a randomised double-blind placebo-controlled trial to assess the effects of benfotiamine in diabetic sensorimotor polyneuropathy — phase II RCT protocol. BMJ Open. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35115359/
  8. Ziegler D, Sipola G, Strom A, et al. (2026). Effects of benfotiamine treatment over 12 months on morphometric, neurophysiological and clinical measures in diabetic sensorimotor polyneuropathy — randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase II trial. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41571333/
  9. He S, Wang S, Xu T, et al. (2024). Role of thiamine supplementation in the treatment of chronic heart failure: an updated meta-analysis of 7 RCTs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38940395/
  10. Wong EKC, Lee JY, Chow J, et al. (2022). High-dose thiamine supplementation in older patients with heart failure — pilot randomised controlled crossover trial. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35734514/
  11. Moskowitz A, et al. (2016). Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of thiamine as a metabolic resuscitator in septic shock. Critical Care Medicine. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26771781/
  12. Wang G, Liao X, Liao Y, et al. (2025). Thiamin supplementation on mitigating kidney injury and mortality in patients with septic shock — systematic review and meta-analysis of 6 RCTs. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41277404/
  13. Xu X, Bai X, Cao W, et al. (2026). Efficacy of thiamine (vitamin B1) in sepsis and septic shock — meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/41863966/
  14. Gibson GE, et al. (2020). Benfotiamine and cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s disease: results of a randomized placebo-controlled trial — phase IIa RCT. Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33074237/
  15. Xie F, et al. (2014). Pharmacokinetic study of benfotiamine and bioavailability assessment compared to thiamine hydrochloride — randomised trial. Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24399744/
  16. Alaei-Shahmiri F, et al. (2015). The impact of thiamine supplementation on blood pressure, serum lipids and C-reactive protein in impaired glucose metabolism — double-blind randomised crossover trial. Diabetes & Metabolic Syndrome. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25982678/
  17. Babaei-Jadidi R, et al. (2003). Prevention of incipient diabetic nephropathy by high-dose thiamine and benfotiamine — experimental study. Diabetes. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12882930/
  18. Lee MJ, et al. (2016). Comparative pharmacokinetic analysis of thiamine and its phosphorylated metabolites administered as lipophilic derivatives — randomised crossover PK study. Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27707509/
  19. Tuychiev GU, Askarov IR, Abdulloev OS (2024). Analysis of vitamins in pine pollen and plants of eastern biota — HPLC determination — [analytical study]. Journal of Chemistry of Goods and Traditional Medicine 3(1):130–137. https://doi.org/10.55475/jcgtm/vol3.iss1.2024.255
  20. Instituto Nacional de Salud (Peru), Centro Nacional de Alimentación y Nutrición. Tablas peruanas de composición de alimentos — camu-camu — [food-composition table].

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