What’s the Difference – Folic Acid vs. Folate?

Folate and folic acid are different forms of vitamin B9. While there’s a distinct difference between the two, their names are often used interchangeably. In fact, there’s a lot of confusion regarding folic acid and folate, even among professionals. This article explains the difference between folic acid and folate.

The following article was written by Atli Arnason BSc, PhD for the website Healthline. Follow or subscribe to Healthline by clicking on the following link: https://www.healthline.com/

Vitamin B9

Vitamin B9 is an essential nutrient that naturally occurs as folate.

It serves many important functions in your body. For example, it plays a crucial role in cell growth and the formation of DNA.

Low levels of vitamin B9 are associated with an increased risk of several health conditions, including:

Elevated homocysteine. High homocysteine levels have been associated with an increased risk of heart disease and stroke (1Trusted Source, 2Trusted Source).
Birth defects. Low folate levels in pregnant women have been linked to birth abnormalities, such as neural tube defects (3Trusted Source).
Cancer risk. Poor levels of folate are also linked to increased cancer risk (4Trusted Source, 5Trusted Source).

For these reasons, supplementing with vitamin B9 is common. Fortifying food with this nutrient is mandatory in many countries, including the United States and Canada.

SUMMARY
Vitamin B9 is an essential nutrient that’s mainly present as folate and folic acid. It’s commonly taken in supplement form and even added to processed food in North America.

What is folate?

Folate is the naturally occurring form of vitamin B9.

Its name is derived from the Latin word “folium,” which means leaf. In fact, leafy vegetables are among the best dietary sources of folate.

Folate is a generic name for a group of related compounds with similar nutritional properties.

The active form of vitamin B9 is a folate known as levomefolic acid or 5-methyltetrahydrofolate (5-MTHF).

In your digestive system, most dietary folate is converted into 5-MTHF before entering your bloodstream (6Trusted Source).

SUMMARY
Folate is the naturally occurring form of vitamin B9. Before entering your bloodstream, your digestive system converts it into the biologically active form of vitamin B9 ⁠— 5-MTHF.

What is folic acid?

Folic acid is a synthetic form of vitamin B9, also known as pteroylmonoglutamic acid.

It’s used in supplements and added to processed food products, such as flour and breakfast cereals.

Unlike folate, not all of the folic acid you consume is converted into the active form of vitamin B9 — 5-MTHF — in your digestive system. Instead, it needs to be converted in your liver or other tissues (5Trusted Source, 6Trusted Source).

Yet, this process is slow and inefficient in some people. After taking a folic acid supplement, it takes time for your body to convert all of it to 5-MTHF (7Trusted Source).

Even a small dose, such as 200–400 mcg per day, may not be completely metabolized until the next dose is taken. This problem may become worse when fortified foods are eaten along with folic acid supplements (8Trusted Source, 9Trusted Source).

As a result, unmetabolized folic acid is commonly detected in people’s bloodstreams, even in the fasted state (10Trusted Source, 11Trusted Source, 12Trusted Source).

This is a cause for concern, as high levels of unmetabolized folic acid have been associated with several health problems.

However, one study suggests that taking folic acid along with other B vitamins, particularly vitamin B6, makes the conversion more efficient (10Trusted Source).

SUMMARY
Folic acid is a synthetic form of vitamin B9. Your body does not convert it into active vitamin B9 very well, so unmetabolized folic acid may build up in your bloodstream.

Is unmetabolised folic acid harmful?

Several studies indicate that chronically elevated levels of unmetabolized folic acid may have adverse health effects, including:

Increased cancer risk. High levels of unmetabolized folic acid have been associated with increased cancer risk. However, no evidence proves that unmetabolized folic acid plays a direct role (13Trusted Source, 14Trusted Source, 15Trusted Source).
Undetected B12 deficiency. Among elderly people, high folic acid levels can mask vitamin B12 deficiency. Untreated vitamin B12 deficiency may increase your risk of dementia and impair nerve function (16Trusted Source, 17Trusted Source).

Even a small, daily dose of 400 mcg may cause unmetabolized folic acid to build up in your bloodstream (9Trusted Source, 18Trusted Source).

Although high folic acid intake is a concern, the health implications are unclear, and further studies are needed.

SUMMARY
Researchers are concerned that high levels of unmetabolized folic acid may negatively affect health, but more studies are needed before any strong conclusions can be reached.

What is the healthiest source of vitamin B9?

It’s best to get vitamin B9 from whole foods.

High-folate foods include asparagus, avocados, Brussels sprouts, and leafy greens like spinach and lettuce.

However, for some people, such as pregnant women, supplements are an easy way to ensure adequate vitamin B9 intake.

Folic acid is the most common supplemental form of vitamin B9. It can be purchased at many drug stores, as well as online.

Other supplements contain 5-methyltetrahydrofolate (5-MTHF), also known as levomefolate, which is considered an adequate alternative to folic acid (19Trusted Source, 20Trusted Source, 21Trusted Source, 22Trusted Source).

Supplemental 5-MTHF is available in the form of levomefolate calcium or levomefolate magnesium. It’s sold under the brand names Metafolin, Deplin, and Enlyte and available online.

SUMMARY
The healthiest dietary sources of vitamin B9 are whole foods, such as leafy green vegetables. If you need to take supplements, methyl folate is a good alternative to folic acid.

The bottom line

Folate is the natural form of vitamin B9 in food, while folic acid is a synthetic form.

High intake of folic acid may lead to increased blood levels of unmetabolized folic acid. Some researchers speculate that this may have adverse health effects over time, but further studies are needed before solid conclusions can be reached.

Alternatives to folic acid supplements include 5-MTHT (levomefolate) or whole foods, such as leafy greens.

Oshun Health’s B-Complex contains only natural B-Vitamins – the same as in whole food. Therefore, it poses no risk of unmetabolised folic acid building up in the system.

Henry Deale, chemist Oshun Health

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Fulvic Acid as a Potent Antiviral

Updated: 25 February 2025

Reading time: 10 minutes

Research shows that humic acid, of which fulvic acid forms part, binds so strongly to viruses that it can actually displace them from a cell surface. In vitro studies have shown, for example, that if you allow herpes simplex viruses to attach to host cells and then add humic acid to the solution, it will displace viruses from infected cell surfaces. That is, humic acid has a greater affinity for the virus than the virus does for the host cell. Thus, humic acid can actually displace a virus even after it has attached itself to the surface of a cell.[6]

The following article was originally posted by Michael Ash for the website of Clinical Education, a ‘Not for Profit’ organisation that brings a range of educational experiences to healthcare professionals. Follow Clinical Education by clicking on the following link: https://www.clinicaleducation.org/

The interview with Richard J Laub, MS, PhD, CChem, FRSC, was conducted by Focus Allergy Research Group.

*Note by Oshun Health: Humic Acids referred to in this article is the collective name for both humic acid and fulvic acid. In order to utilise humic acid, it is broken down to fulvic acid in the human gut. This is because humic acid is not soluble at the low pH (acidic) level of the stomach whereas fulvic acid is soluble at any pH level. The antiviral properties referred to in the article, therefore, applies to fulvic acid as well as humic acid.

An Interview with: Richard J Laub, MS, PhD, CChem, FRSC, is a chemist with nearly 150 peer-reviewed published research papers, sixteen patents, and numerous invited reviews and symposium presentations. He was formerly a professor of chemistry at The Ohio State University and San Diego State University, was a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in London, England, was an Alcoa fellow in San Diego, and a Science Research Council fellow in Swansea, Wales. For the last 17 years, Dr. Laub has focused exclusively on sourcing, analysing, studying, extracting and purifying humic acid, a remarkable high-mineral, healing substance with potent antiviral properties, found in ancient soil deposits.

Focus: You have devoted the last 17 years of your life to researching humic acid, an extract of ancient organic soil deposits. These ancient soil deposits—named humus, or humin, from the Greek word for soil—can be found all over the world and contain highly-concentrated minerals and healing substances. It’s interesting that in essence, the soil that nourishes plant life–and later the plant that dies and becomes part of the soil–contains such potent healing substances. Can you give us some basic facts about humic and fulvic acids before we discuss the health benefits?

RJL: Both humic and fulvic acids are extracts from composted organic matter and prove to be excellent mineral supplements. They excel at providing all the trace minerals we need. Fulvic acid is a small and somewhat rigid molecule, with a molecular weight of about 1,500 daltons (a dalton is a unit of mass commonly used in chemistry). Humic acid is equally potent as a mineral supplement, but is a much heavier, bigger molecule. It weighs about 50,000 daltons. Humic acid is flexible, because it is made up of many chains of molecules. It looks a bit like a series of wagon wheels, one inside the other, with spokes going from one wheel to the next. This flexibility is a very important contributor to its antiviral properties.

Focus: What do these very different shapes—small and rigid, or large and flexible—mean in terms of human health?

RJL: Because of its size and flexibility, certain humic acids from particular soil deposits turn out to be potent, broad-spectrum antivirals. That is because humic acid contains many kinds of “functional groups” (specific groups of atoms) that can bind to a multitude of viruses. Research has shown certain humic acids to be effective in vitro against a wide range of viruses, including influenza, HSV, HIV, and others.[1],[2],[3],[4],[5]

Focus: How exactly does humic acid bind to a virus?

RJL: Binding occurs through hydrogen bonding. Electropositive atoms attract electronegative atoms. These are the same forces that hold DNA together. What is remarkable is that humic acid, with its many kinds of functional groups, binds more strongly to viruses than do our own cells. Certain humic acids from certain soil deposits are essentially like a really, really sticky piece of Velcro. Viruses also have really sticky sites—that’s how they manage to bind to a host cell. When these two very sticky pieces of Velcro come together they bind together very strongly.

Focus: Can you explain what a virus does once it attaches to a cell receptor?

RJL: It essentially pokes a hole in the cell, and injects either its RNA or DNA–its genomic material–into the cell. At that point the virus has essentially spent itself, but the viral material inside the cell uses the cell’s machinery to create more viruses, which then leave the cell and go on to bind to and infect other cells.

Focus: What happens to a virus when it binds to humic acid instead of a cell surface?

RJL: Humic acid essentially neutralises a virus’s chemical “stickiness”. Doing so in turn prevents the virus from reproducing since it can no longer attach (“fuse”) to the surface of a host cell. The immune system can then begin to eliminate the virus (largely through the action of macrophages). Also, viruses don’t live forever: if not allowed to reproduce, influenza viruses, for example, die out in 36-48 hours.

Focus: What happens if viruses have already attached to your cells? Can humic acid help?

RJL: Humic acid binds so strongly to viruses that it can actually displace them from a cell surface. In vitro studies have shown, for example, that if you allow herpes simplex viruses to attach to host cells and then add humic acid to the solution, it will displace viruses from infected cell surfaces. That is, humic acid has a greater affinity for the virus than the virus does for the host cell. Thus, humic acid can actually displace a virus even after it has attached itself to the surface of a cell.[6]

Focus: That’s quite amazing—that this natural substance can displace viruses that have already locked onto cells. Is this true of any humic acid from around the world?

RJL: No. Humic acid varies dramatically from site to site. Humic acids from different deposits have very different physicochemical properties. Just like coal—the coal from South Africa is very different in makeup than the coal from Birmingham in Britain. For instance, one of the better-known humic acid deposits in the United States occurs in the state of New Mexico, where humic acid is mined for agriculture–as a fertiliser–and also for the petroleum industry as a drilling mud additive. From an agricultural standpoint New Mexico humic acid is great, but it is not very effective at combating human viruses. A lot of the research I carried out in the early days was simply obtaining samples of humic acid from around the world and testing them to see which ones were efficacious against human viral disease. Remember, humic acid is the result of composted organic matter that is 50-100,000 years old, and that can be found almost anywhere—places where there are freshwater deposits and vegetation living around freshwater lakes, other places where there are saltwater deposits and decomposed organic matter at the edge of marine environments. Some humic acids come from decomposed forests, others from marshes, peat bogs, or scrub-brush. Any plant can be composted into humic acid, but the enormous variety of plant life means that each source of humic acid is unique.

Focus: Once you found the ideal antiviral humic acid, what did you do?

RJL: The next challenge was to purify and sterilise it without degrading it. When you first dig humic acid out of the ground it is dark-brown or even black. Shilajit is a very crude form of humic acid that has been used around the world for hundreds (if not thousands) of years. The most familiar form of humic acid looks like coal, and is sometimes called leonardite or brown coal—though it isn’t actually coal. So, the challenge was to extract the humic acid without damaging it. Methodologies suitable for sterilisation of the final processed product also took very considerable research and development. (The original microbes that created the humus are of course long since dead, but other bacteria and moulds flourish in such soil deposits.) Overall, ten solid years of research and development were required to identify a quality source of humic acid that could also be purified and sterilised without diminishing its effectiveness as a human antiviral agent.

Focus: If one takes humic acid orally, when do peak blood levels occur?

RJL: Peak levels occur at about four hours. By eight to twelve hours the substance is pretty much cleared out of the bloodstream.

Focus: Do you think it has any other special properties beyond being a great mineral source and a potent antiviral?

RJL: Some researchers claim it boosts the immune system, but I’m not convinced it does so directly.[7] I think that humic acid’s wide spectrum of important trace minerals, coupled with its antiviral properties, result in a stronger immune system indirectly. Some of the trace minerals are present in very, very tiny amounts—just a few parts per million—but that’s exactly what we need to support enzyme functions among other things. I also think there are a lot of viruses we are all carrying that haven’t yet been identified (“stealth” viruses). But humic acid will bind to them, regardless.

Focus: That just shows you the broad-spectrum action of humic acid, so that it’s likely to work on many viruses we carry that have not yet been identified. I assume you take it yourself?

RJL: Of course. And I haven’t had a cold or the flu since 2004. Not one.

References

[1] F. J. Lu, S. N. Tseng, et al. In Vitro Anti-Influenza Virus Activity of Synthetic Humate Analogues Derived from Protocatechuic Acid. Arch. Virol. 2002, 147(2), 273-284 View Abstract

[2] C. E. J. van Rensburg, J. Dekker, et al. Investigations of the Anti- HIV Properties of Oxihumate. Chemotherapy 2002, 48(3), 138-143. View Abstract

[3] G. Kornilaeva, A. Becovich, et al. New Humic Acid Derivative as Potent Inhibitor of HIV-1 Replication. Med. Gen. Med. 2004, 6(3), A10360 View Summary PDF

[4] R. Kloecking, B. Helbig, G. Schotz, et al. Anti-HSV-1 Activity of Synthetic Humic Acid-Like Polymers Derived from p-Diphenolic Starting Compounds. Arch. Chem. Chemother. 2002, 13(4), 241-249

[5] Laub Biochem Specialty Labsl, 2001-2002, research conducted by contract for Virology Branch of the Antiviral Research and Antimicrobial Chemistry Program (Dr. Christopher Tseng, Program Officer), Division of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (DMID) Screening and Testing Program for Antiviral, Immunomodulatory, Antitumor and/or Drug Delivery Activities, National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health (NIH, Bethesda, Maryland)

[6] Laub Biochem Specialty Labs, Humic Acid Inhibition of HSV Infection. 1998

[7] G. K. Joone, J. Dekker, et al. Investigation of the Immunostimulatory Properties of Oxihumates. Z. Naturforsch. C: J. Biosci. 2003, 58(3/4) 263-267. PMID: 12710739 View Abstract LinkedInFacebookTwitterEmailPrintMor

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