Five cornerstone articles on COA reading, MHRA regulatory context, counterfeit detection, independent laboratory testing, and purity standards. Written for a UK audience.
A Certificate of Analysis is the single most important document in the research peptide market. Here is how to read every field, what to look for, and what should make you walk away.
Most people who ask about research peptides focus on the compound itself. The more important question is the document — or rather, whether the document exists, whether it comes from an independent laboratory, and whether it actually confirms what the product label claims. This guide walks through every field of a credible COA in the context of UK research and MHRA guidance.
What counterfeit research peptides actually are, how they end up in the grey market, and what the Medicines Act 1968 and Human Medicines Regulations 2012 say about them.
COA FundamentalsField-by-field: batch number, HPLC purity, LC-MS identity, laboratory independence, accreditation. What a credible COA looks like — and what does not qualify.
CounterfeitsWarning signs that a research peptide source is substandard or mislabelled — price, documentation, claims, and laboratory credibility red flags.
Laboratory TestingWhy independence matters, how to verify a laboratory's credentials, and what ISO/IEC 17025 and UKAS accreditation mean in practice for UK consumers.
MHRA · RegulationAn accessible guide to the UK legal position: Medicines Act 1968, Human Medicines Regulations 2012, and what they mean for research peptides and grey-market supply.
Purity StandardsWhat the 98% purity threshold means, how HPLC and LC-MS work, and why both methods together provide the only credible purity and identity confirmation.