Coenzyme Q10 (Ubiquinone, Ubidecarenone)

Abstract

Moore and colleagues identified coenzyme Q10 in 1940 (Greenberg and Frishman, 1988). In 1957, coenzyme Q10 was isolated from beef heart by Dr. Frederick Crane. Karl Folkers, a scientist at Merck Sharpe and Dohme, elucidated its chemical formula the following year. In 1972, Dr. Folkers and an Italian researcher identified a deficiency of coenzyme Q10 in human heart disease (Sinatra, 1999). Based on data from only a small number of patients, the Japanese government approved coenzyme Q10 for the treatment of congestive heart failure in 1974 (Khatta et al., 2000). In 1978 a Nobel Prize was awarded for the discovery of coenzyme Q10’s role in energy transport. The 1980s saw an increase in the number of clinical studies of coenzyme Q10 (Sinatra, 1999). From 1977 through 1991, Dr. Folkers and other researchers published Biomedical and Clinical Aspects of Coenzyme Q, a work of six volumes in which much often-cited coenzyme Q10 research was published. Coenzyme Q10 capsules were advertised to health care professionals by Doctor’s Mutual Service Company of California in the late 1980s. Promotion of coenzyme Q10 to consumers in the U.S. began in the late 1990s.