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Not medical advice. The Atlas is not a substitute for a clinician who can examine you.

SHLP6

Small Humanin-Like Peptide 6

Evidence grade 1 of 5, Untested. Read how the Atlas grades evidence.

SHLP6 rests entirely on in-vitro and in-silico work with no human trials of any kind. It was described in the founding SHLP paper (Cobb et al., Aging 2016), where it was the outlier of the family: it significantly increased apoptosis in NIT-1 and 22Rv1 cells, the opposite of the cytoprotective SHLP2 and SHLP3. Later work (Gruschus et al., Scientific Reports 2023) found it is the most evolutionarily conserved mitochondrial-derived peptide, and a 2025 in-silico paper modeled pro-apoptotic docking against Caspase 8, Bax, Bcl-2 and DRP1, so the literature associates SHLP6 with pro-apoptotic signaling rather than the protective, anti-aging profile marketed for its siblings. Animal-only and cell-only, so grade 1.

FDA
No FDA approval and no investigational (IND) program on record; available only as a research-use-only laboratory reagent, not for human consumption
WADA
Not listed on the WADA Prohibited List

Reference only. Not medical advice.

What can go wrong

Research chemical only, no human safety or efficacy data, and unlike its cytoprotective relatives the published data associate SHLP6 with increased apoptosis.

Talk to a clinician before taking this. The Atlas can tell you what has been studied about SHLP6. It cannot tell you how it would interact with your body, your history, or anything else you are taking, and nothing on this page is a reason to start.

From the same USC mitochondrial-peptide discovery program as Humanin and MOTS-c, with anti-apoptotic properties observed in cancer cell lines.

What people take it for

These are the reasons people give for taking it. They are not effects it has been shown to have.

  • Mitochondrial health research
  • Anti-aging research

How it is supposed to work

SHLP6 is another small humanin-like peptide encoded in mitochondrial DNA, and it is the odd one of the family: rather than protecting cells, it has been observed to promote apoptosis, or programmed cell death, in laboratory studies. Intriguingly, it is one of the most evolutionarily conserved of the group, which suggests it has a genuine biological role even though that role looks different from its cytoprotective cousins.

SHLP6 is one of the six small humanin-like peptides encoded in the same mitochondrial ribosomal gene as Humanin, but functionally it is the odd one out, associated with inducing apoptosis rather than preventing it.

Type
Mitochondrial peptide
Family
Small humanin-like
Action
Pro-apoptotic
Interest
Cancer biology
Human trials
None
Approved
No

The Humanin Cousin That Triggers Cell Death Instead

SHLP6 is the most interesting member of the family precisely because it inverts the family’s signature. While Humanin, SHLP2 and SHLP3 protect cells by blocking apoptosis, SHLP6 has been shown to increase apoptosis, including in cancer cell lines, while still protecting against some forms of mitochondrial-mediated cell death, so its behavior is genuinely complex and context-dependent. That pro-death effect flips the usual concern: rather than a longevity peptide with a cancer-shielding worry, SHLP6 reads more like a potential cancer-biology tool, of academic interest for triggering tumor-cell death. As with the whole family, though, this is preclinical cell-and-animal work with no human trials, no approval and no established use, so it remains a research molecule rather than a therapy in either direction.

Safety in detail

The current entry labels SHLP6 as investigational and at Research Stage, which overstates its regulatory standing. There is no IND or clinical program; it is an unapproved research reagent sold not for human use. Buyers should also note the literature is genuinely mixed on this specific peptide: it is pro-apoptotic in the cell models where it has been tested, the opposite of the protective profile marketed for other mitochondrial-derived peptides.

  • Effects are documented in cell culture and animal models; there are no completed human safety or efficacy trials.
  • Not approved for any use; any consumer material is gray-market research-use-only with unverified identity, dose and purity.
  • As an unstudied injectable, its long-term human safety is entirely unknown.
  • Best understood as a research molecule, not a therapy.

Children and teenagers

SHLP6 has no pediatric use or relevance; it is an experimental research peptide.

What people get wrong

Nothing recorded here yet. There is almost certainly something people get wrong about this one, and the blank space means we have not written it down, not that the record is clean.

Who profits, and who pushes back

Nobody is named here yet, because we have not done that work on this entry. Read that as unfinished. Somebody almost certainly sells this, and somebody almost certainly disputes it. Assume both until we have checked.

SHLP6 has essentially no consumer market, since its pro-death profile makes it unattractive as a longevity product. Its relevance is academic, within the research interest surrounding mitochondrial peptides and cancer biology.

How we got here

SHLP6 was named in 2016 by Laura Cobb, Changhan Lee, Pinchas Cohen and colleagues at UCLA and USC, who used an in-silico scan of the mitochondrial 16S ribosomal RNA gene (MT-RNR2), the same gene that encodes Humanin, to identify six small open reading frames they called small humanin-like peptides 1 through 6. Within that founding family SHLP6 was the contrarian member: where SHLP2 and SHLP3 were cytoprotective and insulin-sensitizing, SHLP6 increased apoptosis, so it has never been developed as an anti-aging product the way MOTS-c and Humanin analogs have. It has stayed a laboratory research peptide, now catalogued by reagent vendors as SHLP6 (Human), and later evolutionary work identified it as the most conserved of the mitochondrial-derived peptides, which renewed interest in its role in aging and neurodegeneration without moving it toward any human trial.

SHLP6 was identified in 2016 alongside the other small humanin-like peptides, in the same search of the mitochondrial ribosomal region, and stood out immediately as the family member with the opposite, pro-apoptotic behavior.

The numbers behind the grade

Type
Mitochondrial peptide
Family
Small humanin-like (SHLP)
Effect
Pro-apoptotic
Conserved
Strongly
Stage
Preclinical
Approved
No

The people taking it

A scientifically interesting but obscure mitochondrial-derived peptide, notable mainly for being the conserved, apoptosis-inducing outlier of the SHLP family.

SHLP6’s relevance is to researchers studying mitochondrial peptides and cancer-cell death, not to a consumer audience.

Studied in research as a conserved, apoptosis-inducing mitochondrial peptide; it has no approved or established human use and essentially no consumer market beyond research curiosity.

Set against the alternatives

SHLP6 is the inverse of its family: where Humanin and SHLP2 block cell death, it promotes it. That makes its closest functional parallel not the other mitochondrial peptides but the senolytic FOXO4-DRI, which also deliberately pushes targeted cells toward death. Against the longevity framing of the rest of the family, SHLP6 is a cancer-biology curiosity rather than an anti-aging candidate.

What we do not know

  • What SHLP6’s apoptosis-promoting role means biologically, and whether it has any therapeutic angle (for instance in cancer).
  • Why it is so conserved despite its distinct activity.
  • Whether its effects are relevant in humans at all.

The market for this

What follows describes how this is bought and sold. It is not a buying guide and it is not an endorsement of any seller.

There is no approved route. It is available only as research-use-only material from peptide vendors, which is not intended for human use; given the absence of human data, self-experimentation is not advisable.

Not produced as a drug; any consumer-facing material is research-use-only, typically synthesized overseas in China, with no quality assurance and frequently no certificate of analysis.

What this entry does not yet cover

What follows is unfinished work on our side, not a finding about SHLP6.

  • Timeline. We have not built the dated record of research and regulatory events.
  • Supply chain. We have not mapped where it is made.
  • What could change. No forward-looking summary yet.

Sources

The studies that matter

  • Cohen group, MDP characterization2016

    Identified SHLP6 and noted its apoptosis-inducing activity, distinct from the survival-promoting SHLP2 and SHLP3.

  • Natural-selection analysis (Scientific Reports)2023

    Found that SHLP6, like humanin, is strongly conserved and under natural selection, implying a real biological function, unlike several other SHLPs.