Vegan collagen-style amino acids plus silica for stronger hair, nails and firmer-looking skin.

Ingredients in Terranova Nutrition Vollagen and Silica 

Per 1 vegetarian capsule

1. Vollagen Amino Acid Complex: 500mg
2. MAGNIFOOD Complex total: 100mg
3. Rose Hips, organic: 50mg
4. Horsetail Spring Shoot, fresh freeze dried: 25mg
5. Nettle Leaf, fresh freeze dried: 25mg
6. Silica, from Bamboo Shoot Extract: 75mg
7. Vegetarian capsule shell

Its a vegan product built around two ingredients:

• Vollagen, a patented vegan collagen which gives the full amino acid profile of human collagen, and
• Silica from bamboo shoot extract.

How Vollagen (Vegan Collagen) Works

1. Supplying Collagen Amino Acids

This is not marine or bovine collagen. It is a vegan amino acid complex designed to give the body the main amino acids found in collagen.

Collagen has a very specific amino acid pattern. It is rich in glycine, proline and hydroxyproline. These are heavily used in skin, hair, nails, joints, tendons, ligaments, bones and blood vessels.

In simple terms, it gives the body collagen-type raw materials without using fish, bovine or animal collagen.

2. Helping the Body Build Its Own Collagen

The body does not just “use collagen” straight from a capsule. It has to make collagen inside cells.

1. Cells such as fibroblasts in the skin and chondrocytes in cartilage use amino acids to build new collagen chains.
2. Glycine is especially important because collagen needs glycine at every third position in its structure. Proline and hydroxyproline help give collagen its strong, stable shape.

So Vollagen works differently from hydrolysed collagen peptides (in most collagen supplements). It does not supply animal collagen. Instead, it gives the body the key amino acids it needs for its own collagen-making process.

3. How Vollagen Works for Skin, Hair, Nails and Joints

• Skin needs collagen for firmness, bounce and smoother-looking texture.
• Hair and nails need amino acids to stay strong and less brittle.
• Joints, tendons and ligaments need collagen-type building blocks because these tissues are protein-rich and structural.

This is why Vollagen is often chosen by people who want a collagen-style product, but need it to be vegan, vegetarian, fish-free or bovine-free.

How Silica Works

Simple Explanation

It helps the “scaffolding” around skin, hair, nails, joints and bones become stronger and better structured.

Long Winded explanation:

Silica works mainly through collagen structure and connective tissue chemistry.

1. Strong extracellular matrix

In the body, silicon is found as orthosilicic acid. It helps fibroblasts (the cells that make collagen and elastin) lay down a better extracellular matrix.

The extracellular matrix is the mesh around cells made from:

• collagen,
• elastin,
• proteoglycans and
• glycosaminoglycans.

It is the “scaffolding” that gives skin, hair follicles, nails, tendons, ligaments and cartilage their structure.

Silica is needed for this cross-linking to occur. Cross-linking is where collagen fibres are tied together into a stronger, more organised network. Without good cross-linking, collagen is weaker and less structured.

2. Glycan Production

Silica is also involved with glycosaminoglycan production. These are water-holding molecules (including hyaluronic acid-type compounds), that help tissues stay hydrated, flexible and cushioned.

3. Increase Enzymes to Stabilize Colalgen

Silica also influences enzymes involved in bone and connective tissue formation, including prolyl hydroxylase, the vitamin C-dependent enzyme needed to stabilise collagen.

How Rosehip Works

Simple Explanation: Rosehip is packed with GOPO. These helps calm joint irritation, while vitamin C (also in Rosehip) helps the body make stronger collagen for cartilage, bones and connective tissue.

Long Winded explanation:

Rosehip is better studied than many customers realise, especially for joints and stiffness. Its key actives are galactolipid GOPO and vitamin C.

1. GOPO helps calm inflammatory signalling around worn or stiff joints. It appears to reduce neutrophil chemotaxis, meaning fewer inflammatory white blood cells are drawn into the joint area. This helps lower some of the chemical signals that can irritate cartilage cells, called chondrocytes.
2. Vitamin C (contained in Rosehip) works differently. It helps the body build strong collagen by acting as a cofactor for prolyl hydroxylase and lysyl hydroxylase, enzymes needed to make stable collagen fibres.

Other Ingredients in Terranova Vollagen & Silica 

1. Horsetail builds strength of Collagen: It is rich in silica, which works by helping form collagen cross-links and strengthening the extracellular matrix, the structure that gives skin, hair, nails and connective tissue their firmness.
2. Nettle as an anti inflammatory and antioxidant: It contains polyphenols, minerals and flavonoids, which work by calming inflammatory signalling such as NF-κB and reducing oxidative stress that can weaken skin, scalp and connective tissue.

Collagen Decline After 25

From the mid-twenties, collagen production drops roughly 1 to 1.5 per cent per year. By 40, you have lost 20 to 30 per cent of capacity. After menopause, the decline accelerates sharply.

Both the amino acid supply and the enzymatic processes that assemble those acids into functional collagen slow with age. Providing both raw materials (Vollagen) and the enzymatic cofactor (silica) addresses both sides of the equation.