back to indexDr. Rhonda Patrick: Micronutrients for Health & Longevity | Huberman Lab Podcast #70
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Welcome to the Huberman Lab Podcast,
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where we discuss science and science-based tools
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for everyday life.
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I'm Andrew Huberman,
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and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology
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at Stanford School of Medicine.
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Today, my guest is Dr. Rhonda Patrick.
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Dr. Patrick is known to some of you as a podcaster
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and one of the premier educators in the landscape
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of mitochondria, metabolism, stress,
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and other aspects of brain and body health.
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Her podcast, Found My Fitness,
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is one of the premier podcasts in the world
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for disseminating knowledge about how the brain
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and body work and how we can use behavioral tools,
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micronutrients, supplements, and other protocols
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in order to maximize our immediate and long-term health.
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Dr. Patrick did her formal training in cell biology,
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exploring the links between mitochondrial metabolism,
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apoptosis, which is naturally occurring cell death,
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which is a healthy form of cell death
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that occurs in our brain and body throughout the lifespan,
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and cancer biology.
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She then went on to do postdoctoral training
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with Dr. Bruce Ames investigating the effects
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of micronutrients, meaning vitamins and minerals,
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and how they affect metabolism, inflammation,
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DNA damage, and the aging process.
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She has published landmark review articles
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and primary research, meaning original research articles,
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in some of the premier journals in the world,
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including Science, Nature Cell Biology,
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Trends in Cell Biology, and FASEB.
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Indeed, Dr. Patrick is an expert
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in an extraordinarily broad range of topics
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that impact our health.
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For today's episode,
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we focus primarily on the major categories
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of micronutrients that are essential
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for brain and body health.
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I have to confess that before the discussion
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with Dr. Patrick, I was aware of only one of the categories
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of micronutrients that we discuss.
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And so you'll notice that I am wrapped with attention
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throughout the discussion.
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And I think that you'll want to have a pen and paper handy
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because she offers not only a very clear understanding
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of the biological mechanisms
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by which other micronutrients operate,
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but some very clear and actionable tools
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and items that we can all embark on
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if we are to optimize our brain and body health.
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We also discuss behavioral protocols.
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Dr. Patrick is well-known for her understanding
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of the scientific literature on sauna
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and the use of heat and cold for optimizing things
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like metabolism, longevity, cardiovascular health.
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And I'm delighted to say that we discussed that as well
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and how behavioral protocols can interface
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with supplement-based and nutritional protocols.
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I'm confident that you'll learn a tremendous amount
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of information from Dr. Patrick,
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much of which is immediately actionable.
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And if you're not already following and listening
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to her excellent podcast, you'll absolutely want to do that.
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It's foundmyfitness.com is the website
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where you can get access to that podcast.
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It's also on Apple and Spotify and YouTube
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as foundmyfitness.
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Dr. Patrick also has a terrific newsletter
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that I recommend signing up for.
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It's foundmyfitness.com slash newsletter
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is where you'll find it.
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And it includes research on fasting, micronutrients,
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sleep, depression, fitness, longevity, and far more,
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along of course with actionable protocols.
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I'm pleased to announce that the Huberman Lab Podcast
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is now partnered with Momentous Supplements.
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Our motivation for partnering with Momentous
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is to provide people one location where they can go
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to access the highest quality supplements
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in the specific dosages that are best supported
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by the scientific research and that are discussed
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during various episodes of the Huberman Lab Podcast.
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If you go to livemomentous.com slash Huberman,
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you will see those formulations.
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I should mention that we are going to add more formulations
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in the months to come,
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and you will see specific suggestions
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about how best to take those supplements,
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meaning what dosages and times of day,
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and in fact, how to combine those supplements
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with specific behavioral protocols
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that have been discussed on the podcast
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and are science supported in order to derive
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the maximum benefit from those supplements.
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And many of you will probably also be pleased to learn
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that Momentous ships not just within the United States,
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but also internationally.
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So once again, if you go to livemomentous.com slash Huberman,
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you will find what we firmly believe
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to be the best quality supplements in the precise dosages
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and the best protocols for taking those supplements,
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along with the ideal behavioral protocols
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to combine with those supplement formulations.
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I'm pleased to announce
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that I'm hosting two live events this May.
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The first live event will be hosted
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in Seattle, Washington on May 17th.
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The second live event will be hosted
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in Portland, Oregon on May 18th.
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Both are part of a lecture series entitled
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The Brain-Body Contract,
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during which I will discuss science and science-based tools
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for mental health, physical health, and performance.
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And I should point out
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that while some of the material I'll cover
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will overlap with information covered here
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on the Huberman Lab Podcast
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and on various social media posts,
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most of the information I will cover
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is going to be distinct from information
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covered on the podcast or elsewhere.
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So once again, it's Seattle on May 17th,
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Portland on May 18th.
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You can access tickets by going to HubermanLab.com slash tour
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and I hope to see you there.
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Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast
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is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford.
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It is, however, part of my desire and effort
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to bring zero cost to consumer information about science
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and science-related tools to the general public.
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In keeping with that theme,
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I'd like to thank the sponsors of today's podcast.
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Our first sponsor is Athletic Greens.
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Athletic Greens is an all-in-one
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vitamin mineral probiotic drink.
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I've been taking Athletic Greens since 2012,
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so I'm delighted that they're sponsoring the podcast.
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The reason I started taking Athletic Greens
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and the reason I still take Athletic Greens
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once or twice a day is that it helps me cover
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all of my basic nutritional needs.
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It makes up for any deficiencies that I might have.
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In addition, it has probiotics,
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which are vital for microbiome health.
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I've done a couple of episodes now
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on the so-called gut microbiome
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and the ways in which the microbiome interacts
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with your immune system, with your brain to regulate mood,
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and essentially with every biological system
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relevant to health throughout your brain and body.
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With Athletic Greens, I get the vitamins I need,
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the minerals I need,
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and the probiotics to support my microbiome.
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If you'd like to try Athletic Greens,
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you can go to athleticgreens.com slash Huberman
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and claim a special offer.
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They'll give you five free travel packs,
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which make it easy to mix up Athletic Greens
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while you're on the road,
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plus a year's supply of vitamin D3K2.
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There are a ton of data now showing that vitamin D3
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is essential for various aspects of our brain
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Even if we're getting a lot of sunshine,
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many of us are still deficient in vitamin D3.
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And K2 is also important because it regulates things
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like cardiovascular function,
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calcium in the body, and so on.
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Again, go to athleticgreens.com slash Huberman
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to claim the special offer of the five free travel packs
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and the year supply of vitamin D3K2.
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Today's episode is also brought to us by Thesis.
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Thesis makes what are called nootropics,
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which means smart drugs.
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Now, to be honest, I am not a fan of the term nootropics.
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I don't believe in smart drugs in the sense that
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I don't believe that there's any one substance
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or collection of substances that can make us smarter.
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I do believe based on science, however,
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that there are particular neural circuits and brain functions
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That's just the way that the brain works.
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Different neural circuits for different brain states.
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And so the idea of a nootropic
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fails to acknowledge that smarter is many things, right?
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If you're an artist, you're a musician, you're doing math,
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I've been using thesis for more than six months now,
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My go-to formula is the clarity formula,
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or sometimes I'll use their energy formula before training.
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To get your own personalized nootropic starter kit,
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go online to takethesis.com slash Huberman,
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Today's episode is also brought to us by Inside Tracker.
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Inside Tracker is a personalized nutrition platform
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that analyzes data from your blood and DNA
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to help you better understand your body
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I've long been a believer in getting regular blood work done
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for the simple reason that many of the factors
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but they also give you very clear directives
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and very actionable based on the very easy to use dashboard
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at Inside Tracker.
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If you'd like to try Inside Tracker,
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you can visit insidetracker.com slash Huberman
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to get 20% off any of Inside Tracker's plans.
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Just use the code Huberman at checkout.
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And now for my discussion with Dr. Rhonda Patrick.
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This has been a long time coming,
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even longer than you know,
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because even before we discussed you coming
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on this podcast as a guest,
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I've been watching your content for a very long time.
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So I want to start off by saying thank you.
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You were the spearhead to break through
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from academic science to public education.
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So I consider you first in,
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and the rest of us are just in your wake.
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So thank you for that.
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Oh, that is so kind.
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Thank you so much.
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It's absolutely true.
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I am so excited to be here having a conversation with you.
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It's absolutely true.
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If anyone does their research,
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they will realize that the statement I just made
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is absolutely true.
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And there isn't even a close second, you know,
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any other public facing educators
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that have formal science training
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and do regular posting of content came in several years
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after you initiated it.
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So we're all grateful.
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I have so many questions,
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but I want to start off with a kind of a new,
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but old theme that you're very familiar with.
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So temperature is a powerful stimulus,
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as we know for biology.
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And you've covered a lot of material related
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to the utility of cold,
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but also the utility of heat.
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And as I learn more and more from your content
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and from the various papers,
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it seems that there's a bit of a conundrum
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in that cold can stimulate a number of things
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like increases in metabolism, brown fat,
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et cetera, et cetera.
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Hopefully you'll tell us more about those,
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but heat seems to be able to do a lot of the same things.
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And I wonder whether or not the discomfort of cold,
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deliberate cold exposure and the discomfort of heat
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might be anchoring to the same pathway.
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So would you mind sharing with us a little bit
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about what happens when we get into a cold environment
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on purpose and what happens when we get
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into a hot environment on purpose?
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And I'm hoping that this might eventually lead us
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to some point of convergent understanding.
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I would love to, let's take a step back.
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And I think you brought up a really important point here.
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And I think that point has to do
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with the intermittent challenging of yourself
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and whether that is through temperature changes
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like cold or heat or through other types of stressors
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like physical activity or perhaps even dietary compounds
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that are bound in plants.
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These are things like polyphenols or flavanols.
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Humans, we evolved to intermittently challenge ourselves.
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And before we had Instacart where you could basically
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just get your food delivered to you,
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before the industrial revolution occurred,
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we were out hunting, and I say we, not us, but humans.
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We were out gathering, we were moving,
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and we had to be physically fit.
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You couldn't catch your prey
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if you were a sedentary slob, right?
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We're moving and you had to pick your berries,
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And so physical activity was a part of everyday life.
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And caloric restriction or intermittent fasting
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was also a part of it.
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This is another type of challenge.
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We didn't always have a prey that we caught
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or maybe temperatures were such that
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there was nothing for us to gather, right?
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So food scarcity was something common
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as well as eating plants.
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So getting these compounds that I mentioned.
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So these are all types of stress, intermittent challenges
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that activate genetic pathways in our bodies.
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These are often referred to in science
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as stress response pathways
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because they respond to a little bit of stress.
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Physical activity is strenuous.
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Fasting is a little bit stressful.
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Heat, cold, these things are all types
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of little intermittent challenges.
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And there is a lot of crosstalk between these stressors
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and the genetic pathways that they activate.
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And these genetic pathways that are activated
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help you deal with stress.
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And they do it in a way that is not only beneficial
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to help you deal with that little stressor,
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exercise or heat, it stays active
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and it helps you deal with the stress
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of normal metabolism, normal immune function happening,
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just life, aging, right?
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So this concept is referred to as hormesis, right?
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This is a little bit of stressful challenge
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that activates these stress response pathways
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in a beneficial way that is a net positive
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that actually has a very profound antioxidant,
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anti-inflammatory response or whatever the response is.
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It could be the production of more stem cells.
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These are cells that help regenerate different cells
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within tissues or something like autophagy,
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which is a process that can clear away
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all the gunk inside of our cells,
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pieces of DNA, protein aggregates.
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So you'll find that these stress response pathways
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are activated by a variety of stressors.
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So for example, one pathway is called heat shock proteins.
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And as their name would apply, one would go,
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oh, they're activated by heat.
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Well, correct, they are activated very robustly by heat.
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And we can talk about that.
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But you can eat a plant like broccoli sprouts,
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which is high in something called sulforaphane.
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This is a compound that is sort of like a hormetic compound
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or as David Sinclair likes to say,
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it's a xenohormetic compound.
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I love that, I love that term.
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And it activates heat shock proteins, among other things.
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It also activates a very powerful detoxification pathway
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called NRF2, which helps you detoxify things
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like carcinogens that you're exposed to.
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Heat activates that.
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So what I'm getting at is there is overlap.
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Like cold also activates heat shock proteins.
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You're like, really, cold?
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Yes, it activates.
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These are stress response pathways
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and they are activated by various types of stressors.
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Now, you're gonna more robustly activate heat shock proteins
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from heat versus cold, but there is some overlap.
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So I think that sort of forms a foundation there.
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Yeah, that's very helpful.
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And it brings to mind in the context of the nervous system,
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I always tell people, you only have a small kit
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of neurochemicals to work with.
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There isn't dopamine for Netflix
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and then dopamine for relationship
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and dopamine for work, et cetera.
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Dopamine is a generic pathway by which motivation,
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craving and pursuit emerge, et cetera.
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Just like adrenaline is a generic theme
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of many different behaviors.
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And it seems that it is the job of biological systems
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to be able to take a diverse range of inputs,
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even unknown inputs, like we don't know
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what technology will look like in three years,
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but you can bet that some of those novel technologies
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will tap into the very systems that I'm talking about now.
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And there certainly will be other stressors to come about
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that will tap into these pathways.
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I have two questions related to what you just said
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before we talk a little bit more about cold and heat.
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You mentioned plants as a route
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to creating intermittent challenge.
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There's a lot of debate, mostly online,
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about whether or not plants are our friends
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or plants are trying to kill us.
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The extreme version from the carnivore types,
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pure carnivore diet types,
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is that plants are trying to kill us.
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From the plant-based diet folks,
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it seems like it's more about what's healthy
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for the plant and animals and maybe for us.
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But if we set aside that argument
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and we just raise the hypothesis
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that plants have compounds that are bad for us,
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but maybe by consuming them in small amounts,
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they're creating this hormesis type scenario.
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So then I think we conceivably solve the problem.
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We could say, yes, plants are bad for us,
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but in small amounts, they provide this hormetic response
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and they're good for us, right?
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So in the same way that too much heat is bad for us,
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too much cold is bad for us, can kill us, can kill neurons,
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but appropriately dosed in an intermittent challenge
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type of scenarios can be good for us.
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Is that how I should think about plants in these compounds?
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Do you think of them as good for us or as bad for us?
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They're a very sharp blade and we want to use them potently.
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I actually, I think that it's almost impossible.
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I mean, you'd have to eat nothing but the same plant
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all day, every day in large.
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I mean, the bioavailability of these compounds
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in the plants, they're attached to a food matrix.
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You know, it's not like taking it
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in a supplement form as well.
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It's such that it's very difficult to make it toxic.
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Now, there are some cases, for example,
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if you eat cabbage, and I think there's some group
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in Africa or somewhere that that's all they eat is cabbage,
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and there is a goitrogen in cabbage.
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It's not sulforaphane, it's another compound,
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but that's all they eat every day.
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And they get, yeah, and they're like iodine deficient
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So I do think you can, of course, make,
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I mean, there are types of plants that are toxic
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in small quantities, right?
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Folks, don't play this game with hemlock.
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But you're not gonna get poisoned from eating,
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you know, your serving of broccoli at dinner, right?
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So, I mean, it depends on the plant.
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These generalizations are kind of, they're just not useful.
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And I think that a lot of people online,
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in the blogosphere, they gravitate towards them
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because it's just easier and it's a lot more sensational.
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Plants, meat, and starches,
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I'm one of those rare omnivores out there now.
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I feel like I'm a rare, or it's rare to be an omnivore,
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but I think once you step out of the social media,
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as you said, the blogosphere, most people,
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I would say 99% of people on the planet
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are probably omnivores.
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And someone will probably correct me,
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but I doubt the number falls below 98.
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I think if you look at data,
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and when we have carnivore data,
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I can't wait to see it, but right now it's a lot of,
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okay, well, this is a lot of anecdotal evidence
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and there's a lot of good starts with anecdotes,
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but people change a thousand things at once
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and they don't realize that, but they do.
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And so anecdotal data is only so good, right?
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It's a starting point.
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And so we don't really know long-term
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what carnivore diets are gonna do.
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They may be beneficial short-term,
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they may be beneficial for reasons of elimination
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of other things, like who knows, right?
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Lots of possibilities.
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But I do think with respect to plants,
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there's so much evidence, like for example,
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sulforaphane is one that I really like
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because there's just evidence that sulforaphane
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is a very powerful activator of the Nrf2 pathway.
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And this is a pathway that regulates a lot of genes
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and a lot of genes that are related
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to like glutathione production,
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genes that are involved in detoxifying compounds
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that we're exposed to from our food,
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like heterocyclic amines.
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In fact, there have been GWAS studies.
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So these are genetically,
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these are studies that are genome-wide associated studies
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for people listening that aren't familiar.
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People have a variety of versions of genes
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and we have a gene that's able to make heterocyclic amines
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to basically detoxify it so it's not as harmful.
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And people that don't have a certain version of that
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that's doing it well are very prone
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to like colon cancer and increased cancer risk.
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But if they eat a lot of broccoli
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and cruciferous vegetables, it negates that risk
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because they're getting sulforaphane,
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which activates a lot of the glutathione transfer,
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glutathione transferase and synthase genes.
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So glutathione is a major antioxidant in our brain
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and in our vascular system and our body basically.
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So there's evidence that eating things
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like compounds that are like sulforaphane
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or broccoli or broccoli spouts,
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which have like up to 100 times more sulforaphane
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than broccoli are activating glutathione in the brain.
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There's human evidence of that.
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I mean, that's amazing.
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Sorry to interrupt.
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I want to make sure when,
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so broccoli sprouts are different than broccoli.
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And you just told us that they have much,
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they're much richer in these compounds.
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So note to self, I should have broccoli sprouts,
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not just broccoli.
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Can we cook the broccoli and still get these nutrients
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or do we have to eat it raw?
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I confess eating raw broccoli is really aversive to me.
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So the sulforaphane is formed
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from a compound called glucoraphanin,
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which is in the broccoli.
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And the enzyme that converts it into sulforaphane
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is myrosinase and it's heat sensitive.
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So you do somewhat lower the sulforaphane levels
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when you cook the broccoli.
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However, there was a study a few years back
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that showed adding one gram of mustard seed powder,
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ground mustard seed powder,
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which also contains the myrosinase enzyme,
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to your cooked broccoli
link |
increases the sulforaphane by fourfold.
link |
Because I confess, I like broccoli if it's cooked
link |
to the appropriate density,
link |
not too mushy, but definitely not raw.
link |
The idea of eating raw broccoli to me just sounds horrible,
link |
but I like the way mustard seed sounds.
link |
So just a little bit of mustard seed powder
link |
added to the cooked broccoli
link |
can recover some of these compounds.
link |
Yes, so what I do is I will lightly steam my broccoli
link |
and then I add a little bit of my Kerrygold butter
link |
and then I add some mustard seed powder on the top of that.
link |
And it's got a little kick.
link |
Like it's just a little spice, you know?
link |
And if you don't taste that, it's expired.
link |
Like it should have a little kick.
link |
And because I know people will want to know
link |
how often and how much, you know,
link |
are you eating this every day or most days of the week?
link |
Well, I had shifted to supplementation with sulforaphane.
link |
I'm admitting right now
link |
that I've been terrible about it the past,
link |
like, I don't know, six months or so.
link |
The supplementation or the broccoli?
link |
Yes, the supplementation.
link |
And so there's another way to get,
link |
there's another compound and it's actually called moringa.
link |
And Dr. Jed Fahey, who's really the expert on sulforaphane,
link |
he's a good friend of mine.
link |
He's been on the podcast a couple of times.
link |
He basically thinks and, you know,
link |
has done a lot of research on moringa as well
link |
that it's like a cousin and it activates the NRF2 pathway
link |
similarly to sulforaphane.
link |
And so I've been buying this Cooley Cooley moringa powder.
link |
I don't have any affiliation with them.
link |
Cooley Cooley is a brand.
link |
Cooley Cooley is a brand.
link |
That you have no affiliation to.
link |
I have no affiliation,
link |
but Jed Fahey has researched it like that specific brand.
link |
And so it's like, it's legit, you know,
link |
it's like science-backed
link |
in terms of actually containing moringa
link |
and activating NRF2 and I add it to my smoothies.
link |
So that's what I've been doing.
link |
What are some dose ranges?
link |
And of course we give the usual recommendations
link |
that people should talk to their physician,
link |
et cetera, et cetera.
link |
But if people are going to, what do you take?
link |
That's always the, let's take the David Sinclairian approach
link |
where he'll talk about what he does
link |
as a way to deal with this.
link |
And of course, everybody's different and should,
link |
in all seriousness, should,
link |
anytime you add or delete something from your consumption
link |
should consult some trusted healthcare professional,
link |
What, do you recall the dosages?
link |
I do a big heaping tablespoon.
link |
So moringa, coolly coolly moringa, it sounds like a song.
link |
It's with a K, I know.
link |
But, you know, for people also listening,
link |
it's like, well, why would I do that?
link |
You know, I mentioned the glutathione in the brain.
link |
I mentioned it in plasma.
link |
It's been shown to lower DNA damage in people
link |
and white blood cells.
link |
It's also been shown,
link |
there's been several different studies in China.
link |
You know, in China, there's a lot of air pollution.
link |
And I mentioned that, you know,
link |
it's a very powerful activator of NRF2
link |
and I know you're familiar with NRF2,
link |
but NRF2 is like, it's your transcription factor
link |
that is, it is binding to a little specific sequence
link |
in a variety of different genes
link |
and it's like turning them on,
link |
or in some cases, turning them off.
link |
It's regulating what's being activated
link |
or what's not being activated or being turned off.
link |
And some of the genes are basically
link |
these detoxifying pathways.
link |
We talked a little bit about the glutathione,
link |
but there's also ones that are involved
link |
in airborne carcinogens like benzene.
link |
So benzene is found in air pollution,
link |
I mean, cigarette smoke.
link |
If you're smoking cigarettes still,
link |
like please try to quit.
link |
Yeah, you're mutating your DNA.
link |
Like just say nothing of the lung cancer,
link |
you're mutating your DNA.
link |
And heart disease risk, heart disease risk.
link |
But anyways, people, and this has been repeated
link |
in more than one study,
link |
that literally after 24 hours of taking,
link |
I can't remember off the top of my head
link |
what the dose of sulforaphane from broccoli extract,
link |
broccoli seed extract was, or broccoli sprouts extract,
link |
not the seed, it was the sprouts.
link |
Anyways, they started excreting
link |
like 60% benzene and acrolein.
link |
I mean, that's something that we get in cooked food.
link |
It's coming out in their urine?
link |
Coming out in their urine.
link |
Well, I'm not a smoker and I have to be honest,
link |
it's rare that I hear of a supplement for the first time
link |
because I've been deep diving on supplements
link |
since I was in my teens.
link |
This is fascinating.
link |
And it brings me back to this question that we had before.
link |
And I appreciate that you answered it very clearly.
link |
Plants have compounds that are good for us.
link |
They're not just stressing us.
link |
They're activating pathways that are reparative.
link |
That's what I'm taking away
link |
from everything you're telling me.
link |
And that our bodies,
link |
we're supposed to be getting that stress
link |
to have those pathways activated.
link |
Like it is like, you know, right?
link |
I mean, this is conserved among different animals.
link |
Like this is something that is,
link |
it's supposed to happen.
link |
And in our modern day world,
link |
we don't have to eat plants.
link |
We don't have to move anywhere or exercise.
link |
We don't have to go through periods of not eating food
link |
because we can have it at our fingertips at any second.
link |
So, I mean, we've got this conundrum of
link |
we're never activating these stress response pathways
link |
that we're supposed to activate.
link |
We're supposed to.
link |
I find that fascinating.
link |
And again, drawing a parallel to the nervous system.
link |
So what I'm hearing you say is that historically,
link |
we would have to go through some stress,
link |
some confront cold or confront heat
link |
or confront effort or hunger
link |
and have to exercise essentially
link |
in order to obtain these compounds.
link |
And then those compounds are reparative.
link |
Yeah, I feel that resembles the dopamine pathway.
link |
I always say, you know,
link |
there's nothing wrong with dopamine.
link |
People think about dopamine hits as bad or dopamine is bad.
link |
There's absolutely nothing wrong with dopamine.
link |
The problem is dopamine,
link |
especially high levels of dopamine,
link |
released without the need for effort
link |
to access that dopamine is problematic.
link |
So a line of cocaine gives you a ton of dopamine
link |
with no effort except to ingest the drug.
link |
Whereas working for four years or more to get your degree
link |
will release a lot of dopamine
link |
and a lot of cortisol along the way, as we know.
link |
And it's considered a healthy accomplishment in most cases.
link |
A tremendous amount of,
link |
we're approaching the spring
link |
and there'll be a lot of graduations.
link |
Weddings are coming up now that the pandemic
link |
is kind of hopefully slowing
link |
and there'll be a lot of dopamine.
link |
High levels of dopamine are great,
link |
but only after the effort of having done something
link |
in order to access it.
link |
And so that's what I'm taking away from what you're saying
link |
is that we need to go through this intermittent,
link |
the different types of intermittent challenge.
link |
And we are rewarded with particular compounds
link |
that are reparative both for the challenge,
link |
but then make us stronger.
link |
It is, hormesis really is, it seems,
link |
the case of what doesn't kill us makes us stronger.
link |
What, so you mentioned-
link |
Can I add to that one thing you just said?
link |
Because this has been shown with, for example,
link |
sulforaphane in animal studies,
link |
you precondition, give the animal sulforaphane
link |
and then you expose them to like hypoxia
link |
or some kind of ischemic stroke condition,
link |
whatever they do to induce that.
link |
And the sulforaphane, it basically protects them.
link |
Like their precondition
link |
and their stress response pathways are primed.
link |
And so when they're then exposed to the ischemic stroke,
link |
their outcomes are so much better,
link |
so much better than the animals
link |
that didn't get the sulforaphane 48 hours before,
link |
And this has been shown in multiple animal studies
link |
with sulforaphane specifically in the brain.
link |
I know Mark Mattson, Dr. Mark Mattson,
link |
he's often thought of as the intermittent fasting king,
link |
but he's a neuroscientist and he did publish some work
link |
and talks about sulforaphane as well.
link |
I'm really glad you brought that example up
link |
because many of the questions I get on social media
link |
and elsewhere are about traumatic brain injury
link |
and TBI is just one example.
link |
And people always think, oh, sports, it's football.
link |
Whenever you say TBI, people always think football.
link |
And I just want to just take a moment to editorialize.
link |
90% or more of traumatic brain injury
link |
is construction work, at-home accidents.
link |
Football players are,
link |
hockey players are, martial artists are a tiny fraction
link |
of the people who have TBI and concussion of various kinds.
link |
It just so happens that within those communities,
link |
many of them, 75% or more, experience those.
link |
So it's salient within those communities,
link |
but concussion is prominent.
link |
People are always asking,
link |
what can I do in order to offset brain injury?
link |
I had a concussion two years ago, what can I do?
link |
And it's been a tough question
link |
because we really don't have anything for them.
link |
I mean, you tell them sleep well, eat well, exercise,
link |
but it sounds like some of these reparative pathways
link |
either should be explored in the context of brain injury
link |
or I'm guessing are being explored
link |
in the context of brain injury.
link |
Yeah, so a couple of things there.
link |
One is that, I mean, traumatic brain injury,
link |
I mean, it's terrible, but it's also,
link |
it's so interesting because it's also
link |
like literal real-time brain aging.
link |
Like, you know, like it's,
link |
you're able to like accelerate it and understand.
link |
So I often think of,
link |
when I think of traumatic brain injury,
link |
I think of so much overlap between Alzheimer's disease
link |
and dementia and these neurodegenerative diseases
link |
because there are a lot of similarities there, you know?
link |
And so sulforaphane, I personally think,
link |
and I do think there's been some animal research with TBI,
link |
I mean, and sulforaphane,
link |
mostly preconditioning rather than treatment.
link |
So again, it's like, well, I mean, if you're gonna,
link |
if you want a healthy lifestyle thing
link |
and you're a construction worker
link |
or you're fill in the blank, that's, you know, gonna,
link |
I mean, anyone that drives into a car,
link |
I mean, you're at risk to some degree, right?
link |
Around Stanford, we have, you know,
link |
I would say people demonize motorcycles.
link |
People demonize a lot of things,
link |
but moving fast through space on a small object
link |
next to a 3,000 pound vehicle, I mean, we've lost,
link |
we have a number of friends that have died.
link |
We have a number of people with traumatic brain injury.
link |
I'm not against cycling or cyclists,
link |
but it is, it's a risky sport by any stretch.
link |
So in taking things like moringa
link |
or eating my broccoli sprouts,
link |
maybe cooking them a little less
link |
than I'm currently cooking them,
link |
putting on the mustard seed,
link |
is there evidence that,
link |
well, first of all, NRF2 is expressed in neurons, right?
link |
So those cells should be protected.
link |
Are there other cells of the body
link |
that could possibly gain protection from these pathways?
link |
Well, lungs, for one, but just even in plasma cells,
link |
I mean, I think it's pretty,
link |
NRF2 is pretty ubiquitously expressed.
link |
Liver, so there's, I mean,
link |
there's so many animal studies
link |
that have looked at all those things.
link |
I try to kind of gravitate towards human ones
link |
because it's a lot more relevant.
link |
But I think, you know, overall,
link |
like I mentioned, you know, DNA damage lower,
link |
it's like 24 or 34% lower in human blood cells
link |
after broccoli sprout powder supplementation.
link |
And I made a video on this like years ago, 2016 maybe,
link |
and I think I have like the references on there
link |
to exact amounts, I can't remember.
link |
But it's kind of an old video, it's 2016.
link |
But I also had Jed on the podcast
link |
and he did talk about this.
link |
But you know, it's also been shown
link |
in randomized controlled trials
link |
to help treat autism and autistic symptoms.
link |
And yet again, it's doing interesting things in the brain.
link |
And I think it does have something to do
link |
with the oxidative stress and the glutathione,
link |
which would be relevant for TBI treatment.
link |
It hasn't been shown empirically
link |
that that helps with treatment,
link |
but I do think someone could do that study.
link |
I think that it should be done, honestly,
link |
because it's a low-hanging fruit.
link |
I mean, if there's any impact,
link |
and there is at least one preliminary study
link |
that glutathione is increased in the brain
link |
after humans are basically taking sulforaphane, so.
link |
Which is really, for people listening,
link |
that's so important because a number of compounds
link |
that people take in supplement form
link |
don't cross the blood brain barrier,
link |
or they get metabolized in ways
link |
that what's listed on the bottle almost becomes irrelevant
link |
for what your cells actually experience.
link |
So that's very reassuring.
link |
We will get back to heat and cold
link |
and this theme that I tried to surface,
link |
but I just find this too interesting
link |
to diverge at this point from these themes.
link |
So what other compounds or micronutrients
link |
do you place in the top tier of useful, interesting,
link |
there are animal studies,
link |
maybe there are hopefully also some human studies.
link |
We've talked about a few.
link |
I know you've talked a lot about omega-3 fatty acids.
link |
So if you had to do your kind of top three,
link |
your superstars of nutrients for the brain and body,
link |
sounds like we've got one set.
link |
What would you put in alongside them?
link |
Omega-3, the marine omega-3 fatty acids.
link |
So these are found in marine types of animals,
link |
fish, cold water fish, fatty fish.
link |
So there's three fatty acids.
link |
There's one from a plant and that's often referred to
link |
as ALA, people call it short, affilinoic acid.
link |
And then there's eicosapentaenoic acid,
link |
or EPA, and docahexaenoic acid, which is DHA.
link |
I'm amazed you can pronounce two
link |
of the most difficult words to pronounce right next to it
link |
and spell right next to ophthalmology,
link |
which if you can spell it.
link |
I know people who have appointments
link |
in ophthalmology departments
link |
that don't know how to spell ophthalmology.
link |
Little secret, there's an extra P in there.
link |
So the ALA, I'm not going to attempt to pronounce it
link |
because your pronunciation was perfect,
link |
of both of these two compounds.
link |
And you said are marine sources.
link |
So fish, so sardines, cod, this sort of thing.
link |
But what about krill?
link |
I've seen krill oil.
link |
And there was a few years back,
link |
people were saying krill is a better source
link |
for omega-3s than is fish oil.
link |
I took some krill oil capsules, made me itch all over.
link |
Do you have a shellfish allergy?
link |
No, I don't think so.
link |
I'm not a big fan of shellfish,
link |
but I like, you know, I'll have oysters every now and again,
link |
or shrimp or something and feel fine, so.
link |
Yeah, we can talk about sources.
link |
So krill is a source mostly of a type of DHA and EPA
link |
that's in phospholipid form.
link |
So it's a phosphatidylcholine omega-3 fatty acid.
link |
And that's different than most of the,
link |
well, if we're talking about fish oil supplements,
link |
that's a different story.
link |
But if you're talking about comparing fish to eating krill,
link |
like we're talking about the foods.
link |
Oh, I would never eat krill.
link |
Okay, are we talking about the supplements?
link |
Okay, so fish oil supplements.
link |
Yeah, krill supplement versus fish oil supplement.
link |
And if it fits, if it's a fish oil supplement,
link |
if it fits in the conversation,
link |
talking about great sources of omega-3s in their whole form,
link |
I have a bad feeling you're going to tell me sardines.
link |
Sardines are, yeah, they're awesome.
link |
Anyways, except for the taste.
link |
And for the potential contaminants,
link |
mercury, I think, was one.
link |
No, Joe was, yeah, it was mercury.
link |
And Joe was telling me about,
link |
like he used to eat sardines every day.
link |
Joe Rogan was telling me that he used to eat sardines
link |
every day, and then he had really high mercury levels.
link |
And I was really shocked, because sardines are low
link |
in the fish groups.
link |
So the higher up you get, swordfish and sharks,
link |
really high mercury,
link |
because they're eating all the other fish, right?
link |
But I think some brands,
link |
and if you look at Consumer Lab,
link |
Consumer Lab, it's like a third-party site
link |
that I'm affiliated with, but I use them
link |
because they do a lot of analysis of different foods
link |
And so you can look at some of their sardines,
link |
and they have a list of ones that are pretty decent.
link |
But anyways, back to your question
link |
about fish oil supplements versus krill oil supplements.
link |
So one of the major differences is that fish oil supplements,
link |
if you get a high-quality one, it's in a triglyceride form.
link |
So you've got a glycerol backbone with three fatty acids,
link |
and that's attached, and those are either DHA or the EPA.
link |
Or if you have a lower-quality fish oil supplement,
link |
then you have what's called ethyl ester form.
link |
And typically, the reason for that,
link |
it's when fish oil is purified,
link |
it's run through this column with alcohol or something,
link |
they cleave it off the glycerol backbone,
link |
and then it's just kind of easier to leave it like that
link |
than re-esterifying it, which costs more money.
link |
So you can get it in ethyl ester form,
link |
which isn't as bioavailable.
link |
And in fact, if you don't take it with food,
link |
you're going to be in trouble.
link |
You're not going to absorb much of it at all.
link |
Would you see this on the packaging?
link |
Is it going to say it's in this ethyl form?
link |
Some fish oil brands will put it on their website,
link |
perhaps on their packaging, but most of the time,
link |
you'll have to dig for it on the website and or call them.
link |
But I think, for the most part, ones that are higher end
link |
will market it like triglyceride form.
link |
And it's not that ethyl ester is bad,
link |
it just means take it with food.
link |
So one of the major prescription omega-3s out there
link |
is both of them, actually.
link |
Lavazza, which is a mixture of DHA and EPA,
link |
as well as Vasipa, which is a highly purified EPA.
link |
These are both prescribed by physicians to patients
link |
with hypertriglyceridemia.
link |
So high triglycerides, among other things,
link |
I think maybe dysregulation of lipids as well.
link |
This is amazing for people, so these are prescription drugs
link |
that are essentially very high potency purified omega-3s,
link |
but they're given to people for lipid issues.
link |
So this is the treatment of issues with fat metabolism
link |
by giving people fat.
link |
Just to really, I just want to push home,
link |
again, I'm not carnivore keto or anything,
link |
I'm an omnivore, but to just push home that we,
link |
one thing that's so wonderful that you've done
link |
over the years and that you continue to do
link |
is to move away from these very broad sweeping statements
link |
I mean, here's a case where we're saying fat
link |
is not only good, it can be used to combat issues
link |
with that metabolism.
link |
And then fats are not just one thing, they're many things.
link |
So anyway, I just want to put a little highlighter
link |
and a point of appreciation there and make sure
link |
that people are sensitized to the fact that if you hear
link |
that fat is bad, you have to ask what kind of fat, right?
link |
And here we're talking about these omega-3s.
link |
Okay, so the triglyceride form can be taken
link |
with or without food, and there's prescription forms.
link |
What's, I can't get, I don't know if I can get ahold
link |
of the prescription form unless-
link |
You have high triglycerides.
link |
Or I have a friend with high triglycerides.
link |
It's illegal folks, don't share prescription drugs.
link |
Or you talk to your doctor and you say,
link |
I'm already taking this from,
link |
I mean, I don't know how it works.
link |
What's the dosage that you recommend people get?
link |
One way or another.
link |
Okay, so the dosage that physicians prescribe
link |
for high triglycerides, for example, is four grams a day.
link |
Four grams of EPA?
link |
Of, yes, of the Veseepa.
link |
I think Lavazza's also prescribed at four grams a day.
link |
And you can get either of those from your physician.
link |
My father-in-law just got one of them prescribed
link |
because we were buying our own omega-3 for years and years.
link |
It's like, hey, you can actually get this
link |
and health insurance can cover it.
link |
And it's a really purified form,
link |
but you have to take it with food.
link |
That was the bottom line.
link |
I've totally gone on tangents,
link |
but you're asking more interesting questions anyways.
link |
Well, normally I ask about mechanism
link |
and then I talk about protocols, but in the-
link |
I mean, we haven't gotten there yet.
link |
But I think that, and we definitely will get there,
link |
but I think a number of people nowadays
link |
are just really excited about what they can do
link |
And so here we're just raising the importance of omega-3s
link |
and then we'll definitely get to the why
link |
and the underlying mechanism.
link |
I think four grams is,
link |
I mean, and in fact, Bill Harris, Dr. Bill Harris,
link |
he's just one of the pioneers
link |
on omega-3 fatty acid research.
link |
He was on our podcast last August.
link |
And he was saying the reason FDA chose that
link |
was literally just because how much
link |
they could get people to take.
link |
It wasn't like an upper end,
link |
oh, anything above that is unsafe.
link |
That wasn't the case.
link |
I mean, it was just purely cost
link |
and like compliance.
link |
So like what they can get into a pill,
link |
the amount they can get
link |
and how many pills they can get people to take.
link |
I'm smiling because our good friend,
link |
Sachin Panda at the Salk Institute,
link |
who's done a lot of important work on intermittent fasting
link |
and other incredible work on circadian rhythms, et cetera.
link |
When I was talking to him in preparation
link |
for an episode on intermittent fasting,
link |
I said, why the eight hour feeding window?
link |
And he said, well, the graduate student
link |
who ran those studies had a partner,
link |
I think it was a girlfriend as I recall,
link |
hope I didn't get that backward.
link |
And the partner said, listen,
link |
you can be in lab 10 hours a day,
link |
but you can't be in lab 14 hours a day
link |
if you want this relationship to work.
link |
And so it was eight hours of feeding window
link |
plus some measurements and time to walk into the lab,
link |
park the car, et cetera.
link |
And so the eight hour feeding window
link |
that everyone holds so wholly
link |
was actually just born out of this relationship
link |
between these two graduate students.
link |
Had they been single,
link |
I was single all through graduate school
link |
or most of it anyway.
link |
And I lived in the lab.
link |
So if it'd been me, we'd all be,
link |
intermittent fasting would mean eating 14 hours a day.
link |
That was a joke, not a good one,
link |
but I just want to make clear I'm joking.
link |
But the point that you're making is a really good one
link |
that the four gram amount is not a threshold
link |
based on anything except the threshold
link |
of people's willingness to actually take the stop.
link |
So, and I think that's important for people to hear
link |
because so often we hear the eight hour feeding window,
link |
four grams of EPA, you know, 150 minutes of cardio.
link |
And it's really a question of what you can reasonably do
link |
So I take four grams a day.
link |
I take two in the morning, two grams in the morning
link |
and I take two grams in the evening.
link |
I take my EPA in the morning
link |
and I take my DHA in the evening.
link |
I do, I don't know if,
link |
I don't think it's necessary, not necessarily.
link |
I just happen to buy,
link |
I happen to get a certain fish oil supplement
link |
that's like separates them.
link |
And so, you know, like Lavazza,
link |
Lavazza is a great one and it's all like in one
link |
What if someone doesn't have a prescription?
link |
So I take over the counter fish oil.
link |
I know I feel better
link |
because I've done the experiment of going on and off.
link |
I take the mainly for, I don't have depression,
link |
but my mood is better.
link |
My joints feel better.
link |
I just feel better.
link |
And I like to think that my platelets are slipperier
link |
and they're cruising through any little obstructions
link |
in my veins or arteries.
link |
That's the image I have in my head,
link |
but I don't have any data to support that part.
link |
I mean, so if you're asking for like,
link |
where do people get these?
link |
Well, let's say I look at the bottle
link |
and it says two grams per serving,
link |
but then I look and it's 750 milligrams of EPA, right?
link |
Or a thousand milligrams of EPA.
link |
Let's say half of it is EPA.
link |
Then do I want to hit a threshold of EPA
link |
or a threshold of what's listed on the bottle, right?
link |
On the front of the bottle.
link |
And because my understanding is that we need
link |
to hit a threshold level of EPA
link |
in order to derive these important benefits.
link |
I think two grams is a good threshold.
link |
Now, the International Fish Oil Standards, IFSO,
link |
they have a website where they do third-party testing
link |
of a ton of different fish oil supplements
link |
from around the world.
link |
And they measure the concentration of the omega-3 fatty acids
link |
in the actual supplement
link |
because nothing is ever what it says on the bottle.
link |
And then they also measure contaminants.
link |
So mercury, PCBs, dioxins,
link |
things that you'd find potentially in fish
link |
that are harmful to humans.
link |
And they also measure mercury and then oxidized fatty acids.
link |
So these omega-3 fatty acids
link |
are polyunsaturated fatty acids,
link |
which are extremely prone to oxidation.
link |
So please keep your fish oil in the refrigerator
link |
because it's colder.
link |
Yeah, they're extremely prone.
link |
Mine's in the cupboard, so now I know.
link |
The shelf life's increased.
link |
It's lower oxidation.
link |
It makes perfect sense.
link |
So anyways, they measure that.
link |
And I typically like to look for,
link |
they give you a total oxidation number.
link |
It's called TOTOX.
link |
No, T-O-T-O-X, TOTOX is what we call it for short.
link |
And I like it to be at the least under 10, ideally under six.
link |
It's really hard to find all the right mixtures of things.
link |
But people can go to this website
link |
and they can browse through the products.
link |
I have put together an Excel sheet,
link |
which I have a YouTube little screencast
link |
that I'm yet to publish, press the publish button on.
link |
But it basically, you have to go back and check and update
link |
because these are from different lot numbers
link |
They do have up to like 20, 27 or something.
link |
And so I've gone through and found my top picks
link |
of high EPA brands and high DHA brands
link |
if I were to buy some, the ones that I would choose
link |
because of the low total oxidation
link |
and the high concentration of either EPA or DHA.
link |
Now, people can go and do this themselves.
link |
It just takes some work.
link |
No, I'm glad that you did the work.
link |
I'm going to put up a tweet every week with you tagged
link |
until this list is published online.
link |
Sorry, Rhonda, but I'm going to do it.
link |
I know it's very sadistic of me,
link |
but in service to the community and myself.
link |
And I chose five brands from each and I tried to choose.
link |
I tried to find one in like Europe and one in Canada.
link |
So there was like a great selection of US and other.
link |
I don't want to do that work and I trust you.
link |
So yeah, I try and get two grams per day of EPA
link |
from supplementation.
link |
I'll now put it in the refrigerator.
link |
I made that decision mainly based on the data
link |
that I'm aware of looking at comparison
link |
of people doing that anywhere from two to four grams
link |
of EPA per day compared to SSRIs,
link |
serotonin selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors
link |
and treatment of depression.
link |
And I don't want to take an SSRI if I don't have to.
link |
And fortunately I don't have to,
link |
but the data by my read are remarkable.
link |
People that take these things in sufficient doses,
link |
meaning the EPAs are able to get by with much lower dosages
link |
of SSRIs for depression relief,
link |
or in some cases to come off their SSRIs completely
link |
or avoid going on antidepressant medication.
link |
Now, of course, this is not something people should cowboy.
link |
You know, mental health issues are serious,
link |
but what other reasons,
link |
I'd love your thoughts on that, on the mental health part.
link |
And so maybe you could tell us what are some things
link |
that getting two to four grams of EPA per day
link |
is going to help with in our brain and the rest of our body?
link |
So I actually published a paper back in 2015
link |
about the role of omega-3 and vitamin D in depression,
link |
bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and impulsive behavior.
link |
But so like within that paper,
link |
like doing background research,
link |
and this was a review article, by the way,
link |
I was just connecting dots because I love it.
link |
I'm going to grab it.
link |
I confess I don't know the paper,
link |
but I love quality reviews
link |
because the references they're in are so useful.
link |
Well, there's a huge role for inflammation,
link |
and the cause of inflammation and depression.
link |
And I think we did a short animated video on this as well
link |
like years ago back when I was publishing that work
link |
where people are injected with lipopolysaccharide.
link |
I mean, this is something that we're generating
link |
from our gut, mostly from our gut permeability,
link |
which happens a lot.
link |
Endotoxin, it's also called,
link |
it's like it's endotoxin lipopolysaccharide.
link |
It's basically the outer membrane of bacterial cells
link |
when bacteria die.
link |
So like when the immune cells in our gut
link |
come into contact with the bacteria
link |
because we drank alcohol five days in a row or whatever,
link |
we release endotoxin or something stressed us out.
link |
We release endotoxin into our body,
link |
and that causes inflammation.
link |
And so you can inject people with lipopolysaccharide
link |
and cause depressive symptoms.
link |
However, if you take those same cohort of people,
link |
and I think it was somewhere around two grams,
link |
and then inject them with lipopolysaccharide.
link |
You're establishing causation here, right?
link |
It totally, the depressive symptoms versus the placebo.
link |
So the placebo was saline control.
link |
So this was a placebo control
link |
because obviously it's hugely important for depression.
link |
It ameliorated the depressive symptoms
link |
that was caused by lipopolysaccharide.
link |
Amazing, and LPS, lipopolysaccharide, is no joke.
link |
Years ago, when I was working on thermal regulation,
link |
we would inject animals with LPS to induce fever.
link |
The vagus nerve registers
link |
the presence of LPS signals
link |
to these particular hypothalamic areas
link |
and cranks up body temperature,
link |
because basically it's a signal
link |
that the body is infected, right?
link |
So I will continue with my two grams per day.
link |
Maybe I'll ramp it up to four.
link |
I'm not doing the DHA separately.
link |
There's DHA in the same supplement.
link |
boy, we've got a lot of things to hit back on,
link |
because one of your original questions was
link |
krill oil versus fish oil.
link |
Yes, it's still in the queue.
link |
DHA specifically is in phospholipid form.
link |
It's more bioavailable.
link |
So our bodies, if you're comparing exact quantity
link |
or concentration in triglyceride form
link |
versus phospholipid form,
link |
you will get more in your plasma cells,
link |
in your plasma, not plasma cell,
link |
in your plasma, with krill oil.
link |
However, krill oil supplements are so low dose.
link |
Like, I mean, good luck getting two grams
link |
of omega-3 from krill oil.
link |
And also krill oil supplements are notoriously rancid.
link |
I don't know for whatever reason.
link |
Maybe that's what made me itchy all over.
link |
I think they're just,
link |
I haven't found a good krill oil supplement.
link |
I pretty much stay away from it.
link |
I mean, if you smell it too,
link |
I mean, it's just like, it just smells rancid.
link |
So, but the thing is,
link |
and I also published a paper on this back in 2019 or,
link |
yeah, something like that,
link |
about DHA in phospholipid form getting into the brain
link |
through a different mechanism
link |
than DHA in triglyceride form.
link |
And so it's going through a transporter
link |
called the MFS-D2A transporter.
link |
And I think it's very relevant
link |
for people with an ApoE4 allele.
link |
With an Alzheimer's susceptibility.
link |
Right, so like 25% of the population has an allele
link |
and a gene called ApoE4.
link |
And basically it's ApoE,
link |
but the four is referred to as the bad kind of version of it.
link |
This is something in our bodies.
link |
It's also in our brain.
link |
And if people have one of these versions,
link |
if they got one from their mom or their dad,
link |
they have a twofold increased risk for Alzheimer's disease
link |
which is much more, it's less common.
link |
I think it's like 2% of the population
link |
or something has two alleles.
link |
But they have like a 10 or 11 fold
link |
increased risk of Alzheimer's disease.
link |
So there is a role for phospholipid form,
link |
but you also make phospholipid DHA inside your body.
link |
And you can do that by taking in more triglyceride form.
link |
So two grams like the magic,
link |
two grams or more is the magic number, I think.
link |
So kind of back to like the Y for fish oil
link |
and I personally think it is one of the most powerful
link |
anti-inflammatory things, dietary lifestyle,
link |
things that we can get easily, relatively easily
link |
that is gonna powerfully modulate the way you think,
link |
the way you feel and the way you age.
link |
And a variety of different types of studies
link |
kind of led me to that conclusion.
link |
A variety of observational studies.
link |
So there's been lots of work by Dr. Bill Harris
link |
and his collaborators looking at
link |
what is called the omega-3 index.
link |
So this is actually the omega-3 level in red blood cells.
link |
So red blood cells turn over about every 120 days.
link |
So it's a long-term marker of omega-3 status.
link |
This is very different from 99.9% of any study you see
link |
or any lab that you go to
link |
to get your omega-3 levels tested.
link |
You're getting your plasma phospholipid levels tested,
link |
which is kind of like, you can think of it as,
link |
what did I eat a couple of days before?
link |
My omega-3 levels are great,
link |
but did you eat fish like that every week?
link |
Or was it like you went out to dinner?
link |
So it's not a great biomarker for long-term omega-3 status.
link |
It's kind of like the fasting blood glucose levels
link |
versus the HbA1c, which is like a long-term marker, right,
link |
of your blood glucose levels.
link |
So the omega-3 index, he's done a variety of studies,
link |
observational studies,
link |
so for people listening, these are studies
link |
that are obviously flawed
link |
because they're not establishing causality.
link |
You're looking at people's lifestyles.
link |
But in the case of Bill Harris's work,
link |
he's measuring something.
link |
So he's measuring the omega-3 index.
link |
And he's measuring the omega-3 index in people
link |
and then looking at their mortality risk, for example,
link |
or their cardiovascular disease risk.
link |
And what he has found is that most,
link |
first of all, standard American diet
link |
has an omega-3 index of 5%.
link |
Japan, by contrast, has an omega-3 index
link |
of around 10 to 11%.
link |
Big difference there.
link |
And they also have about a five-year
link |
increased life expectancy compared to people in the US.
link |
Do you think that's mainly due
link |
to their fish intake, seafood intake?
link |
So what he showed was, I think it's a big part of it.
link |
I mean, you can't always say it's the only thing,
link |
but what he showed in his data was that in,
link |
and I think it was Framingham's study,
link |
where he looked at the omega-3 index
link |
in people that had a omega-3 index of 4% or lower,
link |
so close to what the standard American is,
link |
but a little bit lower,
link |
they had a five-year decreased life expectancy
link |
compared to people that had an 8% omega-3 index.
link |
And so, big difference there, right?
link |
Five years life expectancy.
link |
But here's the really interesting thing, Andrew.
link |
He also looked at smokers,
link |
and smokers and their omega-3 levels.
link |
And so he stratified it, right?
link |
And he found smokers that had no omega-3
link |
were like the worst of all.
link |
I mean, it was just like the worst, right?
link |
We all know smoking is bad for us
link |
and will take years off our life expectancy.
link |
But smokers that had the high level,
link |
like smokers that were taking their fish oil
link |
or eating fish or whatever it was they were doing
link |
to get them up to 8%,
link |
they had the same life expectancy
link |
as non-smokers with the low omega-3 index.
link |
And that's amazing.
link |
And it's also amazing to me
link |
that people still smoke cigarettes,
link |
but I see a lot of people vaping.
link |
And I know a lot of people consume cannabis, right?
link |
Has there been any studies of specifically of vaping
link |
or people smoking marijuana and all-cause mortality?
link |
I haven't seen those.
link |
I haven't seen those.
link |
They're not motivated enough to come in as research subjects.
link |
That was, again, a poor joke.
link |
It is hard to study people marijuana use,
link |
unless I'm told by my colleagues that study this stuff,
link |
unless you offer people marijuana,
link |
in which case they'll do it.
link |
But again, they're actually not very good research subjects
link |
in all seriousness,
link |
because they are not very motivated or consistent
link |
and they forget their appointments.
link |
So that's incredible.
link |
And you mentioned that the data on pollution
link |
related to the plant compounds earlier.
link |
So it's almost like these things are, again,
link |
are acting in a reparative way.
link |
The omega-3s are, I mean, they are resolving inflammation.
link |
They're like blunting inflammation.
link |
They're doing so many different,
link |
like they affect so many different parts
link |
of the inflammatory pathway,
link |
which is, I think it plays a huge role in the way we age,
link |
the way our brain ages, the way we feel, our mood,
link |
just our joints, all that.
link |
And so it's amazing, but it's not...
link |
I feel better when I take it.
link |
I try to eat some fatty fish a couple of times a week.
link |
I do want to just touch on food sources for a moment.
link |
First of all, are there plants that are rich in omega-3s?
link |
And second, I have some friends who are really into meat.
link |
And I like meat a lot.
link |
My dad's Argentine, but I don't eat very much of it.
link |
I try and eat high quality meats in relatively limited
link |
amounts, but I do eat pretty often.
link |
But I've been told by these sources
link |
of questionable authority,
link |
that if an animal grazes on really good grasses,
link |
for instance, that the meat can contain a lot of omega-3s,
link |
which in principle makes sense based on this omega-3 index.
link |
Cause you're telling me that a lot of it,
link |
this omega-3 is sequestered into the red blood cells.
link |
So if I'm eating high quality grass fed meat
link |
and the grasses had omega-3s,
link |
do my steaks have omega-3s or no?
link |
So there was a study published that compared
link |
conventional meat.
link |
So meat that is, that animals are fed, you know,
link |
corn or soy or whatever it is.
link |
Which is terrible, but for animals and people,
link |
as far as I can tell, I'm sure I'll get some attacks,
link |
I won't read those comments.
link |
The, again, a joke, I read all the comments,
link |
but it seems to me that these animals have to get,
link |
either be taking fish oil or eat plants
link |
that are very rich in omega-3s in order for the meat
link |
to actually contain sufficient omega-3s.
link |
So the meat, comparing the conventional meat
link |
to like the grass fed or pasture raised cows or cattle,
link |
there were higher levels of alpha linoleic acid.
link |
And ALA is, it can be converted into EPA and DHA.
link |
But the conversion is very inefficient
link |
and very dependent on a variety of factors,
link |
including genetics.
link |
Genetics, a huge, you know, regulator.
link |
Like some people can do it much better.
link |
Others, like you're getting like 5% of conversion to EPA.
link |
Estrogen is a major regulator of making that more efficient
link |
and it makes sense because pregnancy,
link |
when your estrogen just goes through the roof,
link |
I mean, these omega-3 fatty acids
link |
play a very important role in brain development.
link |
So you're, you know, women are supposed to be converting
link |
any ALA they can into the longer chain
link |
omega-3 fatty acids, right?
link |
So estrogen does affect that.
link |
But I would say plant sources,
link |
so if you're looking for the ALA,
link |
plant sources would be walnuts, flax seeds,
link |
those are probably the highest.
link |
But if a person is a vegan or a vegetarian,
link |
their best bet is to actually get microalgae oil.
link |
And you can supplement with microalgae oil
link |
because microalgae do, they do make the DHA.
link |
And so that would be a better source
link |
for people that are vegetarian and vegan
link |
rather than doing the flax seed oil.
link |
Because that conversion inefficiency,
link |
you know, the enzymes that convert ALA into EPA and DHA,
link |
again, it's inefficient.
link |
And then for people that eat fish, sardines, you said?
link |
Salmon, and you have to eat the skin, as I understand.
link |
You don't have to, but it's good.
link |
It's rich with the oil.
link |
Yeah, and the reason I say,
link |
like, I think the best would be wild Alaskan salmon
link |
versus the farm-raised because the farm-raised,
link |
again, they're feeding them, they're feeding them corn,
link |
they're feeding them like green and stuff.
link |
And then they give them astaxanthin.
link |
So astaxanthin is a carotenoid.
link |
It's the carotenoid that's in things like
link |
krill crustaceans that make their red pigment.
link |
Yeah, it's also being used now as a supplement
link |
and there's a prescription form
link |
to try and rescue some age-related vision loss
link |
because of the role of the vitamin A pathway
link |
in photoreceptors.
link |
Yeah, well, you know, actually the carotenoids themselves,
link |
so like luteinine, zeaxanthin,
link |
they're really good at sequestering singlet oxygen,
link |
which is some damaging, right?
link |
Yeah, as we age, because the retinal cells,
link |
cells of the eye are so metabolically active,
link |
they accumulate a lot of reactive oxygen species
link |
and mitochondrial repair and limiting reactive oxygen species
link |
is a major theme of trying to rescue vision.
link |
I think that's a whole other podcast and story.
link |
There's some really interesting data now
link |
on the use of red light to try and trigger these pathways.
link |
That's my good friend of many years
link |
and amazing scientist Glenn Jeffrey's lab
link |
at the University College London.
link |
We should talk about that at some point, if not today.
link |
I saw that study like 2020, was it?
link |
Now they have a second study.
link |
Yeah, it's looking real.
link |
I mean, you know, they're cautious.
link |
They're appropriately British and cautious about it.
link |
You know, I always joke
link |
if those studies had been done over here,
link |
everyone would already know about it.
link |
Glenn is a very conservative guy,
link |
but they've done this stuff now in pigs and rodent models
link |
and now also two studies in humans.
link |
It's looking pretty interesting.
link |
So sardines, but also anchovies.
link |
I mean, by the way,
link |
I hate all the food items that I'm describing.
link |
I can barely tolerate salmon.
link |
I don't like fish at all.
link |
Actually, I like live fish.
link |
I had fish tanks when I was a kid.
link |
No, I find fish, unless it's in sushi form,
link |
I find it absolutely repulsive.
link |
And I don't know why.
link |
I probably have some mutation.
link |
So raw fish is actually higher in mercury than cooked.
link |
Okay, well, that's good.
link |
I don't really like sushi that much anyway.
link |
You're giving me great reasons to not eat fish,
link |
but except I should eat these other fish sources
link |
or supplement more heavily.
link |
That's the message I'm getting.
link |
I eat sardines like every day.
link |
My like first meal almost is like a can of sardines
link |
and an avocado with like-
link |
Yeah, with a little bit of lemon
link |
and then some little hot sauce, like, you know.
link |
Does avocado have omega-3s?
link |
Avocado is very good in monounsaturated fat.
link |
It's not really high in polyunsaturated fat.
link |
Omega-3 really, I mean, it's either the DHA and EPA
link |
that's in the marine sources fish
link |
or it's the plant ALA source,
link |
which is like the flaxseed or the walnuts, so.
link |
I mean, all these companies now
link |
are making these plant-based products that taste like meat.
link |
My wish is that they would just make a fish
link |
that tastes like a steak, but that's-
link |
The fish come out albino, the ones that they farm raise
link |
because they don't eat any of the-
link |
I don't want a genetically modified fish
link |
that tastes like a steak.
link |
Although, you know, I love the taste of steak.
link |
The point here is that if you don't,
link |
if one doesn't see themselves
link |
regularly consuming these fish sources of omega-3s,
link |
it seems to me that the only way to really get them
link |
is from supplementation.
link |
And supplementation is a good way to get a high dose
link |
and to get back to your dose point.
link |
There was a couple of studies that basically, you know,
link |
I think there was some way they showed that people
link |
that are in the 4% omega-3 index range,
link |
in order to get to the 8%, right,
link |
the five-year increased life expectancy
link |
if we're comparing the two groups,
link |
was to supplement with at least two grams.
link |
It was about two grams a day.
link |
And I think it was a little bit less
link |
if it was triglyceride form,
link |
but I think two grams is a good, safe number.
link |
So most Americans that are not eating a lot of fish
link |
and they're not supplementing
link |
are probably around a 4% to 5% omega-3 index.
link |
And to get to the 8%,
link |
and I think that's a good empirical way
link |
of thinking about it, right?
link |
Okay, well, I want to get to that 8%.
link |
By the way, I'm almost 16% omega-3 index.
link |
Yeah, I was going to ask about testing.
link |
So where can somebody measure,
link |
where and how can somebody measure their omega-3 index?
link |
Which again, just to remind people,
link |
is essentially the percentage of omega-3s
link |
that you have in your blood with the caveat
link |
that the omega-3 index will be heavily biased
link |
by what you ate in the previous days.
link |
Not the omega-3 index.
link |
Okay, so the omega-3-
link |
Sorry, I misunderstood.
link |
I thought you said in red blood cells.
link |
If I ate salmon two days ago,
link |
my omega-3 index is going to go up.
link |
No, that was plasma.
link |
So most people are measuring,
link |
like if you look at a lot of studies,
link |
and honestly, Andrew,
link |
I think a lot of the reason for conflicting data
link |
is because people are measuring plasma omega-3 levels.
link |
The phospholipids, it's in a phospholipid, right?
link |
So your phospholipids are carrying things.
link |
These are lipoproteins.
link |
They're carrying things like omega-3
link |
and triglycerides and stuff and shuttling them around.
link |
So the omega-3 index is actually in the red blood cells,
link |
and red blood cells take 120 days to turn over.
link |
So if you're going to do a baseline test,
link |
if you want to know before supplementing
link |
what your level is,
link |
you have to wait 120 days before doing the second test
link |
after supplementing to know how much you went up,
link |
because that's how long it takes
link |
for your red blood cell to turn over.
link |
So the omega-3 index, Bill Harris has a company
link |
that he co-founded.
link |
It's called Omega Quant,
link |
and they measure the omega-3 index.
link |
They have a variety of different index tests.
link |
You can do a basic one or a little more advanced.
link |
This is from a blood draw.
link |
It's a little blood spot thing, yeah.
link |
And he uses money to funnel back into doing lipid research.
link |
He's out there doing all sorts of interesting studies
link |
But the omega-3 index is great.
link |
I think that, honestly, more people and more researchers
link |
should be using it, because the conflicting data,
link |
it always comes down to what we're measuring,
link |
the sensitivity of it.
link |
Are we even measuring anything?
link |
So you're giving someone 500 milligrams of DHA,
link |
and you don't see any effect.
link |
Well, did you measure what their levels were,
link |
and did you measure the omega-3 index?
link |
There's all sorts of problems
link |
with randomized controlled trials,
link |
and I think that we need to,
link |
as scientists, we need to come together
link |
and make some progress.
link |
I mean, let's all talk to each other.
link |
Let's figure things out.
link |
This test is out there.
link |
It should be used.
link |
It should be used not just by Bill's group,
link |
but like everyone.
link |
Yeah, well, and I'm learning so much from you,
link |
and I agree we need more collaboration.
link |
I've always enjoyed really fruitful collaborations
link |
in my lab at Stanford,
link |
and collaborating is just so much more fun.
link |
Online, there seems to be a bias more towards creating silos
link |
as opposed to bridges,
link |
but I appreciate that you bring up the need
link |
for more collaboration,
link |
and knowing which measures are best,
link |
and in this case, now I'll thank you for the clarification.
link |
I understand this omega-3 index is going to be best.
link |
You mentioned you, so basically when now I look at you,
link |
I think you are 16% omega-3.
link |
And dolphins are 19%.
link |
Is that your goal?
link |
You're trying to get there?
link |
To do the interesting.
link |
Actually, they should probably do something
link |
where you're trying to achieve the omega-3 ratio
link |
of your favorite species.
link |
Now that we've covered a bit of how to get these things
link |
into one system, depending on what one eats, et cetera,
link |
and some of the better measurements,
link |
how is omega-3 and some of these other related lipids,
link |
how are they having these positive effects?
link |
In my mind, and this is incredibly elementary,
link |
but my understanding is that at some level,
link |
they're making platelets more slippery.
link |
Is that true or not?
link |
I hope, I'm happy to be wrong.
link |
How is it possibly impacting my mood?
link |
Is it through the synthesis of membrane on neurons
link |
that allows neurons to release more transmitter,
link |
like serotonin and dopamine?
link |
What are some of the purported, reported,
link |
and known mechanisms?
link |
I think some of the most well-known mechanisms
link |
do have to do with the omega-3 fatty acids
link |
being very powerful regulators of the inflammatory process
link |
in some way, shape, or form,
link |
whether that has to do with resolvins that are produced.
link |
So from the metabolites of like DHA, for example,
link |
resolvins play a role in resolving inflammation.
link |
Like you want your inflammatory response to be activated
link |
when it's supposed to be,
link |
but you want to resolve that inflammation
link |
and the inflammatory response in a timely manner, right?
link |
And resolvins help do that.
link |
And so resolvins are one.
link |
And then there's these specialized
link |
pro-mediating molecules, the SPMs,
link |
that also help resolve the inflammation.
link |
There's, like you mentioned,
link |
the leukotrienes and prostaglandins,
link |
and these things are being affected by EPA,
link |
and they do affect platelets and platelet aggregation,
link |
and they do affect that whole pathway as well.
link |
And so there's just,
link |
and there's, you know,
link |
I think there's just so many different ways and inputs.
link |
And so when we talk about inflammation,
link |
honestly, it's a big general term,
link |
but you're talking about,
link |
when you're talking about serotonin release,
link |
you know, at the level of neurons,
link |
you know, we know that these inflammatory molecules
link |
cross the blood-brain barrier.
link |
And I just mentioned ago about injecting people
link |
with lipopolysaccharide and causing depressive symptoms.
link |
You know, it's known that omega-3,
link |
actually, specifically EPA,
link |
is able to help serotonin,
link |
inflammation inhibits the release of serotonin.
link |
And so EPA is actually able to blunt inflammatory responses,
link |
along with DHA as well.
link |
DHA does that through resolvins and stuff,
link |
and this then helps more serotonin be released
link |
because you're not having so much inflammation
link |
getting into the brain
link |
and affecting serotonin release, right?
link |
That's one mechanism.
link |
And then another would be,
link |
well, DHA itself has been shown,
link |
it's a very important fatty acid
link |
that makes up cell membranes, many cell membranes,
link |
including in our neurons.
link |
And as you very well know, Andrew,
link |
the structure and function of receptors, of transporters,
link |
these membrane-bound proteins on the surface of our cells,
link |
including neurons, are affected by the membrane fluidity,
link |
like how rigid and how fluid the cell membrane is.
link |
And DHA plays a role in that.
link |
And so, for example, in animal studies,
link |
if you make an animal deficient in DHA,
link |
their serotonin receptors, dopamine receptors,
link |
they're affected because the structure of them is affected
link |
through the fluidity of the membrane.
link |
And so I think that's another mechanism.
link |
And I'm talking sort of general
link |
because I'm not a neuroscientist.
link |
No, but it makes perfect sense.
link |
I mean, we know, for instance, neuroplasticity,
link |
and almost always, involves the recruitment
link |
of more receptors or an improvement
link |
in some feature of receptors to neurotransmitters,
link |
and they literally move laterally in the membrane.
link |
They kind of float around like little rafts.
link |
Sometimes they are, in fact, in lipid rafts.
link |
And so it makes perfect sense that these molecules like DHA,
link |
which are part of the structural fat of the neuron,
link |
because of course the outsides of neurons
link |
are basically fat,
link |
not just the myelin that people have heard of,
link |
but the actual membranes, that getting that right,
link |
you wouldn't want it as rigid as concrete,
link |
but you wouldn't want it as soft as,
link |
need to come up with something here.
link |
What's that gooey stuff that kids play with?
link |
It's like that goo.
link |
Anyway, it's disgusting,
link |
and it's too soft to be a membrane for a neuron.
link |
That's what we know.
link |
Someone put it in the comments
link |
and tell me what that disgusting gooey stuff is.
link |
You don't want your neurons to be that gooey,
link |
and yet you don't want them to be like concrete either.
link |
And in mentioning DHA,
link |
I'm just going to realize I'm backtracking,
link |
but I want to make sure that we close
link |
all the hatches for people.
link |
We talked a lot about EPA,
link |
but are food sources of DHA
link |
that you find particularly attractive
link |
either by taste or by potency for DHA,
link |
what are just a few that we could throw out?
link |
Because I am aware that there are supplements
link |
where you can get a nice ratio of EPA to DHA,
link |
or you take them separately as you do.
link |
But if I want to make sure that I'm getting enough DHA,
link |
what do I need to be sure I'm eating on a regular basis?
link |
Well, the fish is packaging the DHA and EPA in the ratio.
link |
But I also do eat salmon roe,
link |
which is very salty,
link |
and it's a really high source
link |
of the phosphatidylcholine DHA that we talked about.
link |
So this is fish eggs?
link |
That I like for some reason.
link |
Yeah, so I'm discovering something about myself.
link |
This was not meant to be nutritional psychotherapy,
link |
but you're doing that for me anyway.
link |
I'm discovering that, yeah, I like eating embryonic fish.
link |
I just don't like eating the actual fish.
link |
Okay, so fish eggs are okay.
link |
So caviar, basically.
link |
And that's a good source of the phospholipid form.
link |
And I was consuming that a lot
link |
because I wanted to get the phospholipid form.
link |
So, and it's actually really good.
link |
There's been some animal studies
link |
and piglets and rodents as well
link |
showing that consuming phospholipid DHA
link |
during fetal brain development
link |
like gets like 10 times more DHA in the brain.
link |
Makes sense based on fetal development.
link |
So do I need to buy Beluga caviar?
link |
Stuff can get pretty expensive at $200 a tin.
link |
I don't think you need to, yeah.
link |
I think it's a matter of preference.
link |
And if you're supplementing
link |
with your two to four grams of fish oil,
link |
I mean, you're going to get phospholipid form anyway
link |
because your body's going to make it.
link |
Okay, I've seen some containers
link |
of what I assume to be quality fish eggs
link |
that are not at the caviar level
link |
that you can find in the better grocery stores
link |
that aren't super expensive.
link |
I wouldn't dip as low as to go eat, for instance,
link |
like fishing bait.
link |
Like when we were kids, we used to go fishing
link |
and you'd put the fish egg on the thing.
link |
That's probably not good.
link |
Although it's good enough for the fish, apparently.
link |
Okay, only half joking here, folks.
link |
I'm just trying to protect you from yourselves.
link |
Don't get any crazy ideas about eating fishing bait.
link |
Okay, so that's great to know.
link |
So we have these plant-based compounds.
link |
We have the omega-3s, so EPA, DHA.
link |
And then you mentioned there's a third category.
link |
What would you place in your third category
link |
of foods or supplement-based nutrients
link |
that our health, brain and or body health
link |
can really benefit from?
link |
I mean, I think the most obvious would be vitamin D,
link |
which is actually, as you know, a steroid hormone
link |
that we produce when we're in the sun.
link |
Depending on the time of year, we can make it in our skin.
link |
And depending on how much melanin we have in our skin
link |
or whether or not we're wearing sunscreen
link |
or how old we are, there's a sliding scale
link |
on how efficient that process is.
link |
And as I understand, there's an inverse relationship
link |
where the darker your skin is naturally,
link |
the more vitamin D you need to consume.
link |
Well, the darker your skin is, the harder it is.
link |
So there was a study out of the University of Chicago,
link |
this was several years ago, where they looked
link |
at African Americans and compared African Americans
link |
to Caucasians with light skin, fair skin,
link |
and how well they could make vitamin D from sun exposure
link |
and how long they had to be in the sun
link |
to make X amount, right?
link |
And it turns out that African Americans
link |
with darker pigmentation, which protects them
link |
from the burning rays of the sun, it's a natural sunscreen,
link |
had to stay in the sun like six times as long
link |
as someone with none of that natural sunscreen.
link |
So I think the take home there is a lot of people
link |
with darker skin living in sub-Saharan Africa
link |
or people living in India with darker skin
link |
or in the Philippines, these equatorial regions
link |
where you tend to see darker skin
link |
because it's protection from the burning rays of sun.
link |
They are in the sun war.
link |
And they're getting more vitamin D.
link |
But people that maybe moved to the United States
link |
to like Minnesota or in a place where UVB radiation
link |
isn't getting to the atmosphere 12 months out of the year,
link |
it's only getting there four months, for example.
link |
Or even living in our modern day society
link |
where people just don't go outside anymore.
link |
I mean, we're inside, we're at our laptops in school,
link |
we're at work, we're in our cubicle, whatever.
link |
So supplementation does play a major role,
link |
not only for people with darker skin
link |
that aren't outside all the time, but for everyone.
link |
70% of the U.S. population has inadequate vitamin D levels.
link |
70 of the whole U.S.
link |
So this is everyone.
link |
And so I think that insufficient levels defined
link |
as less than 30 nanograms per milliliter,
link |
and that's sort of defined by the endocrine society
link |
looking at a lot of different aggregate studies
link |
and all-cause mortality, for example.
link |
There's been a lot of different meta-analyses
link |
of all-cause mortality studies
link |
where vitamin D levels really seem to be ideal
link |
between 40 to 60 nanograms per milliliter.
link |
And so in order to get to that level,
link |
if you are not outside all the time,
link |
live in Southern California where you're always outside
link |
without sunscreen on, I always wear sunscreen
link |
because I'm trying to protect my skin
link |
from so many wrinkles and stuff, right?
link |
But also skin cancer is somewhat of an issue as well.
link |
So basically the point is that vitamin D
link |
is a steroid hormone,
link |
meaning it actually binds to a receptor
link |
and another receptor dimerizes with it,
link |
the retinoid receptor.
link |
And that complex goes into the nucleus of a cell
link |
where your DNA is, and it recognizes little sequences
link |
of DNA called vitamin D response elements,
link |
they're called VDREs.
link |
They're specific sequences of DNA
link |
that this complex, bound to the vitamin D receptor,
link |
goes inside and recognizes
link |
and turns on a whole host of genes,
link |
turns off a whole host of genes.
link |
I mean, this is important stuff.
link |
Like imagine 70% of the population
link |
having insufficient testosterone, right?
link |
It's a steroid hormone.
link |
We might be headed there, but probably not.
link |
No, I think that its names are very important.
link |
And I think that one of the issues is that vitamin D
link |
is called vitamin D.
link |
It's not called DHEA or variant, blah, blah, blah.
link |
It doesn't sound like a hormone.
link |
I also, I'm glad that you're mentioning skin
link |
as the major kind of interface
link |
between the environment and vitamin D synthesis,
link |
because a lot of people think of skin
link |
as just a protective sheath around us
link |
or something to adorn ourselves with earrings
link |
or tattoos or whatever.
link |
But skin obviously serves those roles,
link |
but the skin is an endocrine organ.
link |
It has the capacity to make things that impact hormones
link |
and to make hormones.
link |
There's this beautiful study out this last year
link |
where this took place over in Israel
link |
where they had people get outside
link |
for 20 or 30 minutes a day, three times a week,
link |
exposing a culturally acceptable,
link |
yet substantial amount of their skin during that time
link |
and saw big increases in testosterone and estrogen.
link |
And this is through a keratinocyte linked pathway
link |
This was done in humans,
link |
but they did some knockout studies in parallel.
link |
And what this study told me or reminded me
link |
is that skin is an endocrine organ.
link |
So the idea that sun could trigger the activation
link |
of a production of a hormone is really interesting
link |
and makes total sense.
link |
So when vitamin D gets into cells
link |
and it's binding to these VDREs,
link |
what sorts of things are they triggering?
link |
So like for testosterone,
link |
we know it's going to trigger protein synthesis,
link |
muscle growth, tendon strength, et cetera.
link |
With estrogen, it's going to be keep your neurons going,
link |
your joints feeling good.
link |
I always remind people that, by the way,
link |
because guys always seem to want to increase
link |
their testosterone and reduce their estrogen.
link |
Just remind people, if you reduce your estrogen, guys,
link |
your libido will plummet to near zero.
link |
Don't crush your estrogen.
link |
It'll also make you stupid.
link |
If you're not already stupid, it will make you stupid.
link |
So estrogen is vitally important for males and females.
link |
When vitamin D gets into cells,
link |
what sorts of things is it stimulating?
link |
Okay, so first of all, it's regulating more than 5%
link |
of the protein-encoded human genome.
link |
More than, and this was, I say more than
link |
because when I was looking at this data really in depth
link |
back in, starting in 2012 to 2014, it was that,
link |
and then it's now grown.
link |
But one of the important things that you'll find interesting
link |
that I published on back in 2014
link |
was that I'd gone through this big published database
link |
where someone had published all these genes
link |
they found VDREs in.
link |
And basically I found that tryptophan hydroxylase one
link |
and tryptophan hydroxylase two was on there.
link |
And so then I started looking at the sequence
link |
and I was doing some in silico work,
link |
and it turns out that the VDREs
link |
and tryptophan hydroxylase two,
link |
so for people listening, tryptophan hydroxylase
link |
is an enzyme that converts tryptophan into serotonin.
link |
So tryptophan is an amino acid that we get from our food.
link |
You convert tryptophan into serotonin in the gut,
link |
but you also do it in the brain.
link |
However, serotonin does not cross the blood-brain barrier.
link |
So tryptophan has to get into your brain
link |
and then you have to convert it to serotonin in your brain.
link |
Well, the enzyme that does that in your brain
link |
is called tryptophan hydroxylase two,
link |
and it's activated by vitamin D.
link |
The one in the gut is actually tryptophan hydroxylase one.
link |
Some of my published work hypothesized
link |
that it might actually be repressed by vitamin D
link |
because it has a sequence.
link |
The sequence itself, this 12-nucleotide sequence,
link |
it can determine to some degree
link |
whether it's gonna be activated or turned off.
link |
And so I was able to kind of look at that
link |
and think, oh, maybe this and that.
link |
And so since then, there have been some groups
link |
that have confirmed more with in vivo
link |
and or in vitro studies,
link |
because mine was all in silico and all that stuff.
link |
But anyways, so serotonin, a really important one.
link |
But most people, I mean, this is regulating
link |
our immune cell, immune system.
link |
It's regulating our blood pressure,
link |
all that water retention.
link |
I mean, bone, of course, homeostasis, 5%, more than 5%.
link |
I mean, I can't tell you so much.
link |
And with 70% of the US population deficient,
link |
I'm beginning to think that this could be the linchpin
link |
in a number of really important issues.
link |
So supplementing vitamin D3 is what I normally hear is the,
link |
I do, I take, I think I end up taking 5,000 IUs,
link |
sometimes 10 IUs of vitamin D3 per day.
link |
Just done that for a long time,
link |
and I've had my levels tested and they're in range.
link |
But I have a family member, I'll just mention this.
link |
I have a family member who was not feeling well,
link |
just kind of feeling off, a little low,
link |
had some digestive issues.
link |
This went on a long period of time,
link |
was taking, on my recommendation, 15,000 IUs of D3
link |
and was still deficient in D3.
link |
Now takes, and I'm not suggesting anyone do this
link |
as a special case, perhaps,
link |
but no chronic illness that we're aware of,
link |
needs to take 30,000 IUs per day
link |
in order to bring their D3 range just into normal.
link |
Which is, to me, is striking because they eat quite well,
link |
they're a healthy weight, et cetera.
link |
And it's made a tremendous difference
link |
in terms of their mood.
link |
Now, of course, this is correlative.
link |
Now they feel better, they're doing it.
link |
They're probably also getting outside more.
link |
But I mean, I think people need to get tested.
link |
They need to get their D3 levels tested.
link |
But where and what is a good starting range
link |
for people to think about D3 supplementation?
link |
And again, foods that can increase D3.
link |
So vitamin D3 is a good way to supplement with it.
link |
Their vitamin D2 would be a plant source.
link |
You often find it as fortified in foods like milk,
link |
There's been a few-
link |
Does anyone still drink milk besides kids?
link |
Oh, here, it's like you can't find cow's milk.
link |
I mean, all the latkes that you're getting.
link |
Oat milk, soy milk, what's the other one?
link |
They're fortified in those as well.
link |
Oh, they are, okay.
link |
They are, yeah, they're fortified in-
link |
I have a hard time finding cow's milk.
link |
Almond milk and oat milk and all that stuff.
link |
Yeah, they're in all that stuff.
link |
Vitamin D is naturally, to some degree, in fatty fish.
link |
You think about cod liver oil, it has vitamin D,
link |
but you're not going to correct a deficiency
link |
with eating fish for your vitamin D.
link |
You're either going to correct it with sun exposure,
link |
being in the right area, having the right amount of sun,
link |
and being the right age, because as you get old,
link |
you become very inefficient at doing that,
link |
converting vitamin D, making vitamin D3 in your skin.
link |
Well, that's probably what was going on here,
link |
because this person is getting up in their area.
link |
There's a lot of single nucleotide polymorphisms.
link |
We talked about ApoE4 previously,
link |
but there's a variety of genes that people have,
link |
very common, actually.
link |
In fact, I've had many people
link |
that have done that exact same thing.
link |
So measuring your vitamin D levels
link |
before and after supplementation
link |
is the only way you're going to figure that out, right?
link |
If you don't measure it, you don't know.
link |
You can't know what you don't measure.
link |
So there's a variety of SNPs that basically
link |
make that conversion inefficient.
link |
And in fact, there have been a lot
link |
of these Mendelian randomization studies.
link |
So these are studies where people,
link |
scientists will look at common SNPs,
link |
people that have these common variations of a gene
link |
that's more than 1% of the population.
link |
So it's not a random mutation.
link |
It's actually found in a sizable percent of the population.
link |
And then they've looked at various outcomes.
link |
And a lot of times, they'll look at genes
link |
that are also involved in some kind of lifestyle factors,
link |
so vitamin D and SNPs that basically make the conversion
link |
of either vitamin D precursor into D3
link |
or in D3 into 25-hydroxy vitamin D
link |
or into the active steroid hormone,
link |
which is 125-hydroxy vitamin D.
link |
And there's a variety of different SNPs that show people.
link |
So you're not looking at vitamin D levels at all.
link |
You're looking at just the SNPs.
link |
And you know if they have it, they have low vitamin D.
link |
So it's really a way of doing
link |
a beautifully randomized controlled trial
link |
with an observational study because you're not biased.
link |
Vitamin D levels are also associated with health.
link |
People that have higher vitamin D are either outside more,
link |
they're more physically active,
link |
or they're aware of their health
link |
and their supplementing, right?
link |
So you always have to worry about that
link |
when you're doing an observational study.
link |
But Mendelian randomization is beautiful for that reason
link |
where you now just, people randomly have these genes
link |
and it's not like, there's no health status.
link |
Like if you have the SNP, like your family member
link |
was healthy and all that, they were healthy
link |
and yet they couldn't get their D levels up, right?
link |
So these Mendelian randomization studies have found
link |
that people that can't convert into the precursor,
link |
the 25-hydroxy vitamin D,
link |
which is usually what's measured,
link |
it's the most stable form of vitamin D in the body,
link |
they have a higher all-cause mortality if they can't do it.
link |
So people that don't have it
link |
have a lower all-cause mortality.
link |
They have a higher respiratory-related mortality.
link |
They have a higher cancer-related mortality.
link |
So to me, now why did I get on this rant?
link |
Oh, because you're a family member.
link |
So basically, they also are more likely
link |
to get multiple sclerosis.
link |
This has all been done with Mendelian randomization.
link |
And so it really does hammer home the importance
link |
of measuring your vitamin D levels
link |
and being very proactive about that.
link |
I mean, you can get it done anyway.
link |
Your doctor will do it.
link |
You ask them to do it.
link |
So supplementation-wise,
link |
typically if you don't have one of those SNPs,
link |
for the most part, taking 1,000 IUs of vitamin D
link |
will raise blood levels
link |
by around five nanograms per milliliter.
link |
So let's say you're deficient,
link |
you're 20 nanograms per milliliter
link |
and you wanna get to 40.
link |
You're gonna need at least 4,000 IUs
link |
if you don't have any of these SNPs
link |
that change your metabolism of vitamin D, right?
link |
Does it matter when you take it relative to sun exposure,
link |
time of day, with or without food?
link |
I've seen some not so great preliminary evidence
link |
suggesting maybe time of day is important.
link |
I don't think it really,
link |
like I can't seem to find anything that really suggests
link |
because like for it to actually be converted
link |
into the hormone, I mean, it's stored.
link |
It's a slow acting.
link |
These steroid hormones are slow acting.
link |
Yeah, it's not like a media thing, right?
link |
So like maybe we'll get some new data that's like otherwise,
link |
but I just don't, yeah.
link |
It simplifies the problem anyway.
link |
So for people who are going to be stubborn
link |
and not get their D3 levels tested
link |
or their D levels tested and simply say,
link |
oh, I'll just take some D3.
link |
That was me, by the way, until I got tested.
link |
I threw 5,000 IUs into the mix and figured,
link |
well, it's not gonna kill me.
link |
It'll bring my vitamin D levels up.
link |
And I realized that's a bit of a coarse way to approach it,
link |
but I feel fine and I'm still breathing an ambulatory.
link |
So is that reasonable?
link |
1,000 to 5,000 IUs for most people will be reasonably safe.
link |
Again, we're not making,
link |
just assuming that people are gonna just jump to it
link |
without the blood test.
link |
I think that if we look at the literature,
link |
the scientific literature,
link |
it is extremely hard to get like hypercalcemia,
link |
which would be the major concern with really high levels
link |
of vitamin D3 supplementation.
link |
I mean, we're talking like hundreds of thousands of IU
link |
a day for a long time.
link |
Hundreds of thousands.
link |
Now the upper tolerable intake was set
link |
by the Medicine Institute to be 4,000.
link |
It was just like the safe,
link |
it was kind of like one of those things where it's safe.
link |
I personally take 5,000 IUs a day as well.
link |
And my levels really hover around 50 nanograms per mil.
link |
And I do out, I don't put sunscreen on like all the time.
link |
Like I do put it on my face and I wear a hat,
link |
but like some of my skin is being exposed.
link |
So I do make it from the sun as well.
link |
I'm glad you brought up the fact
link |
that you keep arms exposed if you,
link |
because in these studies that I mentioned before,
link |
looking at sun exposure on skin
link |
and increases in other hormones,
link |
testosterone, estrogen mainly,
link |
it became clear from looking at those data
link |
that the amount of skin that you expose is important,
link |
which makes perfect sense once you hear that.
link |
But I think most people are thinking,
link |
oh, I'm out in the sun,
link |
but are you wearing shorts and a t-shirt
link |
or are you wearing a sweatshirt and it's a hoodie
link |
or are you all covered up out in the sun?
link |
Well, that might be great for setting your circadian rhythm
link |
by way of a light to through the eyes
link |
because that's the primary mechanism for that.
link |
But it seems to me that the more of your body surface
link |
that you can safely and appropriately,
link |
please folks, appropriately exposed to the sun,
link |
the more vitamin D you're going to create, right?
link |
So laying out on your back deck in shorts and a t-shirt
link |
with arms exposed and legs exposed
link |
is a very different stimulus
link |
than walking around in jeans and a sweatshirt.
link |
Especially if you have sunscreen on your face.
link |
I know it almost seems like trivially simple,
link |
but I'm not sure that people are used to thinking
link |
about their skin as a interface to create these hormones.
link |
So surface area matters.
link |
And by the way, there have been studies
link |
looking at people that are deficient in vitamin D.
link |
In this case, it was African-Americans
link |
that were given a 4,000 IU a day vitamin D supplement
link |
to bring them back to sufficient levels.
link |
And this was a smaller study than I would like,
link |
but it reversed their epigenetic aging by like three years
link |
because again, it's a hormone.
link |
It's regulating more than 5%
link |
of your protein encoding human genome.
link |
There's been studies looking at
link |
vitamin D receptor knockout mice.
link |
And I use this a lot in my presentations
link |
when I'm talking about vitamin D and longevity.
link |
But if you look at these animals,
link |
the vitamin D receptor, as I mentioned earlier,
link |
vitamin D binds to the receptor
link |
and then it complexes with the retinoid receptor
link |
and they go into the nucleus of the complex
link |
and you turn on and turn off genes.
link |
Well, if you get rid of that receptor,
link |
which is what you can do in animal studies,
link |
you can sort of determine like what effects
link |
there will be with no vitamin D, right?
link |
Like how do you study no vitamin D?
link |
And so what was found was that these animals,
link |
and in fact, I don't think it was a complete knockout
link |
because I think it might be embryonic lethal, but-
link |
Some hypomorphism. Yes.
link |
Which is basically geek speak for a gene
link |
is vastly reduced in its number and function,
link |
number, people know what I mean,
link |
but isn't eliminated completely, yeah.
link |
Right, well, these animals,
link |
if you look at them after the age of four months,
link |
I mean, the mice look like,
link |
I mean, they're accelerated aging, they're wrinkled,
link |
they have no hair, I mean, they just,
link |
I mean, their lifespan's shorter.
link |
I mean, they just, you can look at this animal
link |
and not know anything about mice or work with them
link |
and be like, that animal looks like it's, you know,
link |
of course, mice lifespans are only like two,
link |
two and a half years, but like 500 years old.
link |
Right, it looks like it went to graduate school twice.
link |
Actually graduate school is a lot of fun.
link |
I like to think I age backwards in graduate school,
link |
which is not true.
link |
I look at the photos, I definitely aged forward.
link |
You on the other hand look exactly the same way
link |
you did 10 years ago.
link |
I'm not saying that to flatter you, but it's absolutely true.
link |
I mean, the data are the data, it's remarkable.
link |
So I think it's, I'm definitely gonna try
link |
and get my omega-3 percentage up there.
link |
I'm not gonna, you know, hinge at all on that,
link |
but clearly you're doing a lot of things right.
link |
So if I'm taking vitamin D3,
link |
I still need to get out into the sun, correct?
link |
Okay, I think a lot of people don't know that,
link |
or at least I have family members
link |
that have been a little bit resistance.
link |
Like I take my vitamin D,
link |
so I don't need to get outside as much.
link |
I think people are really afraid of getting out
link |
into the sun because they're worried about melanomas.
link |
And I'm as, to be honest, I'm as scared of sunscreen
link |
as I am of melanoma.
link |
Like that some of the things in sunscreen are really spooky,
link |
mainly the compound.
link |
And here, I'm not one of these conspiracy,
link |
I drink tap water with some folks.
link |
Like people cringe with it.
link |
I drink tap water.
link |
I have the occasional croissant or donut.
link |
I'm not, you know, I'm 90%, 80% of the time
link |
I'm doing the right things the right way, I think,
link |
although I'm now gonna improve on them
link |
with this new knowledge.
link |
But I don't like what I see in most sunscreens
link |
because if you look at these compounds,
link |
they cross the blood-brain barrier.
link |
I don't want compounds crossing the blood-brain barrier.
link |
Dioxide, some of the triclosans
link |
that are also in these cleansers.
link |
I mean, once you know a little bit about neurons, folks,
link |
you realize that the neurons you got
link |
are basically the ones you've got for your entire life.
link |
You know, there's a reason why there's a blood-brain barrier,
link |
a blood ovary, and a blood testes barrier
link |
is because the genetic material resides
link |
in the testes, the ovaries,
link |
and the brain, those neurons don't turn over.
link |
There are a few new neurons,
link |
but not that many unless you're a mouse, frankly.
link |
And so protecting those is very key.
link |
And a lot of the things in sunscreen
link |
are downright dangerous.
link |
So I think there are sunscreens that are safe,
link |
but it's very hard to figure out
link |
which sunscreens are free of these compounds.
link |
I'm amazed that they're still on the market, frankly.
link |
I've always geared towards the ones
link |
with the minerals that are like reflecting it.
link |
It is somewhat difficult to penetrate things
link |
all the way through the skin, get into the bloodstream.
link |
I don't, but I don't know,
link |
maybe some of these compounds get in there easily.
link |
I have seen the evidence with some of those things.
link |
Yeah, there is some evidence they go transdermal.
link |
And they get in, okay, well,
link |
I know that some of them react with the sun.
link |
And while they do protect from the UVA and or B,
link |
they like form massive reactive oxygen species
link |
I mean, it's like the very thing
link |
you're trying to protect yourself from
link |
might actually cause, we don't know.
link |
I mean, like it's completely speculation.
link |
But there is like, I think some more and more evidence
link |
coming out with some of those compounds.
link |
And I can't remember all of them off the top of my head,
link |
but a lot of high-end ones also have,
link |
it's the chemical sunscreen ones, the chemical ones.
link |
We should do, I'm proposing that we do a journal club.
link |
A journal club, folks, is where academics get together
link |
and read papers and they get together
link |
and they pick apart the papers.
link |
There's a strong correlation
link |
between being an early graduate student
link |
and being the most critical.
link |
Because once you've actually published some papers,
link |
you realize that most studies, people are doing their best
link |
within the context of what they can do.
link |
But it'd be great to do a journal club at some point
link |
Because I'd love to really figure out
link |
what's in these compounds.
link |
I mean, people are using them like crazy.
link |
And I'm not one of these people who's like,
link |
oh, I won't use commercial toothpaste or anything like that.
link |
Like I said, I drink tap water,
link |
I use commercial toothpaste, whatever.
link |
But when it comes to sunscreen, it freaks me out
link |
because some of these compounds do go transdermal
link |
and some of them cross the blood brain barrier.
link |
And I'd like to keep my neurons free of that stuff.
link |
Anyway, we're speculating now.
link |
But get out in the sun and get your D3 levels up.
link |
Okay, so we've talked about these plant-based compounds,
link |
the omega-3s and D3.
link |
Unless there's something else that you just absolutely
link |
must throw into the mix,
link |
I probably will return us to the conversation
link |
that I opened up with, which is about cold and heat,
link |
which admittedly I pulled us off that path.
link |
So I want to take full responsibility for that.
link |
But before I do that,
link |
I just want to offer you the opportunity.
link |
Is there anything that fit to supplement-based
link |
or food-based compounds that you think
link |
are especially useful for brain and or body health?
link |
I do think magnesium is important in there as well.
link |
I mean, I think, you know, again,
link |
about 40% of the U.S. population
link |
doesn't get enough magnesium.
link |
It's an essential mineral we're supposed to be getting
link |
from our diet and it's-
link |
Involved in everything.
link |
It's also involved in vitamin D metabolism.
link |
And in fact, being deficient in magnesium
link |
may make it more difficult for you
link |
to actually make vitamin D hormone,
link |
so that 125-hydroxyvitamin D.
link |
So one of those other factors, again,
link |
we talked about genetics,
link |
but there's also magnesium status as well.
link |
Considering 40%, that's a big number.
link |
Now, you know, magnesium's also involved in making ATP,
link |
the energetic currency of our cells.
link |
They're, you know, basically,
link |
all of our cells need ATP to do anything.
link |
And it's also involved in utilizing ATP,
link |
as well as DNA repair enzymes.
link |
These are enzymes that are involved
link |
in repairing damage to our DNA.
link |
I personally think that magnesium insufficiency
link |
causes an insidious type of damage daily
link |
that you can't look in the mirror and see.
link |
Like, when you're deficient in vitamin C,
link |
you're like, my gums are falling apart.
link |
I have scurvy, right?
link |
But like, you can't see DNA damage.
link |
You can't see it, but it's happening.
link |
It's happening right now in my body,
link |
and it's happening in your body.
link |
It's happening, normal metabolism is happening,
link |
you know, every day.
link |
But we repair that damage.
link |
We have repair enzymes in our body
link |
called DNA repair enzymes.
link |
They require magnesium.
link |
Magnesium is a cofactor for them.
link |
What that means is, you know,
link |
a cofactor means enzymes need it to function properly.
link |
And so without that cofactor,
link |
they're not doing it properly.
link |
And I like, the way I like to think about magnesium,
link |
it's easy because people go, what food should I eat, right?
link |
Naturally, that's the next question.
link |
Well, magnesium is at the center of a chlorophyll molecule.
link |
Chlorophyll is what gives plants their green color.
link |
So dark leafy greens are high in magnesium.
link |
It's one of the, and basically,
link |
what does the 40% insufficiency in the U.S. tell us?
link |
People aren't eating their greens.
link |
They're not eating their greens.
link |
They're eating their packaged food.
link |
They're eating their processed food.
link |
Standard American diet isn't really high
link |
in dark leafy greens.
link |
So dark leafy greens are how I like to get my magnesium.
link |
I think it comes along with all these other important,
link |
I mean, you get calcium in them, you get vitamin K1,
link |
you're getting a lot of other micronutrients,
link |
and you're getting other compounds that we don't know about
link |
and ones that we know about, like sulforaphane, right?
link |
As with broccoli, do I need to eat
link |
the dark leafy greens raw?
link |
And in this case, I'm a little more open to it
link |
because I actually like the taste of, dare I say, kale.
link |
And kale is a dark leafy green, right?
link |
And it's high in lutein and zeaxanthin as well.
link |
Yeah, no, I'm going to try chromatin,
link |
meaning I'm not colorblind,
link |
but I just want to make sure it falls
link |
under the strict category.
link |
Because every once in a while, I'm like,
link |
oh, I eat my vegetables.
link |
And people were reminding me avocados is not a vegetable.
link |
I love vegetables also.
link |
But so kale, what are some other examples?
link |
Kale, spinach, chard, like Swiss chard,
link |
rainbow chard, romaine lettuce.
link |
Is the bitterness an important component to this?
link |
I know everything-
link |
I don't know, but for sulforaphane,
link |
sulforaphane for cruciferous vegetables,
link |
that would be the brassica family.
link |
But your question about cooking them,
link |
so magnesium is, it is bound to the food matrix.
link |
And it can be somewhat less bioavailable.
link |
But so cooking it can somewhat release the magnesium,
link |
but it goes into the water too.
link |
So you have to either steam it
link |
or kind of get your water in with it.
link |
Yeah, I personally don't worry about it.
link |
I just don't worry.
link |
Well, if you don't worry, I'm not gonna worry.
link |
But I also like, I too supplement with magnesium.
link |
I do take around, so supplementation with magnesium,
link |
I mean, we could go on and on.
link |
Let's keep this short and sweet
link |
because we're gonna get back to the other stuff.
link |
But it can cause GI distress at high doses.
link |
I personally like to take around 130 or 135 milligrams.
link |
That way it's not like a huge bolus to my gut.
link |
But I think it depends on the form of magnesium too.
link |
I mean, you can take like magnesium 3N8, for example,
link |
and it doesn't affect the gut as much.
link |
Magnesium citrate.
link |
Citrate is what I take.
link |
Yeah, it's a pretty potent gut stimulus.
link |
I mean, I feel like it's a little bit harder to digest.
link |
Well, I take 135 milligrams should be pretty good.
link |
And citrate actually, oh boy, do we wanna go here?
link |
I mean, it's up to you and we can, we don't have to.
link |
I personally, I've been supplementing with magnesium
link |
I use 3N8 and bisglycinate and malate for different reasons.
link |
So I, yes, I would love to go there if you're willing.
link |
I would say malate would be the best.
link |
And that has to do with the short chain fatty acids
link |
being good for the gut and a lot of work done
link |
by a former colleague of mine and good friend,
link |
Mark Shiganaga, showing that the short chain fatty acid
link |
citrate, malate, lactate, but specifically malate,
link |
really, and lactate are the other major ones
link |
that get into the gut epithelial cells
link |
and are an energy source for the mitochondria
link |
and the goblet cells.
link |
So anyways, whole other topic.
link |
Yeah, I take malate because I was told
link |
that it would be helpful.
link |
First of all, it doesn't make me sleepy
link |
like some of the other forms of magnesium,
link |
which act as a mild sedative for me.
link |
They do tap into the GABAergic pathway,
link |
neurotransmitter folks that in general,
link |
broad sweeping generalization here,
link |
can have somewhat of a sedative quality,
link |
which is why I take magnesium 3N8
link |
and or bisglycinate before sleep,
link |
30 to 60 minutes before sleep.
link |
Definitely enhances my transition time to sleep
link |
and the depth of sleep.
link |
No question in my experience.
link |
There's some data that 3N8 can be neuroprotective,
link |
although those studies are still ongoing.
link |
I'm getting the sense that maybe
link |
you're a little more skeptical of that than I am.
link |
Yeah, no, I've seen the studies with the 3N8.
link |
I think like looking at the actual data
link |
from the one clinical study,
link |
there wasn't statistical significance
link |
until all three of the pieces of data were pulled together,
link |
but that really could just be
link |
because their sample size was too small, right?
link |
So I mean- Yeah, I'm thinking that that paired with the-
link |
Yeah, the Guosong Liu's work on with,
link |
so in the, this is getting kind of
link |
into inside ball of neuroscience,
link |
the quality of the labs matters, folks,
link |
and that's something that's not accessible
link |
to people outside of fields.
link |
And Guosong Liu and some of the other folks
link |
at that time at MIT, I think very highly of their work.
link |
And so the animal studies are indeed just animal studies,
link |
but I was pretty impressed by what they did
link |
in those studies, very pioneering
link |
when you think about this being done 10, 12, 15 years ago.
link |
And then, yes, we need more human clinical data,
link |
but for me, I figured that given the safety profile
link |
of MAG3N8, given that it helps me sleep better
link |
and sleeping better is just better for everything, frankly,
link |
that's why I take it.
link |
And bisglycinate and 3N8 seem to be somewhat interchangeable,
link |
but I don't know of any reports
link |
that bisglycinate can be neuroprotective.
link |
But malate, I take sure in the daytime,
link |
for me, and again, this is subjective,
link |
it has a tangible effect in improving
link |
the recovery time from exercise.
link |
So I don't know that I've been sore from a workout
link |
since I started taking malate,
link |
and I used to get very sore
link |
from even kind of trivial workouts.
link |
So I don't know what's going on there,
link |
but I keep taking it.
link |
Malate, again, the short chain fatty acid,
link |
and I mean, when you do intense exercise,
link |
you release endotoxin from your gut.
link |
I'm just going back to the interesting work
link |
because the malate being the short chain fatty acid
link |
and Mark Sugarnog is showing,
link |
this is all in animal research, by the way,
link |
but I mean, it was like feeding these animals malate,
link |
and it really protected the gut, endotoxin release,
link |
and it affected metabolic syndrome and all sorts of things.
link |
But I think malate's awesome,
link |
and I always try to eat green apples.
link |
They're really high in malic acid.
link |
And tart cherries, tart cherries are really high in it
link |
They also taste really good.
link |
But I was really interested
link |
in the magnesium 3N8 stuff.
link |
I take a supplement called Magnesium by Moon Juice,
link |
and it's like a little powder.
link |
It's got a little bit of monk fruit, but it tastes good,
link |
so I do it a little bit before bedtime as well,
link |
probably several more hours though,
link |
because I don't like to drink tons and tons of fluids
link |
before I go to bed,
link |
and it has magnesium 3N8
link |
and a variety of other versions of magnesium in it as well,
link |
and I really like it.
link |
But I thought the magnesium 3N8 stuff
link |
was super interesting.
link |
I would love to see more clinical data as well,
link |
but I think once we get it,
link |
it'll probably be like,
link |
oh, yeah, it's getting into the brain,
link |
and it's awesome, so why wait?
link |
Right, and along those lines,
link |
I once put out a post that said,
link |
you know, I feel like there are a number
link |
of different categories of health information consumers
link |
online and understanding which one you're in
link |
for which topic can alleviate a lot of the strain
link |
and stress of finding the information.
link |
There's some people that are perfectly comfortable
link |
with data from a mouse study.
link |
It's like if it's done in mice, great, I'll try it.
link |
Other people say, no, it has to be done in humans,
link |
double-blind placebo-controlled studies,
link |
randomized clinical trials, et cetera.
link |
And other people are just say, you know what?
link |
I don't even care about any of that.
link |
Just tell me what you do.
link |
And then other people are saying, you know what?
link |
I don't even care what you do.
link |
Just tell me what to do.
link |
And then there's this other category,
link |
which are if it's in pill form or powder form,
link |
And so I think a lot of the battles
link |
of people picking apart people's posts and things
link |
have to do with the fact that people don't realize
link |
that people are showing up to the table
link |
in one or some combination of those stances.
link |
We know people that will try anything,
link |
and we know people that won't take anything.
link |
So the idea here is to create an array of possibilities
link |
for people, and I think the animal data
link |
are very impressive.
link |
We should have you back on to talk-
link |
I take it with the hope of,
link |
because I feel like the animal data is very promising.
link |
And so I'm like, it probably is, so why not?
link |
Well, and obviously you're doing things right.
link |
So cold and heat converge on some common pathways
link |
related to what you called intermittent challenge,
link |
I think if intermittent fasting, cold, heat, exercise,
link |
I mean, maybe even intermittent sleep deprivation,
link |
I keep waiting for the intermittent
link |
sleep deprivation movement.
link |
I will say I pull a few all-nighters per year
link |
just for work demands and procrastination and deadlines.
link |
And I'm the worst combination of academic
link |
because I'm both a procrastinator and a perfectionist.
link |
So you end up pulling some all-nighters.
link |
The sleep I get the next night is pretty amazing.
link |
I must say it's the sleep of gods,
link |
but I don't recommend anyone use sleep deprivation for that.
link |
But I could imagine that we also evolved
link |
having some sleepless nights.
link |
So this idea of intermittent challenges
link |
is a really attractive one.
link |
And I want to make sure that we credit you
link |
with the phrase intermittent challenge.
link |
No, credit Dr. Mark Mattson.
link |
Okay, Dr. Mark Mattson gets credit.
link |
Who has published and he has used that phrase.
link |
Okay, great, we'll make sure.
link |
Just like Dr. David Sinclair, I love the xenohormesis.
link |
He was in like one of his publications just so many years ago
link |
and I just love it.
link |
It's brilliant, a brilliant term.
link |
So Mark Mattson gets credit for that.
link |
Those are pretty smart.
link |
I mean, it's a good school, I guess.
link |
Of course, it's a good school.
link |
We will credit the appropriate people.
link |
Thank you for that clarification.
link |
So you've talked a lot about the use of deliberate,
link |
what I call deliberate cold exposure,
link |
only to distinguish it from cold
link |
that you might just be accidentally exposed to.
link |
But it's sort of obvious when we say cold exposure.
link |
There are some amazing data on cold.
link |
The other day I saw a post from you
link |
and you've included this in talks
link |
before I did not know this until I learned it from you.
link |
That even 20 seconds of immersion in,
link |
I think it was four degree.
link |
49 degree Fahrenheit.
link |
49 degree Fahrenheit.
link |
Okay, I was translating this.
link |
49 degree Fahrenheit water.
link |
So cold water can lead to long lasting increases
link |
in epinephrine, adrenaline.
link |
And I have to presume other neuromodulators
link |
and neurochemicals as well.
link |
What are some cold protocols
link |
that you find particularly interesting or attractive
link |
from the standpoint of, I don't know,
link |
pick your favorite metabolism, neuro slash mood effects,
link |
brown fat stimulation,
link |
which of course weaves back to metabolism.
link |
We could do an entire episode all about cold,
link |
but what I'd love to know is what sort of activity
link |
or stimulus do you think is a reasonable
link |
and particularly potent one to use in terms of cold?
link |
So today I did three minutes at 49 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
I have a cold tub.
link |
So you get in up to your neck?
link |
I keep floating up.
link |
And so I'm like, it's like really hard.
link |
So like I would say like maybe most of my shoulder.
link |
I mean, really I'm floating up.
link |
I was telling my husband, I was like,
link |
there's too much water in here for me.
link |
I can't- Or too much salt in there?
link |
Is it like the Dead Sea where you float on top?
link |
Is there salt in there?
link |
He takes care of all the stuff that,
link |
Yeah, and by the way,
link |
the podcast where I am sponsored by Plunge,
link |
they did give me one.
link |
That thing is fantastic.
link |
Also because it circulates the water.
link |
Which makes sure that you break up the thermal layer
link |
and it's even colder.
link |
It is even colder.
link |
Anyways, so look, I'll give it a,
link |
I'll be honest here.
link |
I wish I did more cold than I do.
link |
I do cold when I'm gonna go on a podcast.
link |
I definitely do cold when I'm gonna do a podcast,
link |
when I'm gonna give a talk or when I'm anxious.
link |
I need to make it more of a ritual.
link |
I love doing the sauna.
link |
Unless it's summertime.
link |
It's a lot easier for me to get in the cold
link |
in the summertime.
link |
But what I do love about the cold is how I feel after.
link |
And I feel less anxious.
link |
I feel more focused,
link |
which is why I usually do it before,
link |
any type of public speaking or just when I'm just anxious.
link |
I'll just get in there.
link |
And so the 20 seconds at 49 degrees,
link |
I think it was 49 degrees Fahrenheit,
link |
was really a good number because time and temperature do,
link |
time or duration, I guess would be a better word,
link |
and temperature do matter.
link |
But you can do 20 seconds at a colder temperature,
link |
which is I prefer.
link |
Or you can do a minute or longer at a warmer temperature.
link |
I think there was another study showing
link |
59 degrees Fahrenheit at one hour.
link |
It was like two, three, four.
link |
But who wants to do one hour?
link |
Yeah, I'm familiar with that study.
link |
I love, so this is really,
link |
reveals just how absolutely nerdy I am
link |
and maybe why some times and relationships in my life
link |
I love reading the method sections of papers.
link |
So people can come at me with a number of things
link |
about papers and I might miss something.
link |
Surely I miss certain things like anybody does.
link |
But the methods I sort of,
link |
I relish in reading the methods.
link |
And that paper is really interesting
link |
because they had people sit in lawn chairs, basically,
link |
in swimming pools for an hour.
link |
And it wasn't really, it was chilly.
link |
It wasn't super cold.
link |
I mean, 60 is not, it's not warm,
link |
but it's not ice cold, obviously.
link |
But an hour is ridiculous at some level.
link |
But the increases in dopamine were massive and lasted hours.
link |
So it's really, so the mood enhancing effects
link |
that you report are, they're not,
link |
you're not imagining that.
link |
Those are almost certainly a,
link |
the consequence of having slowly elevating,
link |
but significantly elevated dopamine that goes on for hours.
link |
That's almost a dream-like profile for dopamine
link |
because most everything else, like an Adderall,
link |
a Ritalin, a cup of coffee and a workout drink
link |
or pre-workout drink or something is gonna give you
link |
a big spike in adrenaline and dopamine and a big crash.
link |
And somehow it creates this really nice contoured profile.
link |
So I, whatever you're experiencing there
link |
is very nicely supported by the data.
link |
Well, I need to get, I need to get doing it more.
link |
I've had a couple of scary experiences
link |
going from hot to cold where blood pressure changes.
link |
I think where I basically went straight
link |
from a really hot jacuzzi.
link |
I was in there for like 30 minutes.
link |
I mean, I was, I was doing heat stress.
link |
Yeah, 104 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
And then I had for 30 minutes.
link |
And then I went straight into, at the time,
link |
It was in like February, it was like winter time.
link |
And it was 50, it was in the 50s.
link |
And I was in there and I was like listening
link |
to Simon Garfunkel.
link |
I was like trying to stay in a long time, get on my cold.
link |
And I was trying to impress Dan
link |
because he like goes in there for like,
link |
he'll stay in there for like 15 minutes.
link |
But I started to feel really like blinky,
link |
like low blood pressure or something.
link |
And I got scared, so I got out.
link |
And then I couldn't stand like I had vertigo or something.
link |
And I was so scared, I was so scared.
link |
And so, and I've had a couple of times too
link |
where just going straight from the sauna to it,
link |
to the cold plunge, where I'm starting to feel,
link |
I'm like, ooh, I feel a little blood pressure change
link |
And it makes sense.
link |
The sauna is causing vasodilation
link |
and the cold plunge is,
link |
or cold exposure is causing vasoconstriction.
link |
So it's like a very, you know, just shock to my system.
link |
And so now I wait.
link |
Like I wait like a few minutes before going in.
link |
But I do need to kind of like make it more,
link |
the cold more routine.
link |
Because I talk all about the science.
link |
I'm familiar with all the science.
link |
And you know, the norepinephrine or noradrenaline,
link |
you know, it's affecting brain and mood.
link |
And you know way more about that than I do.
link |
I know how I feel.
link |
And I know it's a neurotransmitter.
link |
And you know, it is released,
link |
at least in rats they've shown,
link |
I think it might've been rats,
link |
but multiple studies showing in that it's released
link |
from the cold in the brain.
link |
And now in humans as well.
link |
So in that study, we can put a link to this.
link |
It's published in 2000, European Journal of Physiology.
link |
That big dopamine increase.
link |
They also looked at epinephrine and cortisol
link |
and saw some really, yeah.
link |
So this has been done in humans.
link |
Oh, I didn't know.
link |
Oh, no, no, not yet.
link |
Very hard to measure dopamine directly from the brain
link |
unless you're doing micro dialysis.
link |
Unfortunately, their skulls were intact.
link |
Fortunately for them,
link |
unfortunately for the research committee,
link |
their skulls were intact.
link |
So they couldn't measure directly in the brain.
link |
But obviously there's a correlate there.
link |
You know, it's a very real effect.
link |
but the advantage of not doing it too often
link |
is that you're not cold adapted.
link |
Now it's very hard for anyone to get truly cold adapted.
link |
Some people start to look forward to the cold.
link |
And what I think they're looking forward to
link |
is the feeling afterward, that dopamine rush.
link |
But if you get cold adapted,
link |
then it certainly blunts some of the effect.
link |
But I want to be cold adapted
link |
because that means I have more mitochondria
link |
in my adipose tissue and perhaps even muscle.
link |
Like that's been shown.
link |
So maybe there's a good opportunity to,
link |
so cold and UCP1, if you could educate us on UCP1,
link |
I find this really interesting.
link |
And I learned about it from you.
link |
Yeah, well, so norepinephrine
link |
actually released in the plasma.
link |
It does act as a hormone.
link |
Vasoconstriction is one thing it does,
link |
but it also regulates a variety of molecular functions
link |
that have to do with adaption to cold.
link |
One happening to be,
link |
shivering is a very inefficient way to produce heat,
link |
which is what your body's trying to do
link |
when it's exposed to cold.
link |
And your muscles are basically contracting
link |
and producing heat from that,
link |
but that's just not very efficient.
link |
So the more eloquent way to do it,
link |
or elegant, I guess, way to do it
link |
is to basically have your mitochondria produce
link |
tons and tons of heat.
link |
So the way it does this is by activating a gene
link |
called UCP1, uncoupling protein one.
link |
Norepinephrine is upstream of that, activating it.
link |
So what that does is essentially,
link |
so mitochondria are these little organelles
link |
inside of your cells that are responsible
link |
for producing energy.
link |
Usually that's in the form of adenosine triphosphate, ATP,
link |
and that's what lets everything function
link |
inside of your body, from your neurotransmitter production
link |
to your heart beating, et cetera.
link |
However, you can uncouple your mitochondria.
link |
Basically, your mitochondria,
link |
they're like a little battery.
link |
So they have, well, they have a double membrane,
link |
first of all, their structure,
link |
but they have a negative charge on the inside,
link |
and they have a positive charge on the inner membrane,
link |
so in between the outer membrane and the inside part.
link |
Like a neuron, yeah.
link |
So I guess it's like a neuron.
link |
It's like a battery, negative and positive.
link |
Well, basically, you can uncouple that charge,
link |
and so that positive charge,
link |
protons start leaking out of the mitochondria,
link |
and your mitochondria freak out.
link |
So this is called uncoupling it,
link |
and they start to, it's maximum respiration, as we call it.
link |
They try to make as much energy.
link |
They're like, I gotta get that proton back,
link |
that gradient, the electrochemical gradient,
link |
and so they just go insane,
link |
and in this case, it's uncoupled energy,
link |
so the energy they're making is actually heat, not ATP,
link |
but heat is, but you're essentially burning substrate,
link |
You're burning glucose, you're burning lipids,
link |
you're basically burning things and making heat,
link |
and so that's what uncoupling it does,
link |
and that is a much more efficient way
link |
of producing heat than shivering,
link |
so as you become more adapted,
link |
maybe the longer duration that you've stayed in the cold
link |
or the more times you've done it,
link |
you'll no longer shiver anymore.
link |
You will start to then just do this uncoupling type
link |
of thermogenesis, as it's called,
link |
and another type of adaptation that occurs
link |
is you actually produce more mitochondria
link |
in your adipose tissue,
link |
and that actually happens also regulated
link |
by norepinephrine or noradrenaline
link |
through a protein called PGC1 alpha,
link |
and what that protein does is it makes more mitochondria
link |
in your adipose cells, so per adipose cell,
link |
you're getting more mitochondria.
link |
It's a beautiful way to basically make more heat
link |
when you're, it's one of those things where it's like,
link |
your body's going, okay,
link |
I'm gonna be exposed to this cold next time.
link |
How can I make sure I don't die?
link |
Oh, I can have more mitochondria,
link |
and I'm gonna make more heat,
link |
and so you're making more mitochondria
link |
in your adipose tissue,
link |
and this is often referred to as like the browning of fat,
link |
and the reason for that is because
link |
if you look under a microscope at a lipid droplet,
link |
basically a fat cell, not a lipid droplet, adipocyte,
link |
you'll find that it looks darker
link |
because there's more mitochondria in there,
link |
so it's referred to as browning fat,
link |
and so I don't want to get into the whole beige fat,
link |
brown, you know, there's this whole,
link |
I'm sure you've had experts on that talk all about that,
link |
I mean, I always think of white fat, beige fat, brown fat,
link |
and beige is kind of intermediate.
link |
White can be converted into beige, but-
link |
Right, and beige can take on
link |
thermogenic characteristics, essentially,
link |
and so you can activate beige fat so that it's thermogenic
link |
in the sense that it's burning glucose
link |
and or, you know, fatty acids and producing heat.
link |
So the more you expose yourself to cold,
link |
the more you can brown your fat, so to speak,
link |
and therefore you can tolerate the cold for longer periods,
link |
which people do notice,
link |
and you can then have the thermogenic qualities
link |
of having more brown adipose tissue or beige,
link |
activated beige adipose tissue,
link |
which is, you know, you'll get a lot of naysayers
link |
out there saying, oh, brown fat
link |
doesn't regulate metabolism at all.
link |
The reality is there's like thousands of researchers
link |
trying to pill up brown fat and thermogenic,
link |
like they're trying to make it a pill
link |
because it does affect metabolism.
link |
You know, it's not the only thing.
link |
It's certainly, if you're obese and trying to lose weight,
link |
you're not gonna like do that just by doing cold exposure.
link |
You need to do dietary and exercise changes,
link |
you know, predominantly, but it does affect metabolism,
link |
and, you know, this has been shown in human studies,
link |
so it is an interesting,
link |
it's another possible mechanism for affecting metabolism,
link |
and that's in adipose tissue,
link |
but you also make more mitochondria and muscle tissue,
link |
and this is regulated not via norepinephrine,
link |
but it is still PGC1 alpha, interestingly.
link |
Not like, not that anyone else really cares,
link |
but maybe you do, Andrew.
link |
I'm eating this up.
link |
So PGC1 alpha is response to norepinephrine
link |
and adipose tissue to make more mitochondria,
link |
but in muscle tissue, it's unclear what the regulator is.
link |
Cold exposure does it, so this was shown
link |
at least in a couple of studies I've seen
link |
where people that were exercising, I believe,
link |
or maybe it may have been men only that were exercising,
link |
did some sort of training, and then did cold water immersion,
link |
something like 50 degrees Fahrenheit, 15 minutes,
link |
and PGC1 alpha, which is a biomarker
link |
for mitochondrial biogenesis,
link |
which is the generation of new mitochondria.
link |
By the way, that's awesome.
link |
You want more mitochondria in your muscle.
link |
It's associated with improved muscle mass,
link |
improved endurance.
link |
I mean, mitochondria are essentially
link |
either the making energy in your cell,
link |
and we, you know, we don't make more mitochondria normally.
link |
Like, you have certain inputs,
link |
high-intensity interval training exercise can do it.
link |
You can actually make more mitochondria.
link |
Yes, yeah, and that's been shown in people.
link |
Weight training or just high-intensity interval training?
link |
I haven't seen weight training.
link |
I've seen it in high-intensity interval training,
link |
endurance training, but that doesn't mean
link |
that it hasn't been shown.
link |
I just haven't seen it, or that it hasn't been looked at.
link |
It's good to know.
link |
I'm always looking for reasons to finally do
link |
more HIIT-type high-intensity interval training work.
link |
I do weight training, and I do low-intensity cardio.
link |
There was a brilliant study by,
link |
at the time he was a postdoc, Matthew Robinson,
link |
and he's now gone on to start his own lab
link |
at the University of Oregon Health Science Center.
link |
Great place, yeah.
link |
And he did this study where both young and older people,
link |
they had this whole high-intensity protocol,
link |
which I can't remember what it was,
link |
but their protocol for X amount of time,
link |
I'm sure it was at least a month,
link |
they then measured biomarkers of mitochondrial biogenesis
link |
in their muscle tissue.
link |
And the amount of mitochondrial biogenesis
link |
in old people specifically,
link |
it happened in both young and old from HIIT,
link |
from the high-intensity interval training,
link |
was, I mean, it was like enormous, at least 50%, I think.
link |
So I mean, it was just like, whoa.
link |
And so like, why would you want that?
link |
Well, you know, mitochondria, you don't make,
link |
your cells are turning over, you make new cells,
link |
you replace old ones with your mitochondria.
link |
You don't really do that for the most part.
link |
You can, mitochondrial biogenesis does happen,
link |
but you have to stimulate it to happen.
link |
And the way your mitochondria,
link |
like what happens with your mitochondria
link |
is they essentially are bobbing around inside of your cells,
link |
and then they fuse with other mitochondria,
link |
exchange all their content and mitochondrial DNA,
link |
and then fizz back apart.
link |
And that's how they kind of stay young-ish.
link |
But like, as you age,
link |
you keep doing that with the same pool of mitochondria,
link |
then you're gonna get a bunch of old mitochondria
link |
mixing old stuff together, right?
link |
So why wouldn't you wanna like bring up new, healthy,
link |
young mitochondria into that pool, right?
link |
So in my mind, when I hear mitochondrial biogenesis,
link |
I'm like aging, like, that's the first thing I think of.
link |
So anyways, cold exposure does that,
link |
other things as well, so.
link |
And please, thank you for offering to, you know,
link |
somehow filter the level of detail,
link |
but I assure you that listeners of this podcast
link |
are familiar with getting,
link |
drinking from the fire hose of mechanism,
link |
and that was really helpful.
link |
And again, this is just one example of maybe four
link |
or five other things that you've said, at least,
link |
that are gonna inspire me to change my behaviors.
link |
I'm gonna start doing some high intensity interval training.
link |
Dr. Andy Galpin was on this podcast recently,
link |
and he told me that the subtle zone two cardio
link |
and the weight training is great,
link |
but that I really should be doing
link |
some max heart rate work per week,
link |
you know, going into max heart rate for 90 seconds
link |
and resting and repeating that, maybe even mild repeats.
link |
I'm just curious as a brief aside
link |
before we talk about heat, what sort of cardiovascular
link |
or other types of training do you do?
link |
I imagine you are doing high intensity interval training.
link |
If you could just give us a sense of the contour
link |
of your week as it relates to exercise,
link |
and because you've been very gracious
link |
in sharing some of what you do for supplements and food,
link |
what about exercise?
link |
So I, it all depends on my week, of course,
link |
and what I've got going on with my son
link |
and my work schedule, but I typically,
link |
I do a lot of high intensity interval Tabatas
link |
on a stationary cycle.
link |
I use Peloton because I just like that instructor there,
link |
like telling me what to do
link |
and then me competing with everyone else.
link |
I'm like, nah, you know?
link |
So it works for me.
link |
You're revealing something about your psychology.
link |
We just learned about,
link |
so this podcast is actually just a decoy
link |
for a psychological assessment of the guests.
link |
No, I'm kidding, but so now we know you're competitive.
link |
That explains a lot of how you got through graduate school
link |
and then do what you do.
link |
So you're getting on the Peloton
link |
and what does it look like
link |
for someone who's not familiar with Peloton?
link |
I know what they are, but I've never been on one.
link |
You are peddling against the instructor
link |
for how many seconds?
link |
So you're, there's a bunch of people that are online
link |
either doing the class with you at the same time
link |
or have all time doing it
link |
so you can kind of toggle on what you want
link |
and like, you can try to compete
link |
against the all time number.
link |
Oh, so it's really competitive.
link |
And the instructor is just there to like whip you,
link |
like, you know, make you,
link |
there's a part of, the brilliance with Peloton is,
link |
like I used to do rush, what's called rush cycle
link |
and I used to go in, it's basically you go in
link |
and group cycle and have an instructor there
link |
and you do all this high intensity interval training stuff.
link |
And I loved it because there was a competitive aspect to it
link |
that had me working harder than I would work
link |
if it was just me in the room,
link |
like without an instructor or anyone there
link |
and it was just like, I'm at a gym, any gym
link |
and I'm just on a stationary cycle
link |
listening to a podcast doing something,
link |
which is fine if that's your group, right?
link |
But there is something about that group setting
link |
that kind of holds you accountable too, right?
link |
And the Peloton made it somehow virtual, it was amazing.
link |
And I remember being back at rush cycle,
link |
this is before a pandemic
link |
and people talking about Peloton in my class
link |
and I'm like, oh, it's ridiculous, why would I do that?
link |
Like, that's never gonna work, I need to like be here.
link |
And then the pandemic hit
link |
and I was like all over the Peloton
link |
and it works for me really well.
link |
So I tend to do that at least three times a week.
link |
Sometimes I do it more, like I'll do four
link |
and I do a 10 minute, just 10 because it's efficient
link |
and I push my ass, I push myself really hard.
link |
That's the Tabata.
link |
It's 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off and it's 10 minutes.
link |
And on means you're pedaling
link |
like your life depended on it.
link |
And there's a lot of resistance in the pedals?
link |
Well, so you basically, there's a part where you're,
link |
I always do resistance, I'm like the power,
link |
I do the power for,
link |
there's a part where you're sitting cycling
link |
and you're trying to go really fast
link |
but I always crank the resistance up.
link |
I always go above what they give me.
link |
And then there's a part where you're standing
link |
and then you really crank the resistance up
link |
which I really do and like you feel it in your glutes.
link |
It's like going up a hill.
link |
And so they like break it up
link |
and most of the time you'll have like those two parts.
link |
And I love the efficiency of it.
link |
You just, you get it done
link |
and people sometimes hear me go 10 minutes
link |
or really you think you work and I'm like,
link |
look, like you max, you do max, you do Tabata for 10 minutes
link |
and it's like, it's intense.
link |
Yeah, most people can't sprint
link |
for the gate of an airplane they're about to miss
link |
carrying a backpack.
link |
So if you think about, if I think about that
link |
and then I've just described myself
link |
sprinting through the airport and going,
link |
all right, Andy Galpin,
link |
I got my 90 seconds max heart rate in for you
link |
carrying this thing.
link |
But 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off,
link |
repeating that over and over for 10 minutes.
link |
So by the time you're done, you're cooked.
link |
And then I, because I'm competitive during the recovery
link |
that they give you at the minute at the end,
link |
I'm pushing it max because I want to keep the numbers higher.
link |
Great, so three times a week?
link |
Yeah, three times a week.
link |
And then I always have my sauna on preheating up.
link |
It takes about an hour and a half
link |
and I get it to about 189 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
I hop right in the sauna after my Peloton.
link |
So the elevated heart rate continues.
link |
Is that the rationale?
link |
Yeah, I mean, I literally like down a bunch of water
link |
and then I get in and then I like either
link |
read a science paper, prepare for a presentation
link |
or a podcast, or I hash over things in my mind.
link |
And it's interesting because something about
link |
getting in the sauna, I think the stress,
link |
the heat stress of it, I used to,
link |
so I started doing the sauna in 2009 in graduate school.
link |
You're an early adopter.
link |
I started doing it every day.
link |
I lived across the street.
link |
I lived in a studio apartment with Dan.
link |
We lived in the small studio apartment,
link |
smallest apartment you could ever imagine.
link |
And it was across the street from a YMCA
link |
because I was poor in graduate school, very poor, very poor.
link |
I mean, so, you know.
link |
I recall, I recall being, I lived in my lab.
link |
But then again, I lived in my lab as a postdoc
link |
and as a, I admit, I lived in my lab with my bulldog
link |
as a faculty member for other reasons, but I get it.
link |
When you're a graduate student, you're poor.
link |
Yes, and so I used to go to the sauna
link |
before going into the lab, and I started noticing
link |
that I was all of a sudden able to handle stress better,
link |
like the stress of my six-month setback
link |
because of a failed experiment, which is crushing
link |
on top of the pressure from my advisor
link |
and my own pressure, because I'm very competitive
link |
with myself, and I put a lot of pressure on myself.
link |
So I was having a hard time.
link |
I mean, I was very stressed out in graduate school,
link |
and the sauna started to really noticeably affect
link |
my anxiety and my ability to handle stress,
link |
and I was like, what is going on here?
link |
So I started looking into the literature,
link |
and started getting interested in the effects on the brain,
link |
and in fact, at the time, I had a friend
link |
who was not actually experimentally,
link |
but theoretically looking into the opioid system,
link |
and basically, so when you get in the sauna,
link |
you release a lot of endorphins.
link |
Endorphins are the feel-good opioids
link |
that make you feel good, but you also release
link |
something called dynorphin, and dynorphin
link |
is an endogenous opioid that binds to a receptor
link |
called the kappa opioid receptor,
link |
which dynorphin is responsible for that dysphoric feeling
link |
when you're in the sauna and you're hot
link |
and when you're running, doing exercise,
link |
and you're like, you feel uncomfortable.
link |
Well, I think that's dynorphin, I'm speaking in absolute,
link |
I mean, there's evidence in alcoholics
link |
that some of the symptoms of withdrawal
link |
that they experience are related to dynorphin,
link |
and dynorphin is known to negatively impact
link |
the dopamine receptor system.
link |
So basically, it's the feel-like-garbage pathway.
link |
Right, you feel like garbage,
link |
and so you think that that would not be good,
link |
but this is where my friend that comes in,
link |
he was looking at the effects of treating
link |
morphine or heroin addiction,
link |
and people that are using those drugs,
link |
they basically, the endorphins or the morphine or heroin,
link |
they bind to a receptor in the brain
link |
called the mu opioid receptor,
link |
and as they take these drugs,
link |
that mu opioid receptor becomes down-regulated,
link |
and so you need more and more of the drug
link |
to feel as good as you did, right?
link |
Well, endorphins also bind to that receptor,
link |
and he was looking into some of the other drugs
link |
that are like salvinoram or something, salvia, it's called.
link |
It binds to the opioid receptor.
link |
It also makes you kind of feel uncomfortable.
link |
Anyways, he had put some studies in front of me
link |
that showed basically binding of either dynorphin
link |
or whatever ligand to the kappa opioid receptor
link |
basically sensitizes the mu opioid receptor
link |
to the feel-good endorphins,
link |
and also changes, I think it also up-regulates it
link |
or something, so basically,
link |
there's a lasting effect of feeling good.
link |
So the endorphins that you release later
link |
from hugging someone or a joke you're laughing at
link |
or whatever, you feel it for longer, right?
link |
And so, anyways, this is a, with the sauna,
link |
with respect to the sauna,
link |
it's a big sort of hypothesis of mine.
link |
I did kind of publish that part of my hypothesis
link |
in a review article, but I do wish more people
link |
to kind of look into that, that'd be amazing.
link |
But what I was getting at, I think,
link |
was I would use the sauna to memorize things.
link |
This is way back in the day, and I still do it.
link |
And I wanted to talk to you about this
link |
because you're a neuroscientist,
link |
that there's something about being in the sauna,
link |
and I think, I don't know if it has to do
link |
with the stress response,
link |
like when you have an emotional trigger,
link |
like you remember things better, right?
link |
Absolutely, there is a clear and known explanation
link |
for mechanism for this, yeah.
link |
So in the sauna, I mean, you also release norepinephrine,
link |
just like you do in the cold, there's a lot of overlap.
link |
You know, you're really, I mean, it is a stressor,
link |
but I like use it to remember things,
link |
like I'm going through something,
link |
I want to go through a presentation or a talk
link |
or a podcast or whatever, and I go in that sauna,
link |
and I mean, you should try it,
link |
like if you haven't already, I don't know if you have.
link |
I have a sauna and a cold plunge now,
link |
I haven't tried prepare, I read books in the sauna
link |
in the evening, it's a time I insist
link |
on having my phone out of there,
link |
mostly because I, initially,
link |
because I thought I'd cook the phone,
link |
but also just to get some separation from the phone
link |
and screens in the evening, so I read books.
link |
The only challenge sometimes is you're dripping sweat
link |
onto the books, but I'm willing to forego
link |
a few pages of a book.
link |
The idea that being in this semi-stressful environment
link |
would aid in the learning and retention of information
link |
is really well substantiated by this beautiful work
link |
by a guy named James McGaugh.
link |
I don't know if his lab's still active,
link |
but he was at UC Irvine for a while,
link |
and then I think at University of Arizona as well.
link |
They have a great memory group at both places,
link |
very strong in learning and memory, both places.
link |
And he was the one that really defined this
link |
kind of inverted U-shaped function
link |
for the relationship between adrenaline and memory.
link |
Basically, if you're too relaxed and not stressed enough,
link |
you're not going to remember any information.
link |
At peak levels of stress, you actually are a memory machine,
link |
at least within the context of whatever it is
link |
you're trying to learn.
link |
So what you're describing very well matches with that.
link |
And then of course it tapers off
link |
as you really increase adrenaline to the point
link |
where people are starting to lose autonomic function,
link |
where they're just, they're panicking basically,
link |
but obviously you're keeping it in range.
link |
The other thing that I'd like to ask you about
link |
is in the sauna, of course, there's vasodilation,
link |
and perfusion of blood to the brain
link |
is a wonderful way to enhance cognition.
link |
There's even some really nice data
link |
showing that during inhales, as opposed to exhales,
link |
people are better at learning information.
link |
Believe it or not, during the inhale,
link |
you're taking in and absorbing and remembering
link |
more than during exhales.
link |
And these are beautiful studies done in humans, of course.
link |
So I can imagine that vasodilation,
link |
getting more perfusion of blood to the brain,
link |
plus a little bit of stress,
link |
or maybe a lot of stress from the epinephrine,
link |
and yet it's, and then of course,
link |
there's going to be the, I don't want to call it placebo,
link |
but there's going to be the context,
link |
the conditioned place context of it.
link |
Like if we had a good experience
link |
remembering something in the sauna once,
link |
we tend to, the positive association effect
link |
of that location is real.
link |
Just like if people go to a new city and they get robbed,
link |
like if you go to Cincinnati,
link |
I've never been to Cincinnati,
link |
but you get robbed in Cincinnati,
link |
your purse gets taken or your wallet gets taken,
link |
you kind of hate Cincinnati as a tourist,
link |
but that could happen in any number of different cities.
link |
The opposite is also true.
link |
So if something good happens someplace,
link |
so I'm imagining that it's a combination of those effects,
link |
but I'll start, it would be very hard
link |
to do this in the cold.
link |
I feel like the cold is a very potent,
link |
I think it takes you too far down that curve,
link |
the McGaugh curve.
link |
I have to sing songs or something when I'm in there.
link |
Distract yourself.
link |
Oh yeah, I sing songs.
link |
But afterward, you're very efficient at learning.
link |
And with respect to the sauna,
link |
the vasodilation does occur,
link |
so there's a lot of overlap between moderate intensity,
link |
aerobic exercise and heat stress.
link |
And as you can imagine,
link |
when you're exercising,
link |
you're elevating your core body temperature,
link |
And when you're actually in the sauna,
link |
blood does get redistributed to the skin
link |
to facilitate sweating.
link |
But much like exercise,
link |
blood flow in general is improved to the brain,
link |
to the muscles, everywhere.
link |
So I think generally speaking that,
link |
and there's studies showing that sauna use
link |
is associated with a much lower risk
link |
of dementia and Alzheimer's disease.
link |
Like people that use it four to seven times a week
link |
have greater than 60% reduction in dementia
link |
and Alzheimer's disease risk compared to once.
link |
Oh sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off.
link |
You said people who use it,
link |
I apologize, but maybe you tell us again,
link |
people who use it four to seven times per week have?
link |
They have a greater than 60% reduction in dementia risk
link |
and Alzheimer's disease risk
link |
compared to people that use it only one time a week.
link |
People that use it two to three times a week
link |
have something like a little greater than 20% reduction
link |
so there's a dose-dependent effect on dementia risk
link |
and Alzheimer's disease risk.
link |
It also has a profound,
link |
like there's a big link
link |
between the cardiovascular system and the brain.
link |
Obviously blood flow, a big one, right?
link |
You know, like you need to get blood to your brain.
link |
But cardiovascular mortality,
link |
so mortality from cardiovascular disease,
link |
if people use, or actually this was men,
link |
if men use the sauna four to seven times a week,
link |
it's a 50% reduction in cardiovascular-related mortality
link |
compared to one time a week.
link |
Again, dose-dependent manner two to three times a week
link |
is something like 24% lower death
link |
from cardiovascular disease.
link |
There's also lower, you know, sudden cardiac death.
link |
It's like a heart attack.
link |
That's like 60-something, greater than 60% lower
link |
if men use it four to seven times a week versus once.
link |
Again, a dose-dependent thing.
link |
And the thing that's so profound there also to me,
link |
when again, looking at the methods,
link |
when I look at the data,
link |
and this is all work from Dr. Jari Laukonen.
link |
He's in the University of Eastern Finland
link |
and just one of the world experts on sauna use,
link |
especially with respect to cardiovascular health.
link |
What some of his data has also shown is that
link |
if you look at the duration, the time spent in the sauna,
link |
so I mentioned the temperature I do is about,
link |
I do like 189 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
Typically I go in there, I'm pretty heat adapted.
link |
And so the more you do the sauna
link |
or any sort of heat stress,
link |
whether it's a hot tub or jacuzzi, you become adapted.
link |
You basically start to sweat at a lower core body temperature
link |
to cool yourself down.
link |
All these sort of physiological changes
link |
start to happen earlier.
link |
And so I stay in for like 30 minutes.
link |
So I stay in a long time.
link |
You have to listen to your body.
link |
Most of the studies that I just talked about
link |
were from the duration, the time spent in the sauna.
link |
And I said 50% reduction
link |
in cardiovascular disease-related death.
link |
What was shown was that men that were in the sauna
link |
for only 11 minutes,
link |
even if they used it four to seven times a week,
link |
that reduction was only like 8% instead of 50.
link |
It had to be greater than 19 minutes.
link |
So like 20 minutes is the sweet spot
link |
at about 174 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
And most of the saunas in Finland, by the way,
link |
they're humid so they put hot water,
link |
they put water on hot rocks to create steam.
link |
And so it's usually between 10 to 20% humidity
link |
in the Finnish sauna.
link |
So those studies were, I would say,
link |
most of the time you're gonna find
link |
that their humidity is also elevated.
link |
But to me, the dose-dependent nature of it
link |
and the duration, knowing like, you know,
link |
to me that's a very strong data
link |
that this is more causal than some corollary thing.
link |
Because that's always the problem
link |
with observational studies, including these,
link |
which they corrected for a whole host of factors
link |
like cholesterol, you know, exercise,
link |
just everything, everything under the sun.
link |
I mean, they corrected for those.
link |
And on top of that, you have the dose-dependent nature
link |
of the duration, the time spent in the sauna,
link |
and the frequency.
link |
So to me it's like, something's going on here.
link |
Plus there's been studies, intervention studies
link |
where it's like, you know, comparing directly
link |
head-to-head moderate intensity aerobic exercise
link |
on a stationary cycle to 20 minutes in a sauna.
link |
They're physiologically the same things happen.
link |
So heart rate elevates while you're doing the activity.
link |
Blood pressure increases while you're doing the activity.
link |
But then after, heart rate decreases,
link |
resting heart rate decreases below baseline.
link |
Blood pressure is improved, so it decreases below baseline.
link |
This is happening the same
link |
in moderate intensity cycling versus sauna.
link |
So again, this sauna, like this heat stress,
link |
there's something about it that really mimics
link |
this moderate intensity aerobic exercise,
link |
which is really great for people
link |
that can't go for a run, that can't even get on a bike.
link |
So you know, disabled people,
link |
granted there are some safety concerns,
link |
they're pretty mild, but they do exist.
link |
So people that had a recent heart attack
link |
or have some rare kind of heart disease or problem,
link |
drinking alcohol, never do that.
link |
Elderly people prone to low blood pressure
link |
always talk to a physician before doing the sauna.
link |
Pregnant women, oh yeah, I definitely avoided saunas
link |
when I was pregnant.
link |
But I think it's very relevant for disabled people
link |
and also people that are sedentary.
link |
I've been sedentary most of her life.
link |
Like my mother, I've been able to get her in the sauna
link |
because she's not, I mean, I did get her
link |
on the Peloton once, but it's really much easier.
link |
She feels like it's a spa treatment
link |
and it's like she can listen to her music in there
link |
and I care about her health,
link |
but she's mostly been a sedentary person.
link |
And so I find it much easier to convince her
link |
to get in the sauna than to get on Peloton.
link |
Ideally, you do both.
link |
The question would be, well, I exercise, I run,
link |
I do my high intensity interval training,
link |
why do I need to get in the sauna?
link |
And the reality is, and so I published all this
link |
in a review in the experimental gerontology last year,
link |
I guess, late last year.
link |
And basically, cardiorespiratory fitness,
link |
which is a marker of, it's a marker of health.
link |
You know, cardiorespiratory fitness is improved
link |
in people that do exercise and sauna
link |
compared to exercise alone or sauna alone.
link |
So for those healthy, fit people out there
link |
already exercising, there's a synergistic effect
link |
by also adding a sauna into that routine.
link |
And to me, that's great.
link |
And there's so many beneficial things happening
link |
with the heat stress in addition
link |
to like mimicking aerobic exercise.
link |
There's the heat check proteins that we talked about earlier
link |
and those, it kind of brings me back
link |
to my early days of science when I was
link |
at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies
link |
doing research on little nematode worms
link |
that we, or someone else, injected amyloid beta 42,
link |
the peptide, the 42 amino acid peptide
link |
that is involved in amyloid plaques found in the brain
link |
correlated with Alzheimer's disease
link |
and other, you know, brain disorders.
link |
We injected those into the muscle tissue of worms.
link |
And basically, these worms become paralyzed with age
link |
because the aggregated proteins, these proteins aggregate.
link |
Well, heat shock proteins, one of the main things they do
link |
is they basically make sure the proteins
link |
inside of your cells maintain their proper
link |
three-dimensional structure and are folded right
link |
and so they don't, they're not prone to aggregating
link |
and forming these plaques in your arteries
link |
and also in the brain.
link |
And there's, back to my worm studies I was doing,
link |
I would elevate heat shock proteins in those worms
link |
and it would totally, you know, correct the problem
link |
where they would no longer become paralyzed.
link |
They'd move around like they were young.
link |
So many animal studies have been done looking
link |
at Alzheimer's disease, you know, like a human-like
link |
Alzheimer's disease in a rodent
link |
and heat shock proteins protecting from it, you know.
link |
So heat shock proteins are robustly activated in humans.
link |
This has been shown to even, you know, 50% higher
link |
over baseline levels after just 30 minutes
link |
at 163 degrees Fahrenheit in the sauna.
link |
So, and they stay activated at least in rodents
link |
for, you know, 48 hours at least.
link |
So, you know, having these heat shock proteins around,
link |
making sure they're properly taking care of our proteins
link |
so they're not aggregating in our brains
link |
and in our plaques could be another potential way
link |
that sauna's protecting from Alzheimer's disease
link |
and other, you know, cardiovascular health
link |
as well as longevity.
link |
So, you know, there's people that have SNPs
link |
in heat shock protein factor 70
link |
that if they have one of them,
link |
so they got one from their parents
link |
where they have more active heat shock protein 70,
link |
they live on average one year longer
link |
than people that don't have that SNP.
link |
And if they have two versions,
link |
if they got one from their mom and one from their dad,
link |
they live on average two years longer
link |
than people that don't have that SNP.
link |
So, it's also been associated with human longevity
link |
as well as in lower organisms.
link |
So, you can heat shock a worm or a fly
link |
and they live 15% longer.
link |
This is work done by Gordon Lithgow
link |
at the Buck Institute years and years ago.
link |
So, anyways, I guess what I was getting at
link |
was the heat shock proteins
link |
are part of that stress response pathway
link |
that we talked about earlier.
link |
And, you know, they're also activated by cold as well.
link |
Cold shock does activate heat shock proteins.
link |
Sulfuraphane activates them.
link |
Again, it's one of the reasons
link |
I think we should get all of these things
link |
because they are more robust inputs.
link |
You know, their input activating mechanisms
link |
are more robust for, you know, different ones.
link |
So, there is crosstalk.
link |
There is, you know, I mean,
link |
I guess it'd be more accurate to say there's overlap.
link |
But, you know, it's also like
link |
you want to get the most robust from all of them, right?
link |
So, I mean, that's why I want to do the sauna and exercise
link |
and eat my broccoli sprouts and all that stuff.
link |
It's super interesting.
link |
A couple of questions came up for me.
link |
One is, you mentioned these SNPs,
link |
these nucleotide repeats.
link |
Basically genes that some people have,
link |
more of or less of, than others
link |
that can predict longevity in some sense.
link |
Is that the FOXO3 pathway?
link |
That's one that can, yeah.
link |
in fact, if you go back to the worm studies
link |
I was talking about,
link |
that was like one of the first things
link |
when you see it with your own eyes,
link |
you can take these worms
link |
that you basically decrease
link |
their insulin signaling pathway and their IGF-1.
link |
Worms have what are called homologous genes.
link |
So, they have a lot of similarities to humans.
link |
They have an insulin-like receptor.
link |
They have an IGF-1-like receptor.
link |
And they make something like FOXO3, which we have.
link |
And basically if you decrease that insulin signaling pathway
link |
their FOXO3 is always active in those worms.
link |
And they live like 100% longer.
link |
And not only do they live longer,
link |
I mean, they are like a very young worm.
link |
I mean, they are like,
link |
you look at this thing and you're like,
link |
this looks like the worm that was just born like hours ago.
link |
This thing's at the end of its life.
link |
Now, as a side note,
link |
the thing that always got me on this was,
link |
by the way, this was discovered by Cynthia Kenyon,
link |
and this was like back in the 90s.
link |
And honestly, I'm not sure that anything
link |
has been as exciting in the worm world since then,
link |
but I thought, I mean, it was a really big finding.
link |
The only caveat there is that the worms
link |
go through this dour, it's called a dour stage
link |
when this happens,
link |
when you decrease their insulin signaling and stuff.
link |
And they like go into this like metabolic stasis.
link |
Like they're not eating as much or moving.
link |
And so it's like, okay, well, they live 100% longer,
link |
but like they go into this weird state.
link |
I know people like this, some in the longevity community,
link |
they know who they are.
link |
But they'll get the last laugh
link |
because I'll be dead, well-fed, but dead.
link |
And they'll still be going.
link |
So in terms of the many data on sauna,
link |
and I also just want to acknowledge these Finnish groups
link |
that did this work is really pioneering, right?
link |
When you think 20 years ago,
link |
long before social media or any of this,
link |
and they're up there, I should say,
link |
measuring cortisol and growth hormone
link |
and all this stuff in people getting in and out of sauna.
link |
Very, very interesting.
link |
So 20 minutes seems like the threshold
link |
at 170 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
More times per week seems to be better than fewer
link |
when you think, in terms of all-cause mortality,
link |
cardiovascular risk, according to what I just learned
link |
Four would be a good, I think, minimum effective dose.
link |
Four times a week.
link |
And you combine it with the cold.
link |
I've also seen a protocol where,
link |
it's a very extreme protocol.
link |
I don't recommend this to people right off the bat,
link |
where they had human subjects get into the sauna
link |
for 30 minutes, get out for five,
link |
30 minutes, get out for five, 30 minutes,
link |
for a total of two hours of exposure.
link |
But that was what led to these massive
link |
16-fold increases in growth hormone.
link |
I actually have a, and they had to do it very seldom.
link |
So it sounds like these protocols you're describing,
link |
20 minutes done four times per week,
link |
far more reasonable for most people to access.
link |
But I know people are probably desperate to know
link |
what if they don't have a sauna?
link |
You know, a sauna is kind of a unique item.
link |
So I have a couple of questions.
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Can people use hot baths?
link |
With the appropriate warning, of course,
link |
that without getting into description
link |
of the mechanics and the underlying biology,
link |
it's pretty obvious that the testes,
link |
if they get too warm, you'll kill sperm.
link |
That's the reason why the testes are housed in a structure
link |
called the scrotum that can move around.
link |
So just to be, you know, here we are,
link |
biologists just talking about realities here.
link |
So if you're trying to conceive children
link |
or keep your sperm healthy,
link |
guys should probably stay out of warm, hot baths.
link |
For at least six months.
link |
That's been shown.
link |
So sperm motility goes down and sperm production goes down,
link |
but that is completely like corrected
link |
if they stay out of the sauna for six months.
link |
So through six months later, it's back to normal.
link |
That's very useful information, I'm sure,
link |
to a number of people out there.
link |
So if people don't have access to a sauna,
link |
and we get this about cold too.
link |
You always say, what about cold showers?
link |
And I always say, well,
link |
the studies have mainly been done on immersion
link |
because it's hard to keep things controlled
link |
It just doesn't make for a very good experiment
link |
because you get a bigger person,
link |
less of them is under the shower.
link |
And so it doesn't make for a good experiment.
link |
So it's not as good as immersion.
link |
I could imagine that a hot bath would work almost as well.
link |
Yeah, so there's been some studies looking at,
link |
for example, activation of heat shock proteins,
link |
also brain drive neurotrophic factor increases
link |
And so the hot bath at around 104 degrees Fahrenheit,
link |
which is typically what studies will use for temperature,
link |
which is actually cooler than when I crank my bath hot.
link |
But you're very heat adapted.
link |
I'm very heat adapted, yeah.
link |
And it's 20 minutes from the shoulders down.
link |
And that is like a very robust activation
link |
in heat shock proteins and in brain drive
link |
neurotrophic factor.
link |
And then heat shock proteins are also protecting
link |
against muscle atrophy.
link |
So that's also having to do with the protein structure
link |
in the muscle tissue as well.
link |
And this has been studies in animal data,
link |
as well as some recent human data as well.
link |
It was local hyperthermia or local heat treatment,
link |
but essentially it showed that it protected.
link |
I mean, it was like,
link |
there was a study where they were looking at muscle disuse
link |
and it was something like the local heat treatment
link |
prevented like almost 40% of the muscle atrophy
link |
So like, and it's funny because I used to use this on
link |
when I was injured and stuff.
link |
I would go in the sauna because I didn't know at the time
link |
because I was a graduate student,
link |
but I knew just from experiments
link |
that like I'm not losing as much muscle, I feel better.
link |
Like at the time I was reading a little
link |
about the growth hormone and stuff back then,
link |
but, and I knew about heat shock proteins.
link |
And so I kind of knew, but that data wasn't around yet.
link |
And so now we have the data and I've always like,
link |
felt like I wasn't losing my muscle
link |
like I should have been when I was doing the sauna.
link |
And I was doing it literally seven days a week.
link |
It was like hardcore.
link |
This is also during graduate school.
link |
Yeah, now I'm doing the sauna like a bare, bare minimum.
link |
I do three, but I try to do four because of the,
link |
it all depends on my schedule.
link |
I also like to do long runs.
link |
I really, it's like long being like three miles,
link |
not like Cam Hanes long.
link |
But I really, for me, and we were talking about this earlier
link |
like off camera that the runs for me are for my brain.
link |
And I get this mind wandering effect
link |
where I daydream and I think about things.
link |
I work through problems.
link |
I come up with ideas and this is all happening on the runs.
link |
And so I just, I miss my runs if I don't do them
link |
and I miss it because of the brain effects I get from it.
link |
And when I exercise, it's funny because I'm a female
link |
and you think that I'd be exercising to stay fit
link |
and in shape and care about my figure.
link |
But when I exercise, literally what I'm thinking about
link |
is my brain and I'm like,
link |
this is the best longevity drug there is.
link |
This is it right here, Rhonda.
link |
You're always wandering.
link |
You're always wanting to know.
link |
You're wanting to do the best.
link |
If you don't exercise, you're missing that essential dose.
link |
And so that for me is the motivation,
link |
the doping seeking thing I'm looking for.
link |
Admittedly, I do not do enough strength training
link |
and I have to do it, have to, have to, have to.
link |
I'm like, I'm so after the endurance and the hit
link |
and I really need to add that in
link |
because muscle mass is also extremely important
link |
for aging as well.
link |
So that's my fault.
link |
Well, the brain effects are really interesting.
link |
I try and get one longer run per week and a few other runs
link |
and I do it without a phone.
link |
I don't listen to podcasts.
link |
I occasionally will listen to music,
link |
but I really try not to.
link |
I also find that my mind solves problems.
link |
I feel like it washes out the cobwebs, so to speak.
link |
Some of the most brilliant and prolific neuroscientists
link |
that I know who've had very long careers, Eric Kandel,
link |
Nobel prize winner at Columbia comes to mind
link |
for all his work on memory, used to swim a mile a day.
link |
And now I think swims half a mile a day,
link |
but he's in his late 90s and he's still sharp,
link |
which is incredible.
link |
And his lab has done some work showing that
link |
any load bearing exercise repeated.
link |
So endurance work, unlike the Peloton or cycling,
link |
that's really load bearing,
link |
although you're cycling really hard with the resistance,
link |
but causes the release of osteocalcin from the bones,
link |
which acts in an endocrine way, sort of like a hormone,
link |
can actually travel to the hippocampus.
link |
And at least in these animal studies,
link |
induce the proliferation of neurons, growth of synapses,
link |
BDNF, a number of downstream things,
link |
which kind of makes sense.
link |
If we were to put a just so evolutionary story on this,
link |
a body that's active can signal to the brain
link |
that the body still needs cognition.
link |
An inactive body in some ways is depriving the brain
link |
of any signal of what the body is doing, right?
link |
This is obviously I'm making this up as conjecture,
link |
but we know in various ocean animals
link |
that they'll swim around for some period of their life
link |
and then they'll have a completely stationary portion
link |
And basically the brain degenerates there.
link |
You don't need much of a nervous system
link |
if you're not moving.
link |
So I think there's really something there
link |
and also just letting your ideas and mind drift.
link |
and I appreciate that you shared your protocols
link |
because I think right now we're in an interesting time
link |
in public health information history
link |
where people are just kind of getting bombarded
link |
with cold is good, heat is gold, cold is good,
link |
heat is good, excuse me, I misspoke.
link |
There are all these micronutrients
link |
and of course, macronutrients are important too.
link |
And today you've really enriched us
link |
with the description of the underlying mechanisms
link |
and the logic behind them.
link |
But also sharing what you do is really informative
link |
because I think people need a jumping off place
link |
and obviously they need to start someplace
link |
and getting heat adapted, et cetera, it takes time.
link |
But I really appreciate that you're willing
link |
to share your protocols and that you do the things
link |
that you teach and educate people about.
link |
As a final question, because I have to ask,
link |
red light sauna or no red light sauna?
link |
I've been a little bit vocal about my feelings
link |
that none of the red light saunas I've ever been in
link |
got hot enough and it was frustrating.
link |
So I feel like it's neither here nor there.
link |
However, I do acknowledge that red light
link |
and low level light therapies are now known
link |
to do a number of interesting things.
link |
It was a Nobel Prize in 1908 for phototherapy for lupus.
link |
So it's not like a new thing,
link |
the idea that red light and light could do things
link |
positive for our biology.
link |
But do you have a red light in your sauna?
link |
Do you think it's useful?
link |
And I mention this because this is the number one question
link |
I get about sauna, red light or no red light
link |
or some intermediate answer.
link |
So I don't have an infrared sauna,
link |
but I have a sauna that has lights, it makes red light,
link |
but I don't think it's the red light
link |
that you're talking about.
link |
It's not activating it at a specific wavelength, which is-
link |
It's usually so that the range that seems to be helpful,
link |
and I confess, I use a red light panel for other things,
link |
is 670 nanometer out to about 720 nanometer.
link |
So it looks like red and very dim lights,
link |
dim red and bright red.
link |
And the idea is that red light can travel,
link |
the photon and energy is such that it can travel down
link |
through the deep layers of the dermis of the skin.
link |
I don't have a red light in my sauna.
link |
I don't know if it's essential or not.
link |
I don't think so based on all the studies
link |
I've talked about.
link |
I think that would be as-
link |
The potential effect on mitochondria is interesting.
link |
I do think there's a lack of really good solid evidence
link |
in humans, but that might only be
link |
because it's just not studied enough,
link |
and that's usually the case.
link |
So perhaps like there's the Juve, right?
link |
The Juve, they have those red light panels and stuff.
link |
Juve and Cozy are the two ones I know, K-O-Z and Juve.
link |
They're, as far as I know,
link |
I'm probably going to insult both companies
link |
at the same time, but I'd rather insult them both
link |
at the same time than just compliment one or insult one.
link |
Both of them seem excellent
link |
for getting the appropriate wavelengths of red light,
link |
and I do not have a relationship to either of those.
link |
Yeah, well, I personally think that the sauna
link |
in and of itself, it's about the heat stress.
link |
And typically the question I get
link |
is infrared sauna or regular sauna.
link |
And there are some differences as well.
link |
Infrared saunas, maybe the infrared saunas
link |
are the ones that have the red light
link |
that you're talking about.
link |
Infrared saunas only get up to around
link |
140 degrees Fahrenheit.
link |
So as I mentioned, the studies were about 174 degrees
link |
Fahrenheit, and so you really have to stay
link |
in a longer period of time.
link |
However, there have been some studies coming out of Japan.
link |
They use infrared sauna.
link |
They have this whole protocol.
link |
It's called Weigh On Therapy,
link |
and they get people in infrared saunas,
link |
and then they wrap them in a towel,
link |
and they stay warm for X amount.
link |
So the whole protocol ends up being like an hour long.
link |
Again, it's 140 degrees Fahrenheit,
link |
so it's an infrared sauna, and it's been shown
link |
to improve a variety of coronary heart disease
link |
and heart-related conditions.
link |
There have been some improvements.
link |
So obviously there's evidence that infrared saunas
link |
can be beneficial for cardiovascular health.
link |
I've used infrared saunas many times at my in-laws.
link |
They have an infrared sauna, and I have to crank
link |
that thing up for a while until it's maxed.
link |
And then I have to sit in there for an hour at least.
link |
I do sweat a lot, and that's another thing
link |
we didn't talk about.
link |
You do sweat some heavy metals,
link |
and some heavy metals are excreted predominantly
link |
through sweat and others through urine.
link |
So for example, cadmium, there's like 125-fold increase
link |
in cadmium excretion from sweat when you get in the sauna.
link |
Also lead is something like 17-fold excretions higher.
link |
Another one is aluminum.
link |
It's about four-fold higher.
link |
So infrared, you do sweat a lot too,
link |
and that's because the main difference
link |
is that you're heating your body up
link |
through thermal radiation versus the ambient air.
link |
Like a standard sauna is a heater,
link |
and the heater's heating up the air,
link |
and that's how you're heating yourself up.
link |
So it is a little bit of a different mechanism.
link |
I prefer regular saunas.
link |
Most of the data out there is from the heat stress itself,
link |
like your heart rate's elevating when you're in there.
link |
You're feeling hot.
link |
You're getting that cardiovascular.
link |
I mean, that's what you're feeling when you're in a hot sauna
link |
and that, for me, takes a really long time
link |
in the infrared sauna to get at the very end.
link |
But I do think there are some benefits from infrared,
link |
and they are more affordable.
link |
They're less of a fire hazard.
link |
But again, hot baths are, I think,
link |
a good alternative modality for heat stress
link |
compared to like a regular sauna.
link |
Great, that's a really helpful answer.
link |
Like I said, I use the red light, but not in the sauna,
link |
and thank you for reminding us
link |
of that 174-degree Fahrenheit threshold
link |
that was mainly used in all these studies.
link |
So we covered a lot of territory,
link |
but I just want to thank you again.
link |
It was extremely thorough and extremely informative.
link |
I now have, my notes always look a little bit
link |
like they were drawn out by a macaque monkey
link |
who has no knowledge of the English language,
link |
but I can decipher this to tell you
link |
that there are at least 10 additions
link |
to my current protocols that I'm going to add,
link |
and I'll have lots of questions.
link |
So I apologize in advance for that.
link |
But on behalf of the listeners and just directly from me,
link |
thank you so much for your time.
link |
Thanks for having me on.
link |
It was a really awesome conversation,
link |
so I enjoyed it a lot.
link |
Let's do it again.
link |
Thank you for joining me
link |
for my discussion with Dr. Rhonda Patrick.
link |
I hope you found it as interesting
link |
and as actionable as I did.
link |
Once again, if you'd like to learn more
link |
about Dr. Patrick's work,
link |
sign up for her newsletter
link |
and to listen to her excellent podcast,
link |
go to foundmyfitness.com.
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You'll find links to the newsletter
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And once again, the newsletter
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If you're enjoying and or learning
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Thank you once again for joining me
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link |
And as always, thank you for your interest in science.
link |
I'll see you next time.