Rhonda Patrick, Ph.D. — Protocols for Fasting, Lowering Dementia Risk, Reversing Heart Aging, & More

Rhonda, it is very nice to see you again.

>> Likewise.

>> Thanks for making the time.

>> Yeah, I'm excited to be here.

>> Yeah. And I was going back through the archives doing my homework as I always do, looking at our past conversations, and it was such a trip down memory lane

because our first podcast together was podcast number 12 of the Tim Ferrris show, which is was in June of 2014.

And then preceding that by a few months, April 2014 was when you had a guest post on my blog called Area's the next big

performance-enhancing drug. So well

performance-enhancing drug. So well done. That's become quite the topic.

done. That's become quite the topic.

>> I know. I kind of like to take a little bit of that, you know, claim to to making sauna popular.

>> Yeah. The fairy godmother of heat shock proteins within the context of saunas.

And we are going to run out of time before we run out of topics or questions as always. And what's so fun about

as always. And what's so fun about having a conversation with someone like you who is not only very scientifically credible and literate, but who's actively involved with the science,

tracking the science and have published is that there's always more stuff to talk about. Things change. There are new

talk about. Things change. There are new developments. There are new discoveries.

developments. There are new discoveries.

There are revisions, which makes me very excited to hop into the conversation.

And for people listening, we're going to cover a lot of things that are very, very actionable and practical. And I

just wanted to give people an idea of some of what's coming. We may not cover it all, but if you'll bear with me, Random, just going to read some of these because it's great. How to increase V2

max and why you should be looking at V2 max as a predictor of longevity with highintensity interval training. What

type of exercise reduces heart aging by 20 years? Brain aging in the same

20 years? Brain aging in the same context or reversing brain aging. the

benefits of exercise, snacks on glucose regulation, and mitochondrial function.

We're going to get a lot because this is something that is a a perennial topic for me, but I've been really doing a deep dive on all things fasting related,

intermittent fasting, metabolic benefits, if versus extended fasting versus ketogenic diet, etc., etc. Daily protein requirements and optimal timing for protein intake. The role of vitamin

D in brain health and protection against cognitive decline. How a low omega-3

cognitive decline. How a low omega-3 index is as bad as smoking and what to do about it. Benefits of creatine for brain and muscle health and best practices.

Microplastic exposure, the biggest offenders and so on. It just goes on and on. We could cover so much ground. And

on. We could cover so much ground. And

the way this conversation came to be to give people a peak behind the curtain is we were texting about all sorts of things including aging parents and what

we're trying and what we're thinking about, what has worked, what hasn't worked seemingly. And I thought we would

worked seemingly. And I thought we would just start there if you're open to sharing because I really gained from our

exchanges, enjoyed our exchanges. And

for instance, talking about creatine as one example, right? There are potential applications to preserving or at least halting the

decline or slowing the decline of cognitive deterioration, right? And

why don't we just begin with the personal because I think that's the most universal. and all of my friends of my

universal. and all of my friends of my vintage um or younger, no one's getting younger, so they're all contending with aging parents and what to do with them,

how to help them. Can you speak to just some of the circumstances with your parents and what you have used as interventions that have seemed to have an effect?

>> I'm one of those people that, you know, my parents, neither of them are really physically active. My dad for many years

physically active. My dad for many years was physically active in the in the sense that he played a team sport. He he

was a baseball player and he did it for many many years all the way into his early 60s and then he kind of just couldn't do it anymore. So my mother never really got into any sports and she wasn't the kind of person that would go

out to the gym or go for runs or anything like that and so physical activity really wasn't part of the equation >> and neither is really a healthy diet. As

I started to do a lot of research into these sort of what I think are interventions that are lowhanging fruits, things that are easy for people to do that can have a pretty big outcome

>> in terms of the effect. You know, the size effect is greater than what you have to put in. So, examples of that would obviously be something like a supplement that you could take, right?

That's the easiest thing you can do is kind of swallow a pill and hope that it has a great effect. And this is where both of my parents are taking a multivitamin. And you might go, well,

multivitamin. And you might go, well, multivitamin really, what's that going to do? And I'll tell you, we've come

to do? And I'll tell you, we've come full circle. You know, 10 years ago,

full circle. You know, 10 years ago, there was a huge splash that was made in the media. Big article came out and it

the media. Big article came out and it was called enough is enough.

Multivitamins are not only useless, they may be harmful.

And it was a study that looked at a variety of different studies. It's

called a metaanalysis that basically said, well, you know, all these vitamins that you're taking are useless and in some cases they can be harmful because they can allow cancer to to grow faster.

And I sort of debunked that, you know, 10 years ago. But over the course of those 10 years, and as you mentioned in the intro here, you know, science is always changing and revisions are made.

We learn new things. And in that 10-year frame, three different randomized control trials have come out. And

randomized control trials are really key because you are comparing you know this intervention which in this case was a multivitamin to a placebo because people

taking anything are obviously going to want a positive effect and many people do anticipate that and they can actually change their biology. Place a real thing.

>> Mhm.

>> So three trials came out looking at the effect of multivitamins on cognition.

And I'm talking the multivitamin that was used was the standard run-of-the-mill. It was sententrum

run-of-the-mill. It was sententrum silver.

>> Centrum. I knew it was going to be Centrum. Yeah.

Centrum. Yeah.

>> It was the vitamin that you would go that's the one vitamin that's not going to have any effect. It's like the you know, but actually it turns out it's got over 40 essential nutrients in it and

it's also got some other nonvitamins. So

things that are like polyphenols like luteine, zeazanthin, these are actually really important for eye health but also the brain.

>> Yeah.

>> And these three randomized control trials were two years long.

And what they showed was that taking a multivitamin for two years had pretty enormous effects on cognitive aging.

These were in older adults. These were

adults were 65 years of age or older.

That's where my parents are. And after 2 years of taking the multivitamin, they had improved cognition on a battery of different tests. That equated to like

different tests. That equated to like reducing global cognitive aging by about 2 years. And on top of that, they

2 years. And on top of that, they reduced their episodic aging by 5 years, almost 5 years. It was 4.8 years.

Episodic memory is the kind of memory that's involved in remembering events, things that that happen in your life.

And so that's a big effect. 5 years of reduced >> episodic brain aging, episodic memory, brain aging.

>> Mhm. And so I think that anyone that's concerned about their parents, one of the easiest things that you can do in terms of improving cognition, now I should mention these were older adults,

yes, but they weren't older adults with ner degenerative disease. So these these were older adults that were otherwise didn't have any sort of neurogenerative disease. That's also important because

disease. That's also important because >> once you get to a pathological state, you you kind of have to do more things to help improve cognition than just a multivitamin. Mhm.

multivitamin. Mhm.

>> That's what I have my mom and my dad on a multivitamin. That's the easiest

a multivitamin. That's the easiest thing. Vitamin D is also another

thing. Vitamin D is also another no-brainer. I mean, 70% of the US

no-brainer. I mean, 70% of the US population has insufficient levels of vitamin D. Older adults are even higher

vitamin D. Older adults are even higher than that. So, you know, almost the

than that. So, you know, almost the majority of all older adults are vitamin D deficient. I mean, most people aren't

D deficient. I mean, most people aren't going outside. And even if they are

going outside. And even if they are going outside, they're either wearing sunscreen or just the fact that they're older affects their their skin's ability to make vitamin D3 from the sun, from

UVB radiation from the sun. And so

there's much less efficient at it. In

fact, a 70-year-old makes about four times less vitamin D than their former 20-year-old self.

>> So vitamin D supplement is a low hanging fruit. Is super easy to bring someone up

fruit. Is super easy to bring someone up to level.

>> Can I ask you a question about vitamin D? Because I know you love vitamin D. So

D? Because I know you love vitamin D. So

here's my question about vitamin D and it actually relates to I believe this is a publication you had in 2019. So we'll

see if things have changed or not but APOE E4 and omega-3 brain delivery. So

my family lot of benefits to having my genetics also a whole bunch of bugs in the code including quite a bit of APOE4.

I'm ApoE34.

And should that change how I consume vitamin D or consume fish oil or omega-3s having that type of status?

>> Right. I would say the vitamin D there hasn't really been any effect that I'm aware of in terms of >> having an AOE4 alil as you mentioned and for people listening

>> or watching you know ApoE4 alil if you have one of those it can double your risk of Alzheimer's disease. If you have two of them, you can go up to a t-fold increased risk for Alzheimer's disease.

>> Yeah.

>> When it comes to fish oil, particularly fish oil, there does seem to be, and this is where my publication came from, but also there's a lot of evidence that

has shown people with APOE4 alles, they don't tend to have as much DHA getting into their brains brains as people without the alals. And on top of

that, in in trials, people with mild cognitive decline, for example, if they supplemented with fish oil and they had APOE4, they didn't have the cognitive benefits that the people

that were not APOE4 had.

>> And so there was this big question in the field as to why that is. And it's

still not entirely known. Although I

will say what my take on that is and in fact I've you know talked to some of the experts in the field as well is that you have to have a higher dose of fish oil for one.

>> Mhm.

>> And it's better if it's in phospholipid form. So fish if you're eating fish it

form. So fish if you're eating fish it is it's in phospholipid form. It's in

triglyceride form. So just for clarity, if you're taking capsules, it may not be the case, but if I'm eating my can of sardines in the morning, then phosphoipid form, >> you're getting more phosphoipid form.

Exactly.

>> Yeah.

>> Now, if you are taking your supplement oils, you can actually make phosphoipid form, but you have to really you have to get to that like 2 g dose range.

>> That's when your body is also converting into phosphoipid form. And then the other way around that is actually consuming a phospholipid form of omega-3. And so that's something that

omega-3. And so that's something that can be done if you're supplementing with either, you know, krill oil, which I'm not a huge fan of because it's super, it's not very concentrated, so you'd

have to really take a lot of it. Or you

could eat something like salmon row, which is a really high phospholipid concentration of omega-3 fatty acids.

>> And you might go, why phosphoipid form?

Well, it turns out the way your brain, you actually get omega-3 into the brain.

>> There's two ways. The first way doesn't require phosphoipid form. It's just this omega-3 is sort of in a free fatty acid form and it diffuses across the membrane and gets into the brain that way. The

second way actually is through a transport mechanism and that is phospholipid form and that's why it seems as though >> people with APOE4 their free fatty acid form isn't isn't

going into the brain as well because they have breakdown of the bloodb brain barrier early on. APOE4 tends to lead to early breakdown of the bloodb brain barrier. And when your bloodb brain

barrier. And when your bloodb brain barrier breaks down, it's hard for things to kind of just passively diffuse as well. I know that is

as well. I know that is counterintuitive, but without getting into all the crazy molecular and biochemistry involved, just take my word on that for the for the two different

forms of omega-3. Or you can read that publication as well.

>> Mhm. Okay, let's step back for a second and just get into the parental specifics and then we can zoom out and talk about mechanisms and all sorts of stuff. But

if you just had to give a couple of bullets on the things that you feel confident in having your mom and dad continue doing or taking, let's start

with the supplements cuz like you said, it's sort of a lowhanging fruit in a sense from a behavioral change perspective, >> right?

>> What do you have them doing? I guess

I'll kind of zoom out and talk about, you know, I think you listened to a podcast I did with Dr. Dr. Mark Matson many several years ago and I had mentioned that my dad was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease

>> in 2017 and that's an important context to consider like what sort of supplements I'm giving my dad and also the fact that you have to think about compliance like what were your parents do you have a parent that'll take a lot of vitamins

>> actually do >> or a few vitamins right so with my dad knowing his disease with Parkinson's disease multivitamin was in there because that's already like so important just to cover a lot of bases you're getting a lot of different you know

vitamins and minerals And then it was omega-3. And in fact, it was a high DHA. And he's getting about 2 grams a day. And there's a lot of evidence that omega-3 can help with

dopamineergic transmission, can help with a lot of brain function, particularly as it relates to Parkinson's disease as well as Alzheimer's disease.

>> So that was the second supplements that he's, you know, taking. And then the last one that I could really get him to take was ubiquininal, which is a reduced form of

CoQ10. Now, co-enzyme Q10 is actually

CoQ10. Now, co-enzyme Q10 is actually something that we have inside of our cells and it's involved in mitochondrial health.

>> So, having a depleted CoQ10 can lead to mitochondrial toxicity. And so, taking

mitochondrial toxicity. And so, taking CoQ10, there's actually been some early studies with even Parkinson's disease patients showing that supplementing with CoQ10 can be beneficial. And he's

actually taken those supplements for for many, many years now. And very I would say surprisingly but also I'm thankful that his Parkinson's disease has

progressed very very slowly. So it's

been 9 years you know almost 10 years and he's really essentially had this Parkinson's disease limited to one tremor in his hand.

>> So that's great and that's all I can say is >> yeah that's great news. It's great news and you never really know at the end of the day what is the reason for that. But

he's convinced I'm convinced, his doctor's convinced that he should keep doing what he's doing and that it seems to be beneficial.

>> Mhm.

>> My dad is one of those guys that doesn't like to take a lot of pills. If he would take more, I would give him more.

>> If he were willing to take more, what would you give him?

>> I would also give him sulfurophane.

>> Mhm.

>> Definitely tried, but he doesn't want to take more pills. So sulurophane is it's a compound that is formed when you eat cruciferous vegetables like broccoli,

cauliflower for example and it's formed from something inside of it called glucaraphin. When you break the plant

glucaraphin. When you break the plant tissue when you bite it or you know chop it up or whatever it forms sulforophane sulforophane is not necessarily in the plant itself. It just gets formed when

plant itself. It just gets formed when you break the plant tissue. That's a

technical thing. So I'm just going to talk about sulforophane and call it sulforophane as if it's part of you know the plant but it's not. Just so you know.

>> Yeah.

>> Sulfurophane, like I said, it's something that's formed in these cruciferous vegetables. Broccoli

cruciferous vegetables. Broccoli sprouts, the young young sprout of broccoli actually is the best source of it. It has 100 times more of that active

it. It has 100 times more of that active precursor glucaraphin than mature broccoli. So that's the best dietary

broccoli. So that's the best dietary source of it.

>> Are you growing your own broccoli sprouts or are you doing off the shelf now?

>> I'm off the shelf now. I used to. I used

to. It's work. It's not that much work, but it is work. But you also like you have to be very fidious about not having it contaminated. And that's where the

it contaminated. And that's where the real work comes in.

>> But I like it because there are people that can't afford the supplement and this gives them another another way to to basically get it. Yeah. For cheap. So

the reason I really like sulfurophane and why I want both my parents on it and my mom has been taking it, we can talk about that in a minute, is because it is the most potent dietary activator of

this system that we have called NRF2, which is this major system. It's a

basically a transcription factor that activates a lot of different genes inside of our body. And it activates genes that are involved in stress. It

activates a lot of what are called stress response genes. And these are the kind of things that are activated when you're doing stressful things like exercise or you know if you're fasting.

>> Yeah.

>> So you really want this pathway to be active >> because a little bit of stress right it's like chronic overdose of stress bad but little doses of stress has this I

guess what would you call it hormetic effect.

>> Exactly.

>> Right. Am I getting that right? Yeah.

>> Yeah. You nailed it. So essentially

we're talking about what is sometimes called ustress or good stress. It's

these small doses of stress where, you know, your body's responding to that stress by activating all these beneficial pathways that deal with stress. Whether we're talking about

stress. Whether we're talking about antioxidant pathways, anti-inflammatory pathways, pathways involved in clearing out damage, you know, damaged stuff from your cells like autophagy, just all sorts of beneficial stuff, right? Those

pathways are activated for a longer period of time than the acute stress that you're giving it. So in this case the sulurophane is a little bit of an acute stress like polyphenols in general are.

>> Mhm.

>> The amount of time that you're ingesting that polyphenol is very small and digesting it. The reality is is that

digesting it. The reality is is that it's activating these stress response pathways that last you know on the orders of like 24 to 48 hours sometimes longer. So you're having this beneficial

longer. So you're having this beneficial effect >> that's overall beneficial from that little bit of stress. And so sulurophane activates NRF2 and one of the main pathways that it's activating is

increasing glutathione production and it's been shown in a couple different human studies that it increases glutathione in both plasma but also in the brain.

>> Yeah, >> glutathione is the major antioxidant that we have in our body and it's very important in the brain. super important

for not only preventing brain aging but also for dealing with dysfunction in the case of acute injury like traumatic brain injury or in the case of Alzheimer's disease or Parkinson's

disease which are other types of injury on the brain glutathione plays a big role there and so I obviously would want my dad to be taking sulfurophane and there's a supplement out there that I

use that has been used in many like 12 or so different studies and so it's you know been shown to be beneficial across the board and that is something that I do give my mom. Now the reason I gave it

to my mom well I was kind of hoping my mom interestingly has two other types of sort of brain dysfunction um problems but they're not neurodeenerative in the sense of Alzheimer's disease and

Parkinson's disease are it's kind of like a something going wrong in the brain and it it affects her motor control. So she has tremors. She has

control. So she has tremors. She has

essential tremor and she has orthostatic tremor. And I have secretly wanted the

tremor. And I have secretly wanted the increase in glutathione to affect those tremors.

But when I gave the sulfurophane to my mom, because I knew the placebo effect, I did tell her that we were using it to detoxify these chemicals that are

associated with plastic like BPA because that's also been something that I'm I'm using sulfurophane for because that NRF2 pathway does activate what are called phase 2 detoxification enzymes. And it's

been shown to detoxify. Even if you're living in like a city like New York or LA where there's a lot of air pollution, it's been shown to detoxify benzene.

Within 24 hours, people start excreting 60% more benzene from their body. Now,

benzene is something that is found in air pollution. It's also in cigarettes.

air pollution. It's also in cigarettes.

>> Yes. Don't drink your own urine if you're taking sulurophane is what you're saying.

>> Definitely don't do that. But also, if you're living in a polluted place, I tell all my friends in LA, I'm like, "You have to be taking sulfurophane.

It's a non-negotiable, right?" So I told her to take the sulfurophane because I wanted her to detoxify BPA because she does eat a lot of processed foods and stuff which are found in plastic.

Anyway, so she started taking it and she came back to me and told me that it was helping her tremors and that she wanted more.

>> How long did that take?

>> Not long. It was actually I think within a week or so, maybe maybe two.

>> It was very quick.

>> Yeah, it's wild.

>> And she is religious about it. I buy it for her and I give her, you know, these these bottles and >> she she takes two a day and she takes a certain brand called Avacol. I don't

have any affiliation with them. They're

a brand that again 12 different published studies using their their supplement >> AV MAC.

>> That's right.

>> Amma.

>> Yeah. And she takes two of their advanced formula.

So she's taking that, she's taking the multivitamin, the vitamin D, and she's also taking the omega-3.

She's doing great. What's funny is that I I was able to then get her into CrossFit and I don't know if it's because her her tremors I think her her tremors have

lessened a bit and so she's been more active and wanting to be more active like she's out dancing more. My mom

likes to dance and I mentioned how I really wanted to get her into a senior's CrossFit class and she sees me do it. I

have a coach come to my house and do we do CrossFit training at my house or my mom has seen me doing it and she's been interested in it and I told her that there's a great senior's class and I

would be willing to you know pay for it and get her in it. It would be huge and she's been doing it now for a couple of months maybe like three or four months >> and she goes three times a week and she

loves it. She loves it. She's made

loves it. She loves it. She's made

friends there.

Sometimes the coaches take videos and she sends them to me. She sends them to her friends. She's so proud. You know,

her friends. She's so proud. You know,

she's doing kettle bell swings. She's

doing wall squats. I mean, it's amazing.

>> Go, mom. That's amazing.

>> It's a very different type of atmosphere than your usual CrossFit class would be, right? You're aware that these are

right? You're aware that these are seniors and so they're not doing, you know, barbell like squatting like heavy weights and stuff. There's they start out with wall squats and then they're, you know, squatting with just like a

really light bar and it's it's really great. Let me hop in for a second here

great. Let me hop in for a second here and I want to know if there's anything else to add to that, but we've talked about this. You and I are texted a hell

about this. You and I are texted a hell of a lot about it that I have Alzheimer's in my family. I have now have multiple relatives who are moderate to advance

with respect to Alzheimer's. Uh saw my grandmother disintegrate.

Terrifying to watch and terrifying to imagine yourself experiencing the same thing. And also at least one of them is

thing. And also at least one of them is APOE33 and I'm APOE34. So I'm like, well, wait a second. If that is where they are

a second. If that is where they are right now and I'm at hypothetically 2.5x greater risk of developing Alzheimer's

disease AD, I should really double down on paying attention to as much as possible for myself, certainly for them as well, but the earlier the intervention,

the better the outcomes generally. So,

I've been looking at all sorts of things and just to reiterate a few things you said. So, on the omega-3 side of things,

said. So, on the omega-3 side of things, just like with sulforophane, not all brands are created equal, right? There's

a lot of garbage floating around out there. Would you say neither of us have

there. Would you say neither of us have any affiliation with this company, but I know our mutual friend Kevin Rose had this particular brand tested that I

guess it's 1 o pure encapsulations. Is that what you

pure encapsulations. Is that what you have your your parents taking or did you use a different brand? So with my dad, he is now taking the Zyogen brand, which

is also very good. And the reason for that is because it's higher DHA.

>> I see.

>> Which is what I wanted.

>> My mom is taking the one.

>> Got it. Cool.

>> Both those brands, by the way, are great. They both been third party tested

great. They both been third party tested and have very high quality fish oil. And

I don't have affiliation with either of them.

>> Yep. I've got my parents on those. I'm

taking those. You mentioned luteine and zeazanthin which uh is is good for quite a few things. Now for those people who may be interested and this probably

won't help me with my particular presbopia so age related visual decline particularly with near work reading a

book let's say but a reds too people could check out studies that have been done on a reds 2 and two of the principal ingredients are lutein and zeazanthin

so there's that now also have been very very curious about how to activate some of the pathways that you mentioned.

Sulfurophane would be a good option for that.

Also looking at, and we don't have to spend a ton of time on this, but exogenous ketones, right? Because

ideally, sure, I would have my parents maybe do intermittent fasting or some extended fasts. I don't think that's

extended fasts. I don't think that's going to happen for a million different reasons, but perhaps exogenous ketones and have looked at that. This is kind of

a work in progress. I'm I've been doing and I know you have too. Lots of

self-experimentation. But there are some case studies in the literature. One of

which you sent to me that are pretty interesting looking at administration.

In other words, giving an older patient with Alzheimer's disease oral exogenous ketones. They tend to taste like jet fuel. They're not tasty.

But the effects of at least in these case studies are pretty remarkable.

Now granted, with the monoester they use in some of these, the offtheshelf cost per day would be like $150 or something

like that, maybe even more. So there's a sort of a cost question. But I'm just going to throw a couple of more things out there that are on my mind. So you

mentioned the exercise piece. This has

been so important for me. So, I've hired a trainer and I

for me. So, I've hired a trainer and I realized my parents are kind of sneaky and sometimes a little I don't want to say passive aggressive, but they they'll say they're going to do something to please me and then they won't do it. So,

getting the trainer to actually pick them up at their house is is something that I decided to do

because there there are a lot of reasons exercise is amazing. One of which is the natural release of cloth. And people can look this up. I'm hoping that you'll be able to inject this in the next handful

of years. We'll see in humans, but K L O

of years. We'll see in humans, but K L O T H O also worth checking out.

Anything else that you would add to that or any commentary you want to sprinkle in? Am I missing any criticals?

in? Am I missing any criticals?

Multivitamin.

>> There's definitely commentary. There's

commentary, but we can get into that if you want to go dive into the why the ketone nesters are beneficial and >> yeah, >> and why the exercise is beneficial. We

can go into that because I'm I love talking about it.

>> Yeah, this is going to be a conversation, right, just between you and me. That's how I treat all these

and me. That's how I treat all these things. And I'm I'm very self-interested

things. And I'm I'm very self-interested because I think the personal is the most universal. Maybe that's just an excuse

universal. Maybe that's just an excuse to make this all about what I want. But

we have been texting also because I told you I've been thinking about doing a 14-day fast. And actually, I ratcheted

14-day fast. And actually, I ratcheted that back from doing a 30-day fast.

And I've done 10 days before water only.

I've done lots of 7 days. And part of the reason is I think I would be better equipped now to do longer fasts because of the intermittent fasting I've been

doing. And this ties into the

doing. And this ties into the conversation around the parents because what I have noticed is for instance doing 168 fasting which

was there's and I'm so sorry the scientist you mentioned before whose podcast interview I listened to on your podcast what was his name again?

>> Dr. Mark Matson.

>> Yeah Mark Matson amazing amazing scientist fantastic conversation lot of seinal work related to intermittent fasting. So 168 what does that actually

fasting. So 168 what does that actually mean? I did this today. I've done this

mean? I did this today. I've done this most days now, which is basically eating between, for me, it's like 2 p.m. and 10

p.m. There are arguments that it should be shifted earlier, like noon to 8:00 p.m. or something like that. But

p.m. or something like that. But

socially, just practically, again, coming back to compliance, like the good system you do being better than the perfect system you don't, generally it's like 2 to 9:00 p.m. is when I eat and

then I fast the rest of the time. And

for the first like 5 to seven days, pretty grumpy, kind of pissy, I'm not going to lie. You know, sent some emails that I probably shouldn't have. But then

once I adapted, I did a recent set of labs and they're my best set of labs that I've seen. I can't solely attribute it to the intermittent fasting, but the

best set of labs I've had in ages on things that were very hard to move prior. also did an oral glucose

prior. also did an oral glucose tolerance test and my sort of insulin sensitivity and glucose management the best it's been in ages. So I was like, "Okay, that's really interesting." The

last time I did a 7-day fast, it was kind of brutal. I hadn't done one in a few years, and I don't think my metabolic machinery was ready for the

task. Very unpleasant, but I have some

task. Very unpleasant, but I have some chronic inflammation or at least chronic pain in my low back. And after doing that 7-day fast, I had 4 weeks of zero

symptoms. And that's the first time in 3 years that that's been the case. So I

was like, "Okay, that's pretty interesting." And so I've ended up

interesting." And so I've ended up harassing you with all sorts of questions such as, "Well, what if I had a little bit of heavy cream in my coffee in the morning?" So it's kind of dirty

fasting, but if I did that, what am I what am I accepting as a compromise or a penalty, if anything? Because then I think of say Longo's work and others

looking at fast mimicking diets where I'm like well wait a second these people are doing let's just say 5 days of fast mimicking dieting per month for 3 months straight and they seem to have all these

benefits that maybe of lower magnitude but mirror water fasting on some level but they're consuming a few hundred calories let's just say for simplicity

per day of those 5 days of quote unquote fasting. If you look at the actual meal

fasting. If you look at the actual meal composition, it ends up being very low calorie keto. Basically, very low

calorie keto. Basically, very low calorie keto with very low protein, like 10% or less, avoiding animal products.

That's the basic way that I've been thinking of it. And

so I was like, well, should I do something like Will Helmina in Germany who have again quote unquote fasted thousands of people, but they do give them bone broth, a little bit of juice.

It's it's akin to the fast mimicking diet, but they they'll do that with people for 30, 60, 90 days, or am I better off doing shorter water fasts or

maybe even a 14-day water fast. And a

lot of the questions came down to I know this is a mouthful, but as you know, I've been thinking about this non-stop.

I was up until 2 a.m. this morning

reading really really old stuff out of the Soviet Union on on psychiatric clinics fasting patients for schizophrenia.

And so that tells you metabolic psychiatry also goes back a long long long time. Not to mention ketogenic diet

long time. Not to mention ketogenic diet for epilepsy, right? So there are a lot of similarities. But if I want the

of similarities. But if I want the benefits, as many benefits as possible with the least pain possible, which includes not losing a ton of

muscle tissue, which is not always the same thing as lean body mass, what should I do? Right? That's kind of the open question.

And that is a huge, huge mouthful. Thank

you for coming to my TED talk. But where

is your current thinking when it relates to all of this stuff?

And I I said earlier at the very beginning that it ties into my parents.

Why is that? Because when we looked at some of my relatives and I got my docs to come in and do like a real proper full work up looking at all sorts of

things that normally wouldn't be tested.

Absolutely. Some metabolic syndrome, right? in the sense that they're highly

right? in the sense that they're highly highly insulin insensitive, like insulin off the charts. And it's like, okay, well, this has been going on for years to get to this point. And Alzheimer's is

sometimes called type 3 diabetes. And

it's like, okay, well, if I can't help them, at least I want to try to help myself and other people who might be listening at an early enough stage. So,

how do you think about all this stuff?

Well, there's a lot to talk about here and I think we got to kind of >> Yeah, chew on one bit at a time, >> right? Let's chew on one bit of time and

>> right? Let's chew on one bit of time and zoom out for a minute and talk about this intermittent fasting concept and why do people want to do intermittent fasting? What are the benefits that

fasting? What are the benefits that they're looking for? Now, you mentioned some metabolic benefits that you had noticed after after doing your intermittent fasting.

>> There's lots of different types of intermittent fasting. You mentioned the

intermittent fasting. You mentioned the 168. So essentially you're talking about

168. So essentially you're talking about not eating food for a period of time >> and that period of time can either be 16 hours, it can be 24 hours, it can be longer in which case it would not be an

intermittent fast, it would be a more prolonged fast which you also talked about.

>> But with the with respect to the intermittent fasting, >> there are a few things that happen and there are a few reasons why people like to do intermittent fasting. First and

foremost, I think most people like doing intermittent fasting is because they want to actually lose weight. And the

weight that they want to lose is not necessarily their lean body mass. They

actually want to lose their fat mass, right? So, they want to lose fat. And

right? So, they want to lose fat. And

that's a big reason why people do intermittent fasting.

>> Well, it turns out that intermittent fasting is more of a tool for weight loss. And what I mean by that is that

loss. And what I mean by that is that there have been multiple studies now that have looked at different types of intermittent fasting in sort of a a community dwelling aspect where people

are just kind of free to eat the way they're going to eat, but they are supposed to be practicing intermittent fasting. And what it's been discovered

fasting. And what it's been discovered is that naturally people end up eating about 200 fewer calories per day when they're doing some form of intermittent fasting. So if they're eating all their

fasting. So if they're eating all their food within an 8 or 10 hour period, for example, usually they'll eat their food within a 10-hour period and then they'll fast for 14 hours. If they do that, they end up actually eating 200 fewer

calories. And so they end up performing

calories. And so they end up performing what's called caloric restriction, which we know can lead to weight loss. And so

a lot of the weight loss actually comes from reducing calorie intake.

>> But that doesn't necessarily mean that everything that's beneficial from intermittent fasting comes down to calories, because it doesn't. But the

weight loss definitely seems to come down to the calories because if you keep calories the same and then have people do intermittent fasting or not intermittent fasting, they won't lose

the weight, but they will have a whole host of metabolic benefits. You

mentioned glucose regulation improvements. I mean, you know, fasting

improvements. I mean, you know, fasting glucose, postprandial glucose, HBA1C, which is a long-term marker of glucose regulation. they're, you know, lipids

regulation. they're, you know, lipids are more favorable and then they have improvements in blood pressure, for example. That's another big one that

example. That's another big one that people get with a more of a longer type of intermittent fasting. So, they're

they're fasting more like 18 hours and eating their food within like a 6-hour window.

>> Now, that's another benefit. Now, you go even further, and I know this is something you're very interested in. So,

beyond, you know, metabolic benefits and people want to get then they want to get into what's called ketosis.

>> They want to be making ketones. these,

you know, things that we're talking about earlier with respect to taking an exogenous ketoneester. Well, you make

exogenous ketoneester. Well, you make something naturally when you start to actually burn fat as energy. You start

to make something called beta hydroxybutyrate.

>> Mhm.

>> But it takes about 12 hours or so. It

depends on the person. It depends on how heavy of a carb diet they eat or how physically active they are. It can be a range right?

>> So, if someone's doing a more ketogenic type of diet, they can actually deplete their liver glycogen quicker than 12 hours. it might even cut it down to like

hours. it might even cut it down to like eight. If they're physically active on

eight. If they're physically active on top of that, you might go down to like even six or something. So, there's

there's a big range here, right? But for

a standard person on like a normal diet, they're they're going to take around 12 hours before they start to deplete their liver glycogen and then start to immobilize fatty acids from their atapost tissue and use that as energy.

And when you start to do that, then you start to get into ketosis. Your body

starts to then make beta hydroxybutyrate, the major circulating ketone. Why do people want that in their

ketone. Why do people want that in their system? because it's not just a very

system? because it's not just a very energetically favorable source of energy. What I mean by that is that you

energy. What I mean by that is that you can actually make more it takes less energy to use beta hydroxybut butyrate to make energy than it does to use glucose for example takes more energy to

actually use glucose. So it's more energetically favorable.

>> It's a clean fuel. Yeah. Also BHP the beta hydroxybutyrate as I understand it. I mean, highly anti-inflammatory effects as well, right?

>> Exactly. That was the next point I was going to make is that it's called a signaling molecule. So, it's actually a

signaling molecule. So, it's actually a way So, your body knows that it's in this stress mode. Okay. There's no food.

It's food scarcity time, right? And this

is something that it's evolutionarily tapped into our into our system into our DNA where times of food scarcity when we're not eating our body switches into

ketosis beta hydroxybutyrates produce and it signals to these other you know genes to basically make more of something beneficial. So it's been shown

something beneficial. So it's been shown to reduce inflammation. It depresses

something called the inflammosome which causes inflammation. It's an HD DAC

causes inflammation. It's an HD DAC inhibitor. So it's a histone diaetylase

inhibitor. So it's a histone diaetylase inhibitor. So it's globally affecting

inhibitor. So it's globally affecting gene expression in in such a way that it reduces genes that are involved in making oxidative stress. It actually

activates brain derived neurotrophic factor. That's the beneficial

factor. That's the beneficial neurotrophic compound that's made in the brain. That exercise also activates as

brain. That exercise also activates as well. So

well. So >> it's doing all these beneficial things, right? And

right? And >> the other thing that it's doing is it's getting into the brain. and it's being used as a very great source of energy.

And so you have this sort of bypass for glucose where the glucose can then be shunted to be used to make glutathione, that very important antioxidant I talked about earlier that sulurophane

activates. Well, it turns out when

activates. Well, it turns out when you're when you give your body ketones or your body's making ketones, your brain actually consumes a lot of

that. There have been tracer studies

that. There have been tracer studies that have looked at that. And what

happens is because neurons are now using the beta hydroxybutyrate as energy, glucose is no longer needed. And so that glucose that is there is then used to

make NADPH, which is a precursor to make glutathione.

>> And so it's called glucose sparing. You

get this glucose sparing effect.

>> Mhm.

>> And so that's another reason why people are interested in intermittent fasting.

And then another main reason, and there's many others, I'm not going to like touch on everything, but the other main reason is it activates repair processes.

>> And what I mean by repair processes is to be in repair mode, you have to be in more of a catabolic state. And we were talking about this earlier. People get

so freaked out by the word catabolism.

>> Oh yeah. Last night when I was walking around New York City, we were talking about this, right?

>> Catabolism.

And I think even over the last few years, you intermittent fasting's kind of gotten a bad rap because people now equate it with, oh, loss of muscle mass.

I'm going to be catabolic. Well, in

order to be in a repair mode, you actually do need to be in a catabolic sort of mode. And these repair systems are so important for cleaning up all the garbage that's inside of our cells. And

that can be things like protein aggregates. These are things that lead

aggregates. These are things that lead to aggregation you know like alphasuclean which is involved in Parkinson's amaloid beta aggregates which is involved in Alzheimer's disease

it's not the cause it's like the cause and the symptom it's like both it's involved in Alzheimer's disease and then aggregates in our cardiovascular system that play a role in cardiovascular

disease but it also cleans out even damaged little or what are called organels and so mitochondria or organal And our organels get damaged. So you

want to be able to repair that damage.

And this process of autophagy is the process that does that. And you know there's lots of different types of autophagy. So if it's a mitochondria

autophagy. So if it's a mitochondria repairing damage to itself, it's mphagy.

But for all this stuff to be active, you have to be in that more catabolic state, which can be induced by not eating, can also be induced by like heavy endurance exercise as well. So talking about those sort of outcomes that people are

interested in, those different end points that people are interested in in achieving, I think something that you're specifically interested in is the metabolic effects of intermittent

fasting as well as the repair processes like the autophagy.

>> Yeah, for sure. And that's why I was asking cuz I don't really I look, I'm as vain as the next person. I like looking less fat if I if I can, but it's not my

main driver, right?

It's mental acuity and hopefully staving off on some level things like ner

degenerative disease and even cancer possibly, right? which has been part of

possibly, right? which has been part of the reason I've done a lot of these extended water fasts, which is I realize there are a couple of hops here in terms of speculation, but seems plausible that

you might zap, you know, punch a couple of precancerous cells in the in the nuts by doing that.

>> Definitely, not only does autophagy play a role in preventing Parkinson's disease, but also Alzheimer's disease as well. Again, this has been shown in many

well. Again, this has been shown in many animal studies. We know that autophagy

animal studies. We know that autophagy plays a role in clearing away the amaloid beta plaques that are involved in Alzheimer's disease. And yes, there are some people that have amaloid beta plaques that don't get Alzheimer's

disease. They may be the more resilient

disease. They may be the more resilient non-APOE4 type of person. But we do know that many many people do get Alzheimer's disease with amaloid plaques. And in

fact, people that have again the snips in what what's called the amaloid precursor protein AP that leads to amaloid beta plaque buildup, they get early onset Alzheimer's disease. So

autophagy plays an important role in clearing away those plaques. And I will say what we don't have a lot of evidence on is what's the minimal effective >> fasting dose to activate autophagy.

Right.

>> God, I wish we had this.

>> I think what we do know in humans from like some of these old studies is that you do see some signal of autophagy activation after 24 48 hours in humans.

Yeah. Now, does that mean that that is the only amount of time that it takes to activate autophagy? No. So, most humans

activate autophagy? No. So, most humans are probably doing anywhere between a 12 to 16 hour nightly fast, right? There's

a period of time when we're not eating, and that is when we're sleeping a little bit before bed, right? Autophagy still

happens in people. We just aren't measuring it because we don't have sensitive tools yet. Yeah.

>> And so, it's not that I don't think a 16- hour fast doesn't act. I I believe it does in I believe there's some autophagy going on. It's probably not that much, >> but if you're if you go into that, you

know, 48 hour fast, then you're really starting to get more robust activation of autophagy.

>> Can I throw something else in here just for fun?

>> Yes. So you mentioned sleep and I've been looking trying to look at Alzheimer's from every possible angle and found literature looking at

disruption of sleep architecture in patients with Alzheimer's disease and the possible application of Zym I believe it is which is another it's a

brand name in a bifurcated schedule for GHB gamma hydroxybutyrate which you have to be very careful with it's a party drug. People die of it because it

drug. People die of it because it suppresses respiration. The person who

suppresses respiration. The person who bought my apartment in San Francisco died of a GHP overdose. But it actually is a tremendously interesting compound

for increasing I think it's it's deep wave sleep specifically which does what? It helps the cleanup crew, right, to do its work and to actually take out the garbage

cellularly. And so if I could wave a

cellularly. And so if I could wave a magic wand, I would have my relatives on something like Zyram. Might actually be a different type of of sleep medication

like the Nora class. Nora might be DORA.

I would also look at and this is something obviously not suitable for most elderly people, but potentially lower dose psilocybin or psilocin. And there is some actually

psilocin. And there is some actually very interesting I don't want to call them speculative hypothetical applications of that to Alzheimer's disease which you can find on PubMed and

from a mechanistic perspective they're they're super super interesting. So, I

just want to double click on the sleep because that is such a a critical component whether you're fasting or not to try to ensure that your sleep architecture is not hyper disrupted

which can be the case with lots of different types of sleep medications that you might take.

And if you have really bad insomnia, it's like, okay, you can do all these other things, but boy oh boy, it would make a lot of sense to try to fix sleep whenever possible.

>> Great. So true. This slow wave sleep does activate the lymphatic system which is cleaning out the amaloid beta aggregates as well.

>> Yep.

>> And the last thing I kind of want to mention is because you were talking about the intermittent fasting and more prolonged fasting and the muscle mass loss or lean body mass which people

equate with muscle mass which it's not.

You there's a lot of things going on. So

the thing is when people are doing intermittent fasting I mentioned they eat fewer calories which means they're eating less meals. They're eating fewer meals. They're not eating as many meals.

meals. They're not eating as many meals.

And so what ends up happening is people lower their protein intake and that's an important signal for you know maintaining muscle mass and certainly growing muscle mass as well. So it

increases muscle protein synthesis which is important. If people are engaged in

is important. If people are engaged in resistance training and doing intermittent fasting they're not losing muscle mass and in fact they can even gain muscle mass >> a little bit not much but they can gain

it too. So, I think the key here is that

it too. So, I think the key here is that if you're doing an intermittent type of fast like an, you know, 168 where you're fasting for 16 hours, that's really not a long long fast. There's not a lot of

concern with losing muscle mass if you're, you know, resistance training.

>> Now, a more prolonged type of fast, you're talking about 14 days, that's a long fast and definitely you're going to be losing some muscle mass no

matter what. Now, how much you lose

matter what. Now, how much you lose depends on, you know, how I guess if you can resistance train lightly while you're while you're fasting, that would be huge because you would be then

activating muscle protein synthesis through another, you know, signal which is not protein, it's mechanical force, right?

>> So, that I think would be really important for preventing the loss of a lot of muscle mass. But what is interesting is that you do lose lean body mass, a lot of it, when you are

doing a prolonged fast like that. And

looking at, you know, the old literature and some of the literature that's been done, a lot of water up to 10 pounds of like water rate, it's just crazy. You

lose that and your organs shrink. And

this is something that's been also shown in animal studies and also by Dr. Walter Longo many years ago. And he's shown in in animal studies, prolonged type of

fasting actually causes organs to shrink because a lot of the damaged cells, not only is autophagy getting activated and you're cleaning out damage within a

cell, but cells that are so damaged that autophagy can't even fix them, they actually undergo death, cell death. And

so you end up getting a lot of cells that die. And then what happens is

that die. And then what happens is during the refeeding phase and this is key the refeeding phase is the growth phase and this is when you regrow organs. It's when your muscle mass comes

organs. It's when your muscle mass comes back. You can you know go back get your

back. You can you know go back get your muscle mass gains back. And so having that refeeding phase is really important and getting the right nutrients like protein for example is is key for that

refeeding phase. But you also lose fat

refeeding phase. But you also lose fat during that fast and you're losing visceral fat. And you had brought this

visceral fat. And you had brought this up last night when we were talking and like did some reading on it because it was like, "Oh, it made perfect sense."

Because your organs are shrinking, you're losing a lot of, you know, cells in your organs, you're also losing some of the visceral fat that surrounds the organs. Right.

organs. Right.

>> And that can get mclassified.

>> Exactly. It gets mclassified as lean body mass. And so you look at this lean

body mass. And so you look at this lean body mass and all you think about is muscle. Well, it turns out muscle is a

muscle. Well, it turns out muscle is a small part of that.

>> There's a lot of other stuff that's going into that lean body mass. It's a

pretty big undertaking, a 14-day fast.

Yeah. But I'll say this, and this kind of like goes goes into what you mentioned about the fasting mimicking diet and perhaps even adding, you know, cream. We can talk about that as well.

cream. We can talk about that as well.

>> I do think I mean, the fasting mimicking diet, you're not going to get the same amount of autophagy that you would get if you did a 5day fast.

>> Yeah.

>> Water fast. Because it's just impossible. You're getting some protein,

impossible. You're getting some protein, you're getting some amino acids that's activating mTor that shuts down autophagy. You're getting energy, ATP.

autophagy. You're getting energy, ATP.

There's a ratio called the ATP to AM ratio which you want it to be low to activate something called AMP kynise >> for autophagy to happen. And so when you're eating heavy cream or eating

whatever fill in the blank any type of calories you're you're changing that ratio and so that kynise is not getting activated as robustly. Now the amount of

you know inactivation of those pathways which then will inactivate autophagy depends on how much you're feeding right how many calories that you're eating how much of that is amino acids >> and specifically lucine right in the

case of longo like really trying to minimize leucine as an activator of mTor and so on.

>> Yes.

>> Yeah.

>> Exactly. I think for the cream, if you're trying to do 168, if someone is trying to do 16A on a daily basis and it's a non-negotiable for having an earlier feeding window because social

just everything compliance-wise isn't going to work and you have to do it later, which means you have to wake up and still be fasting in the morning, right? Then you either like have to love

right? Then you either like have to love black coffee, learn to love it, >> or try maybe MCT powder, MCT oil, because then you're not getting

>> the amino acids in there. Yeah,

>> to activate the mtor, but you can do like a small maybe like a tablespoon of it and so you maybe just get a little bit of depression of autophagy, but not much. That would be my recommendation.

much. That would be my recommendation.

>> And I also want to clarify for folks listening just to really make it specific.

>> When I have had I just like saying dirty fasting. I didn't realize that was an

fasting. I didn't realize that was an expression. I just think it feels fun

expression. I just think it feels fun like a dirty martini. Dirty fasting is kind of cheating in this way. But

when I do that, which is not all the time. I usually have black coffee or tea

time. I usually have black coffee or tea or something like that. But it is heavy cream, >> which is almost entirely fat. It is not creamer that you would just pull off the

shelf. It is not half and half. It is

shelf. It is not half and half. It is

heavy cream, which just from a macronutrient perspective is very, very, very different. And you can really

very different. And you can really overdo it on the calories also. It's

just like liquid fat effectively. But

the MCT powder is a good idea. I tell

you what, if you're open to it, let's shift gears a little bit. I will just say I wish somebody, nobody's going to do this, but would somehow get the

ethics board, IRB, etc. to approve long-term human studies again in fasting. That would be great because you

fasting. That would be great because you used to be allowed to do it. There are

case studies of people who literally fasted for 300 plus days. I mean, like fat, what is it? 9,000 calories per pound. Like there's like you can do a

pound. Like there's like you can do a lot with that fat. So, we'll see if I do 14 days. If I can do 14 days, then I

14 days. If I can do 14 days, then I might just go to 30. But then the refeeding gets really tricky.

>> I think people are concerned with gallstones. So, when you don't eat for a

gallstones. So, when you don't eat for a period of long period of time, then you're not stimulating the gallbladder and the gallstone risk increases, which

is what I think is the big concern with with the long long fasts. But I mean, you know, if you're doing something like that once a year, >> yeah, >> I don't know if it's that big of a deal.

>> I mean, that's why I was doing a 7-day fast once a year for a long time. And

then I took a break for a few years and I did a 7-day water fast and it was so incredibly unpleasant and I had orthostatic hypotension where I stand up and I felt like I was going to fall over

and my, you know, vision started to get funny and I was like, you know what, maybe this isn't for me. But I think it's because my machinery just wasn't

developed for that. Having seen really stark differences in my mental acuity and sustained focus

with the intermittent fasting, I'm like, okay, I feel like doing intermittent fasting, which part of my reason behaviorally for my interest in that also is that getting people to change

their diet is hard. meaning

their diet composition, the food they eat. So if you can just say, "Hey, look,

eat. So if you can just say, "Hey, look, keep eating whatever you want, same thing, but you have to fit it within this window, it's an interesting option

B that might be might work for people who otherwise aren't going to follow a paleo diet or whatever. But if you do the IF and then what I've done is like,

all right, do the IF maybe if you have some grains or in my case legumes and stuff. Okay, fine. and then shift to a

stuff. Okay, fine. and then shift to a mostly ketogenic diet for a period of time. Then I feel like you're you're

time. Then I feel like you're you're pretty well teed up for a longer water only fast. Maybe you supplement with electrolytes. This gets into all

with electrolytes. This gets into all sorts of controversial territory, but if you're okay with it, let's talk about training for a minute because, and I'll force a really awkward segue maybe,

which is one thing I noticed is that my ability to do zone 2 training. Let's

just for simplicity sake say that for people that's you're on a stationary bike or a bike, stationary is just easier to keep consistent. and you're

you're cycling for 60 minutes at a a wattage and a speed that leads you to the point where you could have a conversation with someone on the phone

in short full sentences, but you don't really want to, right? That's like the talk test. Intermittent fasting plus

talk test. Intermittent fasting plus ketosis really helps my zone 2. And then

this leads into the question of just training in general. So, I have to click on this. What type of exercise reduces

on this. What type of exercise reduces heart aging by 20 years? Do you want to start there or do you want to start with V2 max?

>> We can start with V2 max maybe because they kind of lead into each other.

>> Great. Let's do it.

>> So people might be, you know, going what is V2 max? It's essentially a cardiorespiratory fitness. It's measured

cardiorespiratory fitness. It's measured or calculated by V2 max, which is essentially the maximum amount of oxygen you can take up during maximum exercise.

>> And what's so fascinating about that is it's a really important predictor of longevity. So there have now been enough

longevity. So there have now been enough studies that have come out looking at the cardiorespiratory fitness in the in the sense of V2 max and how people with a higher cardiorespiratory fitness have

a 5year increased life expectancy compared to people with a low cardiorespiratory fitness. In fact, if

cardiorespiratory fitness. In fact, if you have a low cardiorespiratory fitness and you go anywhere above that like from low to low normal, it's associated with a 2-year increased life expectancy. And

people with a low cardiorespiratory fitness actually have a higher all-c cause mortality that's comparable or worse than people with known diseases like type two diabetes or cardiovascular

disease or smokers for example. So in in other words, being sedentary is a disease and we need to think about it as a disease and we should be trying to

train to improve our V2 max and that is something that should be in our minds.

And I say this because like just having this conversation that you and I are having right now, it takes about 11 mill of oxygen per minute per kilogram body weight just to have this conversation.

Mhm.

>> Now, just sit still and just breathe. It

takes about 3 milll of oxygen per minute per kilogram body weight. And that's

important because as we're aging, we're sort of heading towards this cliff of V2 max or V2 max goes down as we age just naturally. Even if you're training and

naturally. Even if you're training and doing everything, it goes down.

>> Yeah.

>> And once you get to that cliff, >> everything becomes a maximal effort.

Like you talking, you're out of breath.

You know, carrying groceries to your car from the store, you're just out of breath. Everything is a maximal effort

breath. Everything is a maximal effort and you don't want to be there.

>> So you want to like start from a higher up point so that when you're going down that cliff is much further away >> and and that's where you know the training comes in because you want to

sort of you want to find a training program that's going to improve that that cardiorespiratory fitness, >> right?

>> And that's where you talked about zone 2 training and that's the kind of what I would call moderate intensity exercise.

So you're able to sort of the talk test.

I like the talk test because heart rate is so dependent on the person's fitness level, but let's just say on average generally people are they're not at like 75 or 80% max heart rate. They're kind

of below that on average. Now some

people may actually be above that, but the talk test is great because you can have a conversation. You're breathy. You

don't want to have a conversation, but you can. So, we know that people that

you can. So, we know that people that are doing that moderate intensity type of training, if they do the standard guidelines of physical activity, which are about 2 and 1/2 hours a week of

moderate intensity physical activity, people that do that for 2 months, 40% of those people still can't improve their V2 max.

>> Yeah. Just different gears.

>> Well, unless they actually add in highintensity interval training.

>> Yep.

>> And that's where I kind of get into this. I think people should be doing

this. I think people should be doing vigorous intensity exercise. That's the

type of exercise where you're unable to talk, right? So you you can't have a

talk, right? So you you can't have a conversation because you're going harder. Your heart rate is about 80 85%,

harder. Your heart rate is about 80 85%, you know, it's above 80% max heart rate.

>> That type of exercise has been shown to improve V2 max, especially if you're doing sort of what's called highintensity interval training. as you

know, you've you've talked about this a lot as well, but you're you're doing sort of these intervals of going more vigorous intensity exercise and then you have recovery periods where your heart rate goes down.

>> So, there's been a variety of different protocols out there that have been shown to improve the V2 max if you do them.

>> Generally speaking, what's happening is you're putting a stronger stress on your cardiovascular system, so on your muscular system, even on your brain. So,

the adaptations are greater. And that

one of those adaptations is increasing your stroke volume. So being able to like basically transport oxygen to tissues faster.

>> And that's an adaptation that happens when you're going at a harder when you're training at a harder intensity.

>> What do you do personally? What's what's

your hit look like?

>> My training is 3 days a week I do some sort of CrossFit training that involves highintensity interval training with it as well. And the high-intensity interval

as well. And the high-intensity interval training will either be on a rowing machine or it'll be on a stationary bike or assault bike or it'll be like a skier like those skiers

>> or jumping rope. And I also do longer intervals. So I'll do the Norwegian 4x4.

intervals. So I'll do the Norwegian 4x4.

So that's where I do on a stationary bike or I'll do it on the rowing machine actually as well. I do four minutes of as hard as I can go and maintain for that entire four minutes. So this is obviously not an allout 30- secondond

sprint. this is, you know, I'm I'm just

sprint. this is, you know, I'm I'm just working hard as hard as I can and maintain that for for four minutes. And

then you recover for three minutes and then you do it four times. I'm thinking

of a variation I do sometimes with my husband. I recover for four minutes

husband. I recover for four minutes because we're switching on the rower. So

I sometimes do a little bit longer recovery. But that Norwegian 4x4 where

recovery. But that Norwegian 4x4 where you're doing as hard as you can for four minutes and maintain that, you know, that intensity for the four minutes and then you recover for 3 minutes, you do that four times. That's been shown to be

one of the best ways to improve V2 max.

But you can also do 1 minute on, 1 minute off, which I've also done. So,

you know, you do that 10 times. It's

more like a 20-minut workout.

That's also been shown to improve V2 max. But also, even doing something like

max. But also, even doing something like 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off, like a Tabata >> again has been shown. I do all of these, by the way, and I do variations of them depending on the week. Most of my my

exercise is highintensity interval training, CrossFit training, which incorporates, you know, it's more dynamic. So, it's including like

dynamic. So, it's including like strength training stuff, but it's more high intensity.

>> Mh.

>> And then I do a couple of runs. I do

like two 30 minute runs a week, sometimes three. So, and that's more of

sometimes three. So, and that's more of my zone 2 stuff.

>> Yeah, it's a nice roster. I'll share

just for people who might be curious some of my goals and program at the moment. Right. So, I'm about to turn 48

moment. Right. So, I'm about to turn 48 and feel good overall, but have realized that I really hate

endurance training generally speaking.

And so, I've neglected that and specifically have neglected the stuff that makes me think. I want to puke into a bucket, i.e. V2 max training. The the

zone 2 is like listen to a podcast, maybe have like a slightly breathy conversation, like it's pretty chill.

watch something on the on Netflix, you know, it's pretty straightforward. V2

max specifically chatting with Peter Tia. I'm doing the zone 2, which I do

Tia. I'm doing the zone 2, which I do either on a stationary bike or on a treadmill with typically with a rucks sack at a lower incline. I found that when I had the speed too high incline

too high, I ended up getting lower back pain just from a like really long stride with my lordosis and stuff. And then for the V2 max doing the 4x4 that you described. And I think I'm getting this

described. And I think I'm getting this translation right. But the way it was

translation right. But the way it was described to me was like all right for each of those four minutes you have these these four minute work intervals and then you have three or four minutes of rest and then you

repeat four times. It's like first minute you're like wow this is a lot of work. Second minute you're like wow this

work. Second minute you're like wow this really sucks. third minute you're like I

really sucks. third minute you're like I don't know if I I'm gonna make it. I

don't think I'm going to make it. And

then minute four is like I feel like I'm going to die and I'm being chased by wolves. So it's like when we say maximal

wolves. So it's like when we say maximal effort at least as it's been and and those are not Peter's words but another person I like a lot. It's a lot of work.

It's pretty pukey but I'm going to be doing that given the the longevity associations that you mentioned. Now I

would love just to get your two cents and this relates to vitamin D2 a little bit for me where I'm like in these studies looking at V2 max as a predictor

or coralate of longevity are there other possible confounders that confounding variables that might actually be the real McCoy. In other

words, because you could say, and I know you know all this, but just for people listening, it's like, okay, well, I'll make this up. Like, women who do Pilates in Manhattan have, you know, four years of additional

lifespan. Okay, great. So, you could

lifespan. Okay, great. So, you could conclude then we should all do Pilates to improve lifespan. It's like, well, wait a second. Pilates is expensive and maybe they're also following some a

better diet and so on and so on and so on. But are there any confounders that

on. But are there any confounders that might apply possible competitors to these V2 max studies?

I'm assuming they're observational more than experimental or u sort of intervention based. So what are your

intervention based. So what are your thoughts there? there's absolutely a

thoughts there? there's absolutely a possibility for some sort of confounding factors in any sort of observational study including the ones I'm discussing because you know yes they're going in and measuring their cardiorespiratory

fitness which is better than a lot of observational studies that or you're going off a questionnaire right >> so that's already sort of one at least a oneup over other observational data but

you know at the end of the day you may have someone that has undiagnosed cancer or some kind of undiagnosed disease because they're supposed to be disease-free or if they have a disease, it's like known, right? And so

everything's corrected for.

>> But there's always the possibility that, you know, some people have some disease and that's why they can't exercise very well because they're diseased, right?

And it's the disease that's causing them to have a higher mortality rate than the the lower cardiorespiratory fitness is.

There are, you know, studies always try to account for diet and all that stuff, but at the end of the day, you can never really establish causation, right? So

that is that is why we turn to randomized control trials. And I will say this is where the heart aging comes in and also this type of training.

>> Can I ask you one more thing real quick?

>> Yeah.

>> Before we get to the heart aging real quick. So when I've done V2 max

quick. So when I've done V2 max training, my legs grow like my legs grow like weeds. Like they adapt and get big. And

weeds. Like they adapt and get big. And

so along with the age related decrease in V2 max, there's also sarcopenia and age- related loss of muscle mass. And so

I'm like, I wonder if there's these people who also have higher V2 max tend to have a higher percentage of

lean body mass or muscle tissue, be more heavily muscled than the people without.

I don't know. I mean, that's just I'm just kind of poking at out of curiosity.

>> Yeah. Okay. So, the heart aging, >> right?

>> Yeah.

>> Well, so and you know this goes into why randomized control trials are important because you can establish more causation, right, from an intervention.

And this study was done by Ben Levine out of UT Southwest and Dallas. And it's

a really to me it's just it's seminal ground breaking study that isn't talked about enough. By the way, he's just a

about enough. By the way, he's just a phenomenal cardiovascular exercise physiologist. I mean, he trained with

physiologist. I mean, he trained with the biggest giants out there. And what

he did was he took him and his lab took 50 year olds that were sedentary. So

they're middle-aged, 50 years old, sedentary, but otherwise healthy. So you

didn't have any other diseases besides being sedentary, which I think is a disease, but they didn't have any other diseases like cardiovascular disease or type two diabetes or hypertension, right? So they were otherwise healthy,

right? So they were otherwise healthy, just not active. and he wanted to see if he could put these guys on a pretty long 2-year training protocol, how would that

affect the aging of their heart? So, as

we age, our hearts typically shrink in size and they get stiffer and that affects not only our cardiorespiratory fitness and our ability to exercise. And

you know, I mentioned our cardiorespiratory fitness goes down with age, but it affects our cardiovascular disease risk as well. And so the reason our hearts get stiffer by the way does

come down to a lot of glucose. So the

more glucose stimulation, more glucose is around in your vascular system, it through a chemical reaction forms advanced glycation end products. So this

glycation essentially stiffens the collagen that surrounds your mioardium and your paricardium. And so you get like this stiffer heart that can't respond to stress well, you know. So,

you want your heart to be very plastic and malleable and flexible, right? You

don't want it to be stiff.

>> Doesn't sound good.

>> Just like you don't want your blood vessels to be stiff. What he wanted to do was see if he could change the structure and the trajectory of these these aging hearts. And so, he put him on a 2-year training program which

involved the Norwegian 4x4, by the way.

And when you start someone out that's, you know, not physically active and you want them to do the Norwegian 4x4, when you have them doing their interval, their 4-minute interval, and this speaks

to you as well, or anyone, you don't have to necessarily go as hard as you can the whole four minutes. You just

have to be working hard that interval.

>> Yeah. You do have to last four minutes, right? So,

right? So, >> you have to last four minutes. And so,

some people even start off, they're just briskly walking >> because that's hard for them, right?

>> Yeah. Totally.

>> So, it's all tailored to the individual.

And so, some people get really intimidated where they're like, "Oh, I just there's no way I could ever do that." Well, actually, these people did

that." Well, actually, these people did do it. And they started out doing

do it. And they started out doing Norwegian 4x4, but they also did a variety of other exercises, including moderate intensity and some more vigorous intensity exercise as well as some resistance training. And the

control group was just this like yoga, flexible training sort of stuff that people were doing. By the end of the two years, these people were working out about 5 hours a week. And at some point

they were doing two Norwegian 4x4s a week and then they went down to just doing one a week. But you know over the course of 2 years they did they were getting a lot of exercise about 5 hours a week.

>> Mhm.

>> And essentially at the end of those two years the structure of their heart so the stiffness of it and the you know shrinking of it was reversed. So their

hearts grew and they became more flexible >> and it was reversed in such a way that it was 20 years less aging. So their

hearts looked more like 30 year olds than 50y olds, which is pretty incredible.

>> Yeah, that is amazing.

>> Yeah, it's amazing. And I think it's also like, well, you think 50 it's too late to start exercising. Well, it's not too late.

>> You can be in your 90s and get benefits.

I think that's another really important sort of take-home with that story is that, you know, you can reverse your your aging of your heart by 20 years if you really put in the effort. Five five

hours a week is about what I do. About

five or six hours a week, it's a lot of work. Mhm.

work. Mhm.

>> I didn't always do that, but I've decided as I started to get into my mid-40s, I'm going to spend less time podcasting and more time exercising because this is my health.

>> Yeah. Foundational for everything else.

That's the base of the pyramid, >> right?

>> All right. Let's park that particular piece of training for a moment. Do you

want to piggyback on that and talk about reversing brain aging with exercise? Is

it a different type of exercise or do you get two birds with one stone?

>> You do get two birds with one stone. And

that's why I do like the vigorous intensity exercise because when you're kind of shifting into working out harder, when you're getting that vigorous intensity exercise, you

are shifting somewhat to anorobic metabolism. So, you're working so hard

metabolism. So, you're working so hard that you can't get oxygen to your muscles fast enough to use mitochondria for for the mitochondria to then make energy. And so your body goes, I need

energy. And so your body goes, I need energy quick right now. There's not

enough oxygen here. And so you start to use glucose outside of the mitochondria as energy. And that's called glycolysis.

as energy. And that's called glycolysis.

>> And you're not just only doing glycolysis, by the way. I mean, even if you're doing an allout sprint, you're still somewhat using your mitochondria.

It's not like a black or white thing, right? Is there sort of gray here? But

right? Is there sort of gray here? But

the reality is is that when you're not going intense, you are not mostly you're not doing anorobic exercise. And so what happens is when you're doing that sort of getting in that anorobic state, what I mean is like you're not using oxygen

to make energy, you're just using glucose. You actually make something

glucose. You actually make something called lactate as a byproduct. And

lactate is what's essential for the brain health. So there have now been a

brain health. So there have now been a variety of studies. This was pioneered by Dr. George Brooks at UC Berkeley decades ago. So many studies have now

decades ago. So many studies have now shown this. Now, it's no longer a

shown this. Now, it's no longer a hypothesis, but it used to be called the lactate shuttle hypothesis, where when you start to do this vigorous intensity exercise, you get your lactate levels

higher than baseline. Baseline, you're

usually about.9 millmer or so lactate.

You start to go above that and well beyond. You're getting 7 10 millmer, 15

beyond. You're getting 7 10 millmer, 15 millmer, right? The lactate gets into

millmer, right? The lactate gets into your bloodstream and it's used by other tissues. So it goes back into the

tissues. So it goes back into the muscle. It's used for energy. Gets into

muscle. It's used for energy. Gets into

the brain. It gets into the heart, liver quickly. It happens within 20 minutes.

quickly. It happens within 20 minutes.

You can do a HIT workout, see your lactate go up to 15 millmer. Measure it

20 minutes later and it's back to baseline. I mean, it's quick. It gets

baseline. I mean, it's quick. It gets

consumed.

One of the major organs that consumes it is the brain. This has been shown in human studies.

Not only is lactate very much like beta hydroxybutyrate, our favorite ketone that we've been talking about, because it's a energetically favorable source of energy, lactate is used by neurons to

make energy just like beta hydroxybutyrate is very similar. It's

energetically favorable. All that stuff is happening. Same stuff. So you're, you

is happening. Same stuff. So you're, you know, using the lactate, glucose is being spared, you're making glutathione.

Lactate is also a signaling molecule. So

in the brain it's activating brain derived neurotrophic factor which is important for your you know growing new neurons in the brain which has been shown in human studies. So there have been human studies that have done

exercise for even just one year and shown that you can increase the growth of the hippocampus by like 1 to 2% after that year of training versus losing 1 to

2% of the hippocampus. That usually

happens as you get in older age. The

lactate is again a product of that vigorous intensity exercise. It's

increasing norepinephrine in the brain.

Serotonin, it's a signaling molecule.

It's basically your body's your muscle's way of communicating with the brain.

Hey, I'm really working hard. This is a stressful, you know, time. Let's respond

to that stress, right? And so, your brain is also working hard during exercise and particularly vigorous intensity exercise. It's stressful in

intensity exercise. It's stressful in the brain. Anybody that's done it knows

the brain. Anybody that's done it knows that resistance training also increases lactate and resistance training is very stressful on the brain. And so it's like this response to that stress your brain is now being communicated from the

muscles by lactate which is the communicator and saying hey make all this good stuff so that we can like not die right that's essentially the adaptations that are happening that's why I like to also incorporate vigorous

intensity exercise into my program because I am also prone to ner degenerative disease I have Parkinson's disease on my dad's side I have Alzheimer's disease on my mom's side so I'm very very tuned in to

neurogenerative disease and wanting to prevent it and do what I can and I do think that vigorous intensity exercise is part of that equation >> because I want to get that lactate which

is so beneficial for brain health.

>> So let me ask you about two other things related to brain health since this is on on the mind uh for the first is related to saunas

and the second one is vitamin D. So with

saunas, I was looking back and I think this is probably summarized by some LLM. So I

want to be very careful with citing numbers, but I'm looking at a summary, I believe, of the findings of a large Finnish study published in JAM Internal Medicine 2015 that followed 2,000

middle-aged men for 20 years. That's

wild. And it looks like, please correct me if if from memory you can correct any of this, but all callers mortality 24% lower risk with two to three times per

week. This is sauna use. And four to

week. This is sauna use. And four to seven times per week was associated with 40% lower risk. And I'll just cut to the one that's of greatest interest to me right now. says, "In a follow-up paper,

right now. says, "In a follow-up paper, using this on a four to seven times per week was associated with a 66% lower risk of dementia and 65% lower risk of Alzheimer's." Now, at face value, if

Alzheimer's." Now, at face value, if those numbers are roughly accurate, those numbers seem incredible, right?

And I guess what I'm wondering is how should we think about those results?

Because if out of a 100 people, two people were getting dementia and now it's one person, it's less interesting than other ways of interpreting the data. How should we think about this?

data. How should we think about this?

And how do you personally use if you do sauna or hot tub or heat stress at this point?

>> Those numbers are accurate by the way.

They're spot on.

>> And there is a dose dependence there which kind of strengthens the data, right? So people that are using this on

right? So people that are using this on a more frequently are having a more robust effect. you mentioned 24% lower

robust effect. you mentioned 24% lower all-c cause mortality and then 40% if they're doing two to three times a week versus four to seven times a week they're they're having a 40% lower all cause mortality and the dementia risk is

also extremely interesting to me and this goes back Tim to like some of the earliest experiments that I did as a sort of budding young biologist at the

Sulk Institute where I was working with these little nematode celegans worms and injecting human amaloid beta 42 into these worms arms and essentially

injecting it into their muscle so that they become basically the amaloid beta 42 aggregates and forms these aggregates as these worms age and it happens very

rapidly because their life expectancy is only 15 days within like day or so they start to become paralyzed where they can't move their lower half of their

muscles their mus muscular cells are and they can only move their nose to feed in this little petri dish with ecoli bacteria which is what they eat. I would

do these experiments and then I would overact basically where you do a genetic manipulation and you can make them overexpress heat shock proteins which are something that are robustly

activated upon heat stress as the name implies and sauna has been shown to activate heat shock proteins. If you're

in the 163° Fahrenheit sauna for around 30 minutes, you can activate your heat shock proteins by 50% more than baseline. So when I would add, you know,

baseline. So when I would add, you know, heat shock proteins that would be activated in these worms, it would prevent this from happening. These

protein aggregates don't happen. And

that's because one of the things that heat shock proteins do is they help repair damaged proteins that are misfolded and prevent them from aggregating. And so you want to have

aggregating. And so you want to have more active heat shock proteins if you're wanting to prevent Alzheimer's disease. Now, there's a lot of animal

disease. Now, there's a lot of animal studies that have shown this as well.

For example, you can take a mouse and sort of give it Alzheimer's disease. in

this in a similar way and if they have a lot of active heat shock protein genes then they're not getting the Alzheimer's disease it delays it right I remember reading this study and it was like one of the things I was thinking about was of course you know the heat shock

proteins are activated upon the sauna use that you would probably see a lower incidence of Alzheimer's disease and even dementia there's other things as well cardiovascular health is really improved with the sauna so sauna sort of

mimics moderate intensity exercise and so if you're having improved cardiovascular health that means more blood flow go to the brain. Lots of

things are happening. Right. The one

thing I do want to mention, Tim, and this is this study was I think it came out in 2020ish.

I don't remember the exact year, but it was not out of Finland. I believe was a Polish study.

>> Mhm.

>> And that study looked at sauna use and dementia risk. And there was very

dementia risk. And there was very interesting results there. So they sort of looked at people that were using saunas, but they also sort of categorized them based on the amount of

heat. So how hot their sauna got.

heat. So how hot their sauna got.

>> So in the Finnish studies in Adam Finland, majority of the people are using the sauna at around equivalent of 174° F.

>> Mhm.

>> That's about what the average temperature of pretty much any of those studies that you cited, that's about the average temperature that they're using them. And they're in there for about 20

them. And they're in there for about 20 minutes.

>> Mhm. Now, this other study looked at a wide range of different temperatures, that temperature versus like the really, really high extreme end. So, people that were doing like 200 degrees Fahrenheit or more. And this is something that you

or more. And this is something that you can see nowadays, like there's this sort of, >> you know, go all in, go hard or go home, right? And so, people think that they

right? And so, people think that they need to go in a 200° sauna, and if they go in a 200°ree sauna, it's going to be better than going in a 175 degree Fahrenheit sauna, right?

>> Apparently not the case. In that study again, you saw a protective effect of people that used the sauna. And I think it was also dose dependent, but I can't recall. There was a protective effect,

recall. There was a protective effect, but only if they used saunas that were less than 190° F.

>> People that started going into the 190° to 200° F range actually had an increased risk.

>> Oh, no.

>> So, that was something that I don't know that anyone talks about.

>> But, you know, I've done really, really hot saunas before. I personally don't like it. I get headaches actually. Yes.

like it. I get headaches actually. Yes.

>> So, you know, your head is in there and you have to think about that your head is getting heated up.

>> And so, I don't know that it's necessarily good to go in a 212 degree Fahrenheit sauna.

>> Mhm.

>> You know, for your head. Now, I don't want to say, you know, that with certainty because there could be all kinds of confounding factors, but it's something to keep in mind. And why do you have to go above 190? 190 is hot as

hell. Like, that's good enough. Like,

hell. Like, that's good enough. Like,

you don't have to go above that. My

default setting of my son is 194. So,

it's just kind of like, well, I guess I set it some time ago. So, it's just been set at 194. So, that's sort of my default. So, maybe I want to maybe I

default. So, maybe I want to maybe I want to dial it back.

>> I think 190 is great.

>> Yeah, >> 190 is great. You asked about me and how I use the sauna. Now, I should also mention that hot tubs are are good as well. And in fact, a study just came out

well. And in fact, a study just came out a few weeks ago showing that hot tubs have, you know, comparable effects on blood pressure regulation. All these

parameters that are looked at with sauna use as well. And a lot of people ask that question, you know, oh, what about a hot tub or a hot bath? And I think, you know, not everyone has access to a sauna, not everyone has access to a hot

tub, but a lot of people have access to a hot bath.

>> And I think if you can get a sort of pool thermometer and keep the temperature of your bath 104° Fahrenheit, which is what all the studies use, >> you have to keep adding hot water.

That's fine.

>> It's pretty hot.

>> Yeah, it's pretty hot. You stay in there for about 20 minutes and you're going to have comparable effects. You'll be

sweating like you're in a sauna. Don't

worry about it.

>> Exactly.

>> 104.

>> 104 is hot. And I actually do both. I do

a hot tub and I do sauna. I like to do hot tub at night. It does seem to help with my sleep. And sometimes, but sometimes I'll do the sauna in the day and I'll do it after a workout. It sort

of extends my workout. I particularly

like doing them after a workout like in the winter when it's cold and if I work out outside.

>> So that's kind of how I use the sauna. I

was doing hot tubs for a while like every night. I don't do that in the

every night. I don't do that in the summer because it's just hot. I actually

shift more to cold doing cold exposure more in the summer, which is kind of funny. Pretty much the only time I do it

funny. Pretty much the only time I do it is in the summer. I'm such a wuss. I

like doing the heat a lot in the in the winter.

>> I would be very curious to see if you know they measured like sperm motility and morphology for all the males who are doing this and they're like, "Good news,

you have this incredibly lowered risk of Alzheimer's. Bad news. You're

Alzheimer's. Bad news. You're

effectively sterile from all the heat on your on your swimmers.

>> Good point. There's been studies that have shown you do lower motility for sure. The motility rates lowered and

for sure. The motility rates lowered and that those changes are reversed after 6 weeks of abstaining. So, it is reversible, but also don't use it as a contraception method either because I

know some people that have tried that, it it doesn't work. You can still get pregnant.

>> Yeah, that's not not so smart. Do you

still use if needed curcumin or theumin or any of these products? I

think Mariva or Mariva >> was one that you mentioned as a formulation in place of NSAIDs like ibuprofen or neproxin or is that something that you may have changed your mind on?

>> I actually just did it like a couple days ago when I had a headache and I didn't know why. That's the thing that I go to still and I mean there's some cases where it won't work. Mhm.

>> where it's just like I don't know this is like a really bad headache. I don't

usually get headaches but if I don't sleep well or something something going on or my cycle I will get a headache and I use it. I use four of the Mariva which is a phytosomal curcumin which increases

the bioavailability of the curcumin. I

use the Thorn brand just because I think the brand is reliable. No affiliation

with them but it works for me. It really

does. So it's I think 500 milligrams of curcumin per capsule, I believe. And so I do four.

>> Yeah.

>> So I'm getting two grams. >> Cool.

>> But I do still use it.

>> Yeah. Just don't take it right after your workout. Right.

your workout. Right.

>> Yeah. It doesn't have the same effect.

>> Yeah. It doesn't have the same kind of COX2 inhibition as the other guys.

Right.

>> It doesn't. And in fact, I think it helps with DOMS, delayed onset mus muscle soreness.

>> Oh, I'm sure.

>> And so sometimes actually I do use it actually after a really like hard squat workout.

>> All right. I'm glad I asked. Speaking of

not getting enough sleep, let's hop to creatine because I God, I don't know where I read this, but that higher doses of creatine,

maybe like 25 grams, 20 25 grams, could combat sleep loss or some of the effects of sleep loss. What should we know about creatine? Right? Creatine's been around

creatine? Right? Creatine's been around for a long time. There are dozens of questionable sports performance, athletic performance products come out every year. Most of them are all

every year. Most of them are all marketing, no substance. Creatine has

been used by athletes for a very long time, but for at least the last 5 years, I have been taking it typically five grams a day more for the cognitive or

potential cognitive benefits, right? But

what what else should we know about creatine because you what you put in your newsletter not too long ago was forwarded to me and then you told me via text and I was like, "Okay, we should probably talk about this."

>> Yes.

>> So, h how should we think about creatine and best practices for different applications? Well, it's funny as you

applications? Well, it's funny as you mentioned, it's one of those supplements that have been it was like in the gym bro world forever and still people associate it with that, but yet it's been one of the supplements that's

actually stuck, right? It's worked and there's been countless studies showing its effectiveness, particularly with respect to increasing exercise volume.

So, in other words, what creatine is is it's essentially it's stored in our muscles as something called phosphocreatine. When you take a

phosphocreatine. When you take a creatine exogenously, it's stored in our muscles as phosphocreatine and then used for energy. And so it's a way to make

for energy. And so it's a way to make energy quicker. And so the more of it

energy quicker. And so the more of it you have stored, the the quicker you can sort of make that energy. And so what it's been shown to do is really help with increasing exercise volume. In

other words, you can do one to two more reps per set or sets. You know, you could do an extra set or whatever whatever it is you're doing, right? And

that leads to obviously if you're increasing your workload, you're going to have increased muscle mass and muscle strength because you're increasing your workload. It doesn't work like protein

workload. It doesn't work like protein in the sense that you can increase muscle mass because it's anabolic. You

need to put the work in. So creatine by itself isn't going to make your muscles grow, but it is going to make you work harder. It's going to be easier for you

harder. It's going to be easier for you to work harder. And so you end up increasing your exercise volume, which then has adaptations on your muscle, right? And that's why a lot of people

right? And that's why a lot of people like it because for one, they want their muscles to grow bigger and stronger and two, some people like to use it during competitions or something because they want to be able to increase that

exercise volume as well. It's also

really good for that explosive power type of exercise again because you're getting that quick mobilization of producing energy.

>> And I'm just glossing over decades of research and a lot of specifics here because I want to get to the brain. But

it turns out creatine is something that our liver makes a little bit. I think

like one maybe 1 to 2 grams a day. It's

also something that's found in dietary sources, particularly animal products.

So it's high in like meat, poultry, fish, dairy, not so much in vegetables.

So vegans and vegetarians actually end up they can have lower creatine if they're not supplementing with it because they're not eating animal products, right? Well, it turns out that

products, right? Well, it turns out that it seems as though if you're if you're supplementing and eating a high meat diet, you're getting a good amount of creatine, five grams seems to be about

the point at which your muscles get saturated at least over the course of like a month or so.

>> So, if you've been using creatine for a month or two, your muscle stores are saturated and 5 grams a day is kind of what's consumed by the muscle on a daily

basis to kind of maintain that. So, I

would argue that you might want to go above that to get the brain benefits.

And here's why. Because your muscle is a very, very greedy when it comes to creatine. So, that five grams that

creatine. So, that five grams that you're taking, I used to take five grams a day until about last April or March or something like that. So, the five grams a day is what's been shown in countless studies. That's probably why you take

studies. That's probably why you take it. I took it because it was countless

it. I took it because it was countless studies showing five grams a day was like the the dose. That was the dose that you needed to get the muscle benefits. All these brain benefits now

benefits. All these brain benefits now coming out seem to be at higher doses.

And you mentioned one that was 25 grams. I mean 20 to 25 grams, which is kind of a crazy study where they did about 21 hours of sleep deprivation essentially.

They were barely sleeping at all. and

giving them the 25 gram of creatine, 20 to 25 grams depending on their weight, seemed to not only negate the negative effects of sleep deprivation on their cognition, but it also improved their

cognition beyond what their baseline normal cognition is when they were sleeping.

>> Yeah.

>> And that's what was really intriguing to me as well as some of the other studies where older adults are given, you know, 20 grams of creatine and it improve their cognition. We now have the first

their cognition. We now have the first pilot study in Alzheimer's disease where again 20 grams were given to a very small number of people with Alzheimer's disease. It also improved cognition.

disease. It also improved cognition.

It turns out that when you start to go above the five grams and you get into more than 10 grams range, then some of that creatine is getting into the brain versus being all consumed by the muscle.

Right?

>> I personally use creatine now. I do 10 grams a day every day. And what I have noticed, and this could be totally placebo, but I'll tell you when I don't do my 10 grams a day, what I have

noticed is that the the afternoon sleepiness kind of slump I get is completely gone if I take my 10 grams a day.

>> 10 grams, I don't get afternoon sleepiness. I miss it, I get it. So,

sleepiness. I miss it, I get it. So,

it's not like a stored up kind of thing.

It's like, no, if I miss it that day, it's noticeable. If I travel and I don't

it's noticeable. If I travel and I don't have it, it's noticeable.

>> I'm hooked on the 10 grams a day. If

it's placebo, I don't care. It works.

Right? On top of that, what I've also been doing, ever since, you know, that study came out with the 21 hours of sleep deprivation, I take about 20 grams of creatine when I'm traveling and I

have to give a talk or I'm doing a podcast, particularly because oftent times I'm traveling either to central time or to Eastern's time and I'm, you know, giving a talk early in the morning, which is like 6:00 a.m. my

time. I got to be like on my game. So, I

take the 20 grams and I kid you not, it's like you get this brain boost but without like the caffeine. It's It's

hard to explain >> without the creepy crawly ants on your skin, >> right? Without that like

>> right? Without that like >> jittery caffeine overdose, >> jittery thing. And even that sometimes the caffeine isn't enough. Yeah.

>> If you're really jet-lagged, you know, it's just especially if you're going across time zones.

>> Well, also for me, it's like I'm a caffeine fast metabolizer. If I have a cup of coffee, I'm on fire for 25 minutes and then I'm sleepy. I think

some of that is actually a glucose response, but that's a whole separate thing. Using glucometer when I was doing

thing. Using glucometer when I was doing all my ketogenic experiments and so on, I'm like, "Wow, if I have too much coffee, there is a huge, which is not

that surprising, spike in glucose and then a very predictable subsequent drop off." So it doesn't end up being net net

off." So it doesn't end up being net net that helpful for me unless I'm doing a 20 minute sprint on something which is probably never. So the creatine super

probably never. So the creatine super interesting to me. Let me ask some very specific maybe mundane questions but I think

they're practical which is when these subjects were taking 20 or 25 g was that in one sitting was that in

multiple divided doses when you take it is it in powder form is it little sachets that you can take with you on travel days is it encapsulated

what does it actually look With respect to all the studies, I don't remember if they were in one sitting. A

lot of studies are if they do like a 20 gram, it will be in one sitting.

>> Yeah.

>> What I do is different. I do five gram doses. So creatine monohydrate is the

doses. So creatine monohydrate is the form I take. It's the absolute triedand-true, >> the gold standard.

>> It's the gold standard.

>> It's been around forever.

>> Yeah. There's a lot of other marketing out there that talks about other types of creatine, but that's really the gold standard. And I had Dr. Darren Kando on

standard. And I had Dr. Darren Kando on my podcast. He's a creatine researcher

my podcast. He's a creatine researcher at the University of Regina in Canada and like you know we talked all about this and he really convinced me creatine monohydrate is the way to go. I asked

him about like every type of creatine under the sun.

>> But the way I take it is in five gram doses. And so I do five grams first

doses. And so I do five grams first thing in the morning and then I'll do my workout and then I do another five grams about 11:00 a.m. and that's my 10 grams that I get.

>> Got it. When I'm traveling, I do have these sachets that again, Thorne makes, by the way, no affiliation. I mean,

there's like probably a million other I like Thorn because their their creatine is NSF certified and so it's >> free of contaminants. I I really like that. So again, find your own favorite

that. So again, find your own favorite brand, but I like this brand and I like they have sachets which are 5 g sachets and so I will have my 10 g for the day or again if I'm traveling for

workrelated purposes I will take I will take 15 to 20 gram depending on how much I need. In that case I will do two 10 g

I need. In that case I will do two 10 g doses. Like for me I can tolerate that.

doses. Like for me I can tolerate that.

I don't have any GI problems with it.

>> Yeah, I was going to bring that up.

>> Yeah, some people do. I think doing the five gram doses is like pretty easy on the gut. Most people don't have a big

the gut. Most people don't have a big problem with the five grams. It's when they go above that.

>> Yeah, five is fine, >> right?

>> I'll say a few things. So, the the NSF certified is a pretty simple cheat code just to use as a filtering mechanism for a lot of supplements. And it is shocking

how inconsistent supplement contents are. I mean, I've looked at lab reviews

are. I mean, I've looked at lab reviews of like 20 off-the-shelf melatonin products, and it ranges from zero melatonin up to like 20x the label

amount. It's just bananas. I use

amount. It's just bananas. I use

momentous creatine, but it's passing the same hurdle, right? And I will say like good news, you can reduce the likelihood of

cognitive deficit from sleep deprivation. Bad news is you could

deprivation. Bad news is you could increase the likelihood of disaster pants if you have 20 cramps at one sitting. And I will say maybe from

sitting. And I will say maybe from personal experience, maybe I'm just talking about somebody else, but if you really want to increase the likelihood of disaster pants, then you can do like

a bunch of caffeine like you double espresso or black coffee with MCT powder and then have your creatine around the same time.

you're going to want to pack some Pampers in your travel kit if you do that. So, yeah, just be aware of the GI

that. So, yeah, just be aware of the GI stuff, but I'm excited to up my intake because the science that you cited in the study

or studies in your newsletter seemed really compelling. And it's also one of

really compelling. And it's also one of those supplements where it's like, okay, look, we I assume this is on the grass list, like the generally recognized as

safe. seems very well tolerated over

safe. seems very well tolerated over decades and decades of research assuming you don't have some who knows

right like really outstanding kidney dysfunction or something maybe so why not in a sense it's also relatively inexpensive right compared to a lot of

things let me ask you just because this has been on my my mind with the sulforophane I mangled the pronunciation of it sulforophane do you take that better on

an empty stomach better with food. This

has become an issue when I'm doing the intermittent fasting sometimes, right?

Especially if there's something like the A Reds 2, which I'm taking for the eye health, which is supposed to be twice a day. And I'm like, uh, it's part of the

day. And I'm like, uh, it's part of the reason why I've been doing like the quote unquote dirty fasting with a little bit of fat in the form of that

heavy cream in coffee was to try to take supplements earlier in the day that are benefited from some type of fat in

terms of absorption. So I sulforophane, does it matter? I think if you can take it fasted, that's great.

>> Y >> some people find it kind of is hard on their stomach and so they like to take it with food and that's really the only reason to take it with food is because

they get like upset stomach like GI problem. So

problem. So >> I got >> that would be again the only really real reason that you would have to really take it with food.

>> I want to loop back around just so people aren't like Ferris you forgot about vitamin D. I wanted to talk about vitamin D. So, the vitamin D, I've taken

vitamin D. So, the vitamin D, I've taken vitamin D forever.

Tend to take 5,000 IU a day. I

particularly in the summer get I would say at least an hour in the sun without skin protection. And I build up to that.

skin protection. And I build up to that.

I'm not an idiot about it.

And yet, I am barely in my labs. I'm

always barely squeaking by on vitamin D.

And for almost all of my adult friends who get labs, and this is also

race agnostic, right? Everybody is

deficient or just on the border of being deficient, even if they seem to be taking a lot of supplemental vitamin D and getting a lot of sunshine. And I

have to ask myself, what the hell is going on here? In what set of circumstances is it possible that everyone would be so deficient if they seem to be getting a bunch of sunlight?

They're taking a bunch of supplemental vitamin D. Can you shed any light on

vitamin D. Can you shed any light on this?

>> I can.

>> Or is there a problem with this measurement in the first place? Which is

why I was talking about like proxies and confounders and stuff earlier with respect to some of the other studies.

Yeah. So please please educate me >> the way vitamin D is measured. So

vitamin D actually gets converted into a steroid hormone. And this steroid

steroid hormone. And this steroid hormone >> essentially it's going inside the nucleus of our cells where all of our DNA is and it's activating 5% of the protein encoding human genome. Many of

these genes it activates cloth by the way you mentioned cloth. Vitamin D is important for activating cloth. Nice.

>> Yeah. So

>> very hugely important for dementia risk which we can we can talk about.

to sort of answer your question. So your

vitamin D levels are measured by a proxy and it's called 25 hydroxy vitamin D which is the precursor to the steroid hormone. So essentially vitamin D3 which

hormone. So essentially vitamin D3 which is made in your skin >> or if you supplement with it exogenously gets into your bloodstream >> and that vitamin D3 then goes to the

liver and it's converted into 25 hydroxy vitamin D. That's the major circulating

vitamin D. That's the major circulating form of vitamin D.

>> Mhm. after it's, you know, 25 hydroxy vitamin D is made in the liver, it then goes to the kidneys and it's made into the actual active steroid hormone which is called 125 hydroxy vitamin D. Well,

it turns out the enzymes that are doing the conversion of vitamin D3 into that stable form that everyone gets, you know, when they're getting a vitamin D blood test, that's what they're looking

at requires magnesium to work. And there

have been studies showing that in with low magnesium, >> it doesn't happen readily at all.

Interesting.

>> 50% of the US population has insufficient levels of magnesium. So,

you're talking about a coin toss here, right? One out of two. One out of two,

right? One out of two. One out of two, right?

>> Mhm.

>> 50-50 chance a person's not going to be getting enough magnesium.

>> That's been shown to actually play a role in circulating levels of vitamin D.

So, there have been studies and stuff showing that people that are that have low magnesium intake also have low circulating forms of 25 hydroxy vitamin D. So, that's one thing. M another thing

D. So, that's one thing. M another thing comes down to genetics. There's actually

a lot of people that have snips, very common ones that probably came from more southern latitude areas that don't make as much vitamin D3 from the sun exposure because probably they're getting so much sun right?

>> Yeah.

>> So, essentially, there's the genetic component as well. And I've seen a lot of people's, you know, different snip makeups. And I know quite a few people

makeups. And I know quite a few people that actually have to take a super high level of vitamin D3 to actually get enough vitamin D. And then the other thing is that you mentioned earlier the

variation between supplements. So there

have been studies on vitamin D supplements and it's the same problem with melatonin. There's some vitamin D

with melatonin. There's some vitamin D supplements with a fraction of what is stated in terms of concentration of vitamin D3 on the nutrition facts >> and then some of them have like 10 times

as much vitamin D. So there's just like this huge variation where you're like it says it has 5,000 IUs but it only has 500. There's a lot of different factors

500. There's a lot of different factors that could be contributing to that as well. So and then there's also in terms

well. So and then there's also in terms of like people getting sun exposure. You

said you don't wear sunscreen. Some

people do. People that have darker skin pigmentation have melanin. That's a

natural sun sunscreen. There have been studies showing that. For example, out of the University of Chicago, there was a study that was published a few years back showing African-Americans have to stay in the sun six to 10 times as long

as a Caucasian to make the same amount of vitamin D3 from the same amount of sun exposure >> because they have a natural sunscreen.

>> Y >> melanin, which is that darker skin pigmentation. It's a natural sunscreen.

pigmentation. It's a natural sunscreen.

>> It's also why their skin always looks great as they're aging. You're like,

"Oh, you're 75. Your skin looks like you're 30." I remember I won't mention

you're 30." I remember I won't mention him by name, but meeting this this African-American fellow and I thought he was like 25 and he was 53 and had like f

and the way we got to that is I was like oh you are you married and he's like yeah I have five kids and I was like wait what you have five kids you don't look Mormon like wait what's going on here and lo and behold let me dig into

some of this real quick so recommended brands for vitamin D and how much should someone like me potentially

be taking as a starting point because I'm also wary of taking too much vitamin D. I don't want to overdose on vitamin

D. I don't want to overdose on vitamin D. It seems like there are some risks

D. It seems like there are some risks associated with that. I maybe I'm over overstating them, but how do you think about that? And then in terms of this

about that? And then in terms of this rate limiting factor that you mentioned, magnesium, what type of magnesium? How

much? How should I think about both of these? First of all, we need to talk

these? First of all, we need to talk about vitamin D levels and what the optimal levels are. And that's really important for someone to figure out how much they should supplement with. I tend

to think anywhere between 40 60 to 80.

Like 40 to 80 nanogs per mill, you're you're in an optimal range. I like 40 to 60. I think that's my sweet spot. And

60. I think that's my sweet spot. And

and that's because there's lots of studies out there showing all cause mortality is lower within that range.

>> So, you know, if you're with like 50 nanogs per mill would be great. I mean,

that's a great place to be if you're below, you know, 30. If you're about just 30, you might want to try to get up to 40.

>> Let's just say for argument sake that I'm at 30. I think I'm probably closer to 40, but let's say let's say it's 30 >> for someone that's at 30 Danograms per mill is supplementing with 5,000 IUs a

day.

>> Five. Yeah. 5,000 IUs a day and getting an hour of sun in the summer >> without sunscreen, >> you probably should be closer to 50 nanogs per mill. I would say if you're

taking that.

>> I'll check my last labs. I just had them pulled two weeks ago, so I'll double check.

>> So for someone in that case, you might go up to 7,000 IUs and check and see where you're at a month later.

>> Mhm.

>> And if you then are in the 40 to 50 range, then that's your optimal dose to take. And this is an important

take. And this is an important conversation to have. Tim, because it really is there's an individual component here and people just want to at the end of the day they want to what how much do I take? How much do I take?

>> Well, you have to get a vitamin D blood test. This is one of those that you have

test. This is one of those that you have to really measure because as you mentioned there's huge variation there in terms of you know absorption and then the magnesium issue right there's the

RDA for magnesium right so for men it's about 400 milligrams a day for women it's about 300 milligrams a day of magnesium intake from diet or supplemental sources if you're taking a

supplement and also if you're athletic and sweating a lot and using the sauna those requirements can go up between 10 to 20% depending on how physically active If you are, if you're like the endurance athlete, you're on the 20%

higher, you know, range. If you're more just like the average, like I'm a committed exerciser, then you might have to go up 10% above that, right?

>> So, typically the best forms of magnesium to take are the forms of magnesium that are the organic forms. So, that would mean it's bound to a salt

like magnesium citrate or magnesium malate or magnesium tarate. Those are

more bioavailable than magnesium oxide for example.

>> There's also magnesium glycinate which is also a very bioavailable form. It's

the form that I take >> as well. And dose range, you know, you can take 300 milligrams a day and probably not have any GI distress. And

so that gets you most of the way there and then you get the rest from your diet, right? You're eating some leafy

diet, right? You're eating some leafy greens, you're eating maybe some almonds or something which are really high in in magnesium. If you're not getting any

magnesium. If you're not getting any greens at all, then you're going to have to go up a little bit more to the 400 450 milligram range, especially if you're if you're athletic.

>> If you're taking something like electrolytes, you're getting some magnesium there. So, you can figure out

magnesium there. So, you can figure out how much magnesium is in your electrolyte, and that's that can be counted towards it as well. There's also

magnesium thrienate which is the magnesium form that is allegedly able to cross the bloodb brain barrier better than other forms of

magnesium that I mentioned. And I say allegedly because it's animal studies that have shown that there have been a couple of human studies that were unfortunately there's a conflict of interest. They were done by the makers

interest. They were done by the makers of the magnesium 3 and8 supplement. So

that's always important to keep in mind.

But they have shown that magnesium 3NA could improve some cognitive scores if you kind of pulled all the cognitive scores together. And so I think that

scores together. And so I think that there's no reason why if you're interested in cognition and stuff trying the magnesium 3NA. A lot of people like it >> as well. So that's another form of

magnesium. Although I do think you

magnesium. Although I do think you should probably take some magnesium glycinate along with that because you don't want all the magnesium going into your brain. You want some of it going

your brain. You want some of it going into your liver and activating the, you know, enzymes that are converting vitamin D3 into 25 hydroxy vitamin D, right? So, so that is something to keep

right? So, so that is something to keep in mind. If that form of magnesium

in mind. If that form of magnesium indeed is going into the brain more, you want to make sure you're getting some of the other forms to to cover the other bases of other organs as well.

>> What brand of vitamin D supplementation and magnesium glycinate do you use? Is

that also Thorn or are they other suppliers?

>> I use Pure Encapsulations for the vitamin D. I have some friends, mutual

vitamin D. I have some friends, mutual friends of ours that like the Vesorb vitamin D3. So people that are not able

vitamin D3. So people that are not able to increase their vitamin D as well.

Vesorb really increases the bioavailability of a lot of things including ubiquininal the CoQ10 I mentioned. I should have mentioned that

mentioned. I should have mentioned that I buy my dad that's the form I get for him because it increases the bioavailability. Also some fish oil has

bioavailability. Also some fish oil has been shown to increase the bioavailability. So, Vesor vitamin D3

bioavailability. So, Vesor vitamin D3 can be found at Pure Encapsulations.

I don't have an affiliation with them either. They also have a lot of clean

either. They also have a lot of clean third party tested products as well. And

then I use their magnesium glycinate.

>> For the magnesium 3NA, I use Zyogen. I

like the Zyogen. Magnesium 3 and8.

>> Great. All right. Thank you. I will get on the magnesium and I will also check my last labs. I mean, I am very bespoke about this stuff and to your point, you got to check your levels, guys. You

can't just be shooting in the dark here.

It's not a good idea, >> right?

>> Where should we zigg and zag to next? Do

you want to talk about microlastics and mitigation strategies?

>> It's really a big mess. And the

microlastics are now it's not just okay well I'm not going to drink out of bottled water, plastic bottled water. If

you can get any kind of water filter, any kind of water filter is great.

Reverse osmosis is the best because it filters out the smallest smallest nanoplastics, which are the kind that are actually crossing the bloodb brain barrier and getting into the brain.

>> In the brain, they're associated with Alzheimer's disease and all kinds of things. But we now know they're in

things. But we now know they're in chewing gum. So, anything with the word

chewing gum. So, anything with the word gum base is made of a plastic polymer.

So, if you chew gum, it has to be plastic free gum. And it's not the same.

I'll tell you that. Like, but it's in gum. It's tea bags. Tea bags. If you

gum. It's tea bags. Tea bags. If you

make tea with tea bags, all sorts of tea bags, they're releasing just thousands of microplastic into your beverage, >> they're in essentially everything. And

the problem is is that it's very hard to avoid. The best things that you can do

avoid. The best things that you can do to avoid them is reduce exposure, which would be the water filter. Try to avoid drinking out of any type of, you know, water that's in a plastic bottle. But it

turns out a new study just came out showing it's also been found in glass bottles. I know. It's like, are you

bottles. I know. It's like, are you kidding me? Come on.

kidding me? Come on.

>> Yeah.

>> Apparently, the paint that's on the lid of the glass bottle is like shedding little particles into the beverage and those are microplastics cuz the paint is

got plastic in it. Essentially, my

takehome from this is if you're traveling and you and you have to choose between a plastic water bottle with water in it and a glass one to buy, I would still buy the glass one because

the particle size is higher. It's larger

in the glass bottles. Yeah.

>> And that doesn't get absorbed in the gut very well at all, if any. You actually

excrete it through feces. And so I think the next study that's going to be done will be show this essentially. I'm sort

of speculating here, but because the size matters, the size of plastics and the plastic bottles are super small and that's really absorbed well by the gut epithelia and taken up into the bloodstream and gets to the other

organs. Also, the plastic chemicals like

organs. Also, the plastic chemicals like BPA are in plastic. They're not in the glass. So, I still think that opting for

glass. So, I still think that opting for glass is the best option. Even though

that study came out, oh, glass has more plastic than plastic bottles. It's like

a one of those sensational headlines.

>> The devil's in the details, right?

There's always like nuance there. And in

this case, >> in this case, size matters.

>> This size matters in this case for sure.

>> When it comes to, you know, people want to know, well, is there anything I can do to sort of detox these microplastics, right? That's the big concern that

right? That's the big concern that people have. If it's impossible to

people have. If it's impossible to reduce my exposure because they're just absolutely everywhere, then can I sort of get rid of them? And unfortunately,

there's not a lot of evidence right now out there that you can perhaps some this electropharesis sort of thing where you kind of filter your blood.

>> Yeah.

>> But like, who's doing that? Maybe you'll

do it.

>> That's not something that the public's generally going to do. And I don't even know that I'm going to do it. It's also

even if they were going to do it or willing to do it, it's not readily accessible or cost effective for people to use.

>> Exactly. Your best strategy here is minimizing your exposure to them. And

the way to do that for one would be obviously a water filter top of the list because the water that's coming through your tap through, you know, through your sink does have microplastics in it and that's a major major source of

microplastic exposure for many many people. So if you can get any type of

people. So if you can get any type of water filter, again you can even get countertop reverse osmosis water filters.

>> Those those are great for filtering out the majority of microplastics.

Big big big win. I wonder if the big Burky countertop filtration system is effective at filtering out microplastics. I don't know.

microplastics. I don't know.

>> It is. It's effective at filtering out microplastics. It's not clear about like

microplastics. It's not clear about like the nano nano like the super super small size ones. It might it might not. I

size ones. It might it might not. I

don't know. The micro size ones, it does filter out microlastics. So the the thing with reverse osmosis is it's really filtering out all like even the nanoplastics as well. Of course, you

have to consider readding like certain minerals and trace elements that are found in water back to your water. And

some reverse osmosis companies do that.

You can have them put on a filter that'll just add it back in after it filters out all the microplastics, but you can also just buy mineral drops and put those in your water, or you can

take a mineral supplement that has some of these minerals that are taken out as well.

>> Mhm. The other thing I do want to mention is that the plastic associated chemicals are another concern and that would be like the BPA, BPS.

These chemicals are endocrine disruptors. They disrupt hormones.

disruptors. They disrupt hormones.

They're also associated with Alzheimer's disease. They're associated with cancer,

disease. They're associated with cancer, all sorts of things, right? And those

can actually I think this is a big speculation on my part just based on animal studies. I think sulforophane

animal studies. I think sulforophane plays a role in detoxing BPA from from our system and that's because of the whole situation where it

activates the very same enzymes that do excrete BPA through urine. It does that and it's been shown in animal studies, animal studies that are given sulfurophane and then given a high dose

of BPA, it completely blunts the toxicity of the BPA which is pretty interesting as well. The other thing to keep in mind is heat. And this, I'll say this, all the to-go cups that you're out

there buying when you go to a your favorite coffee shop, fill in the blank for the most part, with the exception of the blue bottle coffee, phenomenal. Like

they're they're great. All these paper cups are lined with plastic. And when

you add a hot beverage into the plastic lining, it releases like all these microplastics into your beverage and it releases the chemicals like BPA into them like like 50fold.

Blue Bottle Coffee, by the way, they apparently line their cups with sugar cane, polyactic acid, >> and so they don't have any plastic. I

remember the other day I went into a Blue Bottle coffee shop and I was like, I really wanted to get a hot tea.

And I was like, you know, do you do you guys line your cups with plastic? And

she's like, no, we line them with sugarcane. I was like, yes. So, that's

sugarcane. I was like, yes. So, that's

something to keep in mind. You see a lot of people drinking these to- go cups everywhere and it's you're pouring a hot beverage into it. It's a really really major source of microplastic exposure because you're accelerating the breakdown of the plastic. Heat

accelerates the breakdown of the plastic and essentially you're doing that in real time like in an instant. Right.

>> Ditto for the tea bags, right?

>> Bring your own cup and the tea bags. So

you have to do loose leaf tea. Yeah.

>> Which is what you know now I'm like always it's got to be loose leaf. I'll

bring my own little I'll sometimes open the tea bag out and I have I bring my own little tea steeper thing with me.

>> The half globes that connect together.

Mine are the ones that you kind of like squeeze on it and opens up and then closes the clamps back together. I use

that because the tea bags again, you're getting the heat on top of the plastic, you know, polymers that are making up the tea bag and accelerating to break down the plastic. So, you're drinking, you know, plastic beverage, right?

>> Yeah.

>> And all the there's all these health consequences now associated with microplastics. You mentioned the brain.

microplastics. You mentioned the brain.

It's been found to accumulate 20 times more in the brain than in other organs.

And people with Alzheimer's disease have, you know, up to 20 times more microplastics in their brain than people that didn't have Alzheimer's disease.

And then the same goes for like cardiovascular disease. There's been a

cardiovascular disease. There's been a study that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine about a year ago showing that people that had microplastics in their whatever aortic

part that they were doing surgery on, those individuals like ended up dying of a heart attack like within the next three years versus ones that didn't have any microplastics. Anyways, all sorts of

any microplastics. Anyways, all sorts of interesting stuff. We don't know enough

interesting stuff. We don't know enough about it, but I think enough said, we do know that they're not good and we want to try to avoid them as much as we can and that they are pervasive. They're

everywhere, right? It's ubiquitous.

>> Yeah. And there's some simple things people can do. I mean, this is not necessarily in the same category, but it's like look, the effects at least seem to be I don't know if they're well

established. Maybe there are animal

established. Maybe there are animal studies on this, but certainly there's a lot of seemingly compelling evidence pointing to the effects of say phalates on as endocrine disruptors on male

fertility.

And it's it's like look, if if you have shampoo or soap with a really strong fragrance, just stay away from it. I

mean, they're like very simple guidelines for some of these things that I I think can be can be very helpful.

Yeah, the microplastic stuff is is kind of terrifying. I did not realize the

of terrifying. I did not realize the gum. I knew about the tea bags, the

gum. I knew about the tea bags, the water filtration. Did not realize the

water filtration. Did not realize the gum. I don't chew a lot of gum, but one

gum. I don't chew a lot of gum, but one of my relatives who has Alzheimer's has chewed like four packs of gum a day for 10 years, right? And I was like, "Oh

I wonder if that's a contributor."

>> Wow, that's crazy. I started chewing gum when I learned about the research showing that xylitol could, you know, inhibit some of the smutagens, bacteria that are involved in cavity formation.

>> And then a few years later, you're like, god damn it.

>> I'm like, well, I was able to reverse cavities multiple times and my doctor was like, keep doing it. I'm like, yes, the xylitol. And then it was like this

the xylitol. And then it was like this year I found this out, Tim. This this

year the study came out with the gum and I was devastated. I mean, I've chewed so much gum. So much gum. And I've let my

much gum. So much gum. And I've let my child chew it and it's like all I could think about was how great it was for the teeth. And and now it's like, oh my god,

teeth. And and now it's like, oh my god, this has like been a source of microplastics that I had no idea.

>> I did thankfully find an alternative xylitol source of gum that is microplastic free. But

microplastic free. But >> it's like chewing on bark.

>> Yeah.

>> Is it like chewing on >> It's pretty much bark.

>> Tasteless bark.

>> It's actually made from bark. No, it's

made from like trees. Like some kind of sap or something from the bark.

>> Like resin or something. Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> Sounds delicious.

You can't just do xylitol mints. You

have to chew it. I guess you have to get it up.

>> You can do xylitol mints.

>> Okay.

>> Yeah, you can do xylitol mints. I have

this as well.

>> Well, you know, just to on the same thread of, you know, you don't always don't always get it right completely right. I was looking at some of the

right. I was looking at some of the research doc that I have in front of me and there's one section that's I highlighted which was each 3-hour increase in nighttime fasting was linked

to 20% lower odds of elevated hemoglobin A1C, right? This long-term marker of

A1C, right? This long-term marker of blood glucose. And then one of your

blood glucose. And then one of your bullets was the effects of alcohol on the brain and cancer risk. And so I was reading this document over dinner. I

sent this to you and my time zones are all screwed up cuz I just got back from Polynesia and so I'm eating at like 1000 p.m. first of all and then I had a glass

p.m. first of all and then I had a glass of wine. So I put the glass of wine on

of wine. So I put the glass of wine on top of my research document with all of this text visible and I sent it to you and I was like am I doing it right?

>> It's like you're not you're not going to always get it right. But let's let's talk do you want to talk about the booze for a second?

>> Alcohol. Yeah. And especially since we were talking about APOE4 >> just to depress people after the microplastics.

>> I know it's like you can't have any enjoyment at all if you want to live a long healthy life. No, you need to find a good balance. Obviously, alcohol is >> it's a toxin.

>> It's also a lot of fun, right? I mean,

it's fun to drink and have a glass of wine. Sometimes it helps kind of it

wine. Sometimes it helps kind of it feels like you're lowering your stress, lowering some inhibitions.

>> Mhm. It's fun to do with a group of friends and stuff. It's not so great for the brain though. And and certainly if you're concerned about Alzheimer's disease and dementia risk and I will say that

>> there's been a lot of mixed research out there looking at alcohol consumption and dementia and Alzheimer's disease where some of it says, well, if you're doing moderate alcohol consumption, you can actually have a protective effect

against dementia and Alzheimer's disease, right? where it's like, you

disease, right? where it's like, you know, this this idea that alcohol, like a glass of wine a day is actually beneficial for you, so you should be drinking that.

>> I wonder if it's actually these social interactions facilitated by alcohol versus the moderate alcohol itself. I

wonder.

>> Well, there's a lot of things going on here. Certainly, social interactions,

here. Certainly, social interactions, that's a confounding factor. Also when

people were then looked for their APOE genotype it was found that it was actually in the nonAPOE4 carriers that you would find that benefit not in the

ApoE4 carriers and then on top of that there's been all this research that >> you know over the years has looked at moderate alcohol consumption and depending on the study that number changes which is such a big bummer. It's

like well what does that even mean? In

some cases it could be you know seven drinks a day >> seven drinks a day. Sorry. A week? Oh my

god. No, in some cases it's seven drinks. Obviously, a week for a woman,

drinks. Obviously, a week for a woman, but for a man it's like 14 drinks a week.

>> Wonder who authored that study.

>> Yeah, exactly. It's a big difference.

But on average, like moderate alcohol consumption is more like a seven drinks a week. Seven drinks a day would

a week. Seven drinks a day would definitely be heavy alcohol consumption.

That would be more like substance abuse, you know, substance use or alcohol use disorder. Let's cut the substance abuse

disorder. Let's cut the substance abuse part out. Let's al alcohol use.

part out. Let's al alcohol use.

>> Why can't you say abuse anymore? Why do

these things have to keep changing? It's

so ridiculous.

>> And it's hard for me because I'm always tripping on my words.

>> Use disorder sounds better than abuse, >> right?

>> I mean, what are the reasons behind this? Do you know?

this? Do you know?

>> I guess it's politically correct >> because I'm funding all this psychedelic stuff and it was like abuse for a long time and then all of a sudden, nope, forot. Can't say that. Who knows?

forot. Can't say that. Who knows?

Anyway, >> it's funny. I've read so much of the literature that I still say abuse because that's what I'm familiar reading.

But anyways, back to this what I was saying, which is seven weeks. Sorry. All

right, we're going to cut this out, Tim.

Seven drinks a week.

>> How many drinks have you had before this podcast Rhonda?

>> Well, I did have some ketone esther or there's a little bit of alcohol that like is involved with that. It's

>> true. But watch out for the 13 butane dial anyway.

>> Right.

There's something called the sick quitter hypothesis which is essentially a lot of these studies were comparing people that are drinking this moderate alcohol consumption with non-consumers

people that abstain from drinking >> and it turns out that many many many many studies did not account for the sick quitter you know aspect which is essentially is that English >> someone gets sick

>> oh sick quitter I got it okay >> sick quitter >> okay >> so essentially what it means is they get sick.

>> Mhm.

>> And so they quit drinking alcohol.

>> Mhm.

>> And then when they're filling out their questionnaire, however many years later, whatever, they are asked, "How many drinks do you have a week?" And they say zero

a week?" And they say zero >> because they quit. Y

>> but the question wasn't asked, "Were you a former drinker?"

>> Disclose the prior drinking habit.

>> Yes. Very important. And now more studies are when they're doing the questionnaires are asking that question.

But many many many years and many many studies did not ask that question. And

so it's very possible when you're looking at these cohorts of people that are comparing moderate alcohol consumption to no alcohol consumption.

They're saying, "Oh, look at there's a benefit. You have less cardiovascular

benefit. You have less cardiovascular disease risk. You have less dementia

disease risk. You have less dementia risk if you drink versus not drink." M

>> we don't really know if that's because these people were former drinkers and did so much damage already that that's why they're getting dementia more >> in the non-drinker

group.

>> In the supposed non-drinker group.

Exactly.

>> Quote unquote non-drinker group. Yeah.

>> Right. Which could have been a former drinker. I think at the end of the day

drinker. I think at the end of the day when you look at alcohol and cancer it's just unambiguous. Right. Alcohol is now

just unambiguous. Right. Alcohol is now classified as I think it's a is it a group one carcinogen where it's known to play a role in causing cancer. There's

no gray area here and there's many many different cancers that it's associated with. So alcohol does get metabolized

with. So alcohol does get metabolized into acetal aldahhide that is something that can be a mutagen. It is a mutagen >> can cause cancer, right? And so there's

a lot of different cancers associated with breast cancer, colon cancer, for example. Breast cancer is a big one

example. Breast cancer is a big one because women's lifetime risk of breast cancer is already high. I mean, a woman has a lifetime risk of one in eight of getting breast cancer. So if you have a

room of eight people, >> one of those women, if you're at a dinner party and eight women are there, then one of those women will come down and be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime.

>> Yeah. When you add alcohol consumption on top of that, if you're talking about moderate alcohol consumption, that risk can go to one in six, >> which is very significant for lifetime risk right?

>> So, I do think that alcohol, I mean, obviously like some people enjoy it and you know, I don't know that there's any amount that's actually safe, but if

you're really looking for a number, it seems like one or two drinks a week >> seems to be the safe spot. Uh, I mean, the safest would be zero, right? Zero

drinks. But like if you're really not wanting to to have the damage, the light drinking, which is like the one to two drinks a week, that's where you're probably the best off talking about a

weekend, right? You have a weekend and

weekend, right? You have a weekend and you're doing like a glass of wine maybe Friday or Saturday night, right?

>> Mhm.

>> I think that's that's the safest if you're looking for like some alcohol consumption. If you're going above that,

consumption. If you're going above that, just be aware there is there is definitely a risk of increasing dementia, increasing cancer risk.

However, there are other lifestyle factors that also play a role here like being obese and exercise. In fact, some of the alcohol and dementia studies that have shown an increase in dementia

incidents with alcohol consumption were negated by people that were highly physically active. So, I do think

physically active. So, I do think there's other things to consider. You

can't just silo everything, right? Okay.

I mean, you got to look at the whole lifestyle.

>> So, air squats before gelato and my tequila shots.

>> Well, let me ask you, what is the purported mechanism? Maybe it's known

purported mechanism? Maybe it's known by which alcohol increases the likelihood that you will experience some

of these maladies like cancer, dementia, etc. is acetal aldahhide acting as a mutagen and therefore just up your like smashing your DNA. So you have these mutations that then proliferate

and turn into some type of dangerous cancer like is there more to the story of mechanism of action?

>> Yeah, I mean acetal aldahhide is one aspect of it. It's an important one but the alcohol itself is causing inflammation. I mean it's causing

inflammation. I mean it's causing >> gut permeability essentially. It's very

hard on the gut and so what ends up happening is you release inflammatory factors into your bloodstream.

Lipopolysaccharide gets released into the bloodstream. Inflammation gets you

the bloodstream. Inflammation gets you know activated inflammation is a major major cause of cancer and also brain aging.

>> So the brain aging aspect is definitely linked to the oxidative stress component and the inflammation component. damage

is happening to neurons. And I think, you know, one of the reasons why people with APOE4 are a little more sensitive to alcohol is because the repair

the repair processes in individuals with APOE4 isn't as robust.

>> It's compromised already. Yeah,

>> it's compromised already, right? And so

they're not able to repair that damage that's being generated from the alcohol.

Whereas people without the AO4 somewhat can repair it a little bit better. And

then you add the breakdown of the bloodb brain barrier on top of that and then you're just getting more inflammation into the brain and neuroinflammation is a major cause in Alzheimer's disease. I

mean it's really a known factor now. And

you're disrupting mitochondria. You're

disrupting just everything you know about to be important for health is sort of affected by alcohol through a variety of mechanisms. >> Do you ever drink?

>> I don't drink very much. I used to drink more. You know, sometimes I go several

more. You know, sometimes I go several months without having anything.

>> I do. So, I'm not like I'm not putting you on the stand here.

>> Yeah.

>> I don't drink all the time, but I'm just giving you a little leeway.

>> I used to drink like at least, you know, a couple times a week, >> you know, where I would do like the weekend thing, >> but I don't I don't drink much anymore.

Once in a while, I'll have like a glass of procco for a celebration. I do enjoy it, but I definitely try to limit it to, you know, certainly once a week. But

like I said, these days I'll go a couple months without having anything and then I'll have a social situation where I like to do it. And the great thing about that is I'm so sensitive to the alcohol.

>> Yeah.

>> That I'm such a lightweight and it's great because I I get like one glass of procco and I'm like this is amazing.

>> I'll say what fringe benefit and this could be >> Can I mention one other thing, Tim?

>> Go ahead. Jump in. Yeah. Yeah. I forgot

to mention with respect to the dementia risk and alcohol, you asked about mechanisms, the sleep aspect, right?

>> Oh, for sure. That's a huge one.

>> Yes, it's a huge one because alcohol does disrupt sleep.

>> That's massive. Yeah,

>> massive. I know people that use it because it helps them fall asleep easier.

>> So, it's definitely something that decreases that sleep latency. people can

fall asleep easier, but it completely disrupts so they have more w awakenings in the middle of in the night and it disrupts REM sleep. There's every reason to definitely not drink and certainly

don't drink close to bedtime. You want

to kind of be able to get rid of the alcohol before you go to sleep.

>> Yeah, >> going back to your picture, you were doing everything wrong, but >> Oh, that was Yeah. Am I doing it right?

Yeah, that was very much deliberate.

Rhonda, one thing and I'm so curious if maybe you've heard reports of this. I

could ask my audience and figure it out.

Wasn't placebo effect because I didn't expect it, but it seems like when in ketosis like past 1.5 millmers, even above like 1.2 for me, and I use a

precision extra device to track that.

I've tried a number of other devices that are remarkably erratic. In any

case, I am much more sensitive to alcohol. much much much much much more

alcohol. much much much much much more sensitive to alcohol, which is great because then I'm a cheap date, right? I

could have my one glass of messcal or whatever and I'm I'm good. And I don't drink super often. I might take like three or four weeks off, but then it'll be like this week I'm in New York City.

This is a city of drinking. A lot of people have decided to do ketamine instead, which I think is a fouian bargain shitty trade for a number of reasons. And then I'll stop. You know, I

reasons. And then I'll stop. You know, I have a party with my oldest friends this weekend. I'm sure there's going to be

weekend. I'm sure there's going to be drinking. and then I'll stop for two

drinking. and then I'll stop for two weeks and take a month off or two months off or something like that. It's kind of how I operate these days. But the

ketosis seems to sensitize me which is I thought pretty interesting. I hadn't

noticed that before when I was in ketosis probably because I wasn't drinking dur during those periods. But

on the ketamine substitute, right? Oh,

this is what I'm using now as a healthier alternative. I think the is

healthier alternative. I think the is this risky question is often is this risky or is this bad for me can be answered in absolute terms but it can

also be answered in relative terms. So the zero alcohol might be better than two drinks. Seems pretty unequivocally

two drinks. Seems pretty unequivocally that's the case. But if you then ask in relative terms as compared to what if you're swapping in another behavior or

smoking after your dinner. I mean

smoking is a whole different kettle of fish that we could unpack some other time. Nicotine is pretty interesting but

time. Nicotine is pretty interesting but lung cancer less interesting.

there is the as compared to what when people find another coping mechanism, right? So, I

just wanted to throw that out there as just another question that I think is is worth people asking. If they're going to abandon something, that's great. if you

can just delete it without replacing it with something. But if there is a

with something. But if there is a substitute, if there is an alternative or something that you may end up adding to your behavior or your consumption,

just to be aware of that because you have to measure A versus B, not just A versus lack of A. Just wanted to throw that out there. I've seen so many people unravel from ketamine that it's I feel a

moral responsibility to mention it because it it can be so so incredibly addictive. fast acting short duration

addictive. fast acting short duration and even though it is very successfully used to treat say treatment resistant depression when it's administered in a

clinic at reasonably higher doses for let's just say six infusions over two weeks something like that John Crystal Eel has done a lot of great research and his his teams and co-authors

used recreationally actually increases your predisposition to depression >> I think psilocybin is a better candidate when you when it comes to something like that, you know, because it's really not addicting.

>> No.

>> And I don't know if you saw this, Tim, but this really, of course, people may not be aware, but it's been shown to treat depression as well.

>> Oh, for sure.

>> More than one study.

>> Oh, yeah. The two major applications are major depressive disorder and alcohol use disorder as it stands right now.

>> Right.

>> Yeah. This study just came out like gosh this like last two weeks or something showing is an animal study that psilocybin increased life expectancy by almost 20% in mice.

>> Yeah. Yeah, I saw that. I think that was out of Emory. Am I making that up? I

think it was out of Emory.

>> Yeah, I think it was.

>> I remember looking at it because I was like, wait a second. I think

they were giving something like five milligrams of psilocybin to these rats or mice. And I'm going to mess up the

or mice. And I'm going to mess up the numbers a little bit, but I was like, wait a second. Cuz I've funded a lot of the science. And for humans

the science. And for humans who are walking around at one, let's just call it whatever 125 to 200 lb,

it's 25 to 30 milligrams. So on a like migs per kicks basis, are those rats getting like the equivalent of 300 dried grams of mushrooms?

>> No.

>> On a monthly basis, I was like, let me look at that a little more closely. And

the metabolism is very different. Yeah,

>> it's still non-trivial. I do think those little furry friends are probably tripping balls. I do think the life

tripping balls. I do think the life extension stuff is interesting. And I

would say just anecdotally looking at people who have consumed in South America, Iawaska for decades, like they are can't prove cause and effect, but almost

always sharper than the rest of the people in their age cohort. Almost

always, which is interesting. I mean,

there raises more questions than it provides answers, >> right?

>> But the life extension stuff is interesting. And I've been funding some

interesting. And I've been funding some science that Chuck Nichols is doing looking at the anti-inflammatory applications of different psychedelic compounds and they are profound really

profound and what makes it most interesting is that it can be achieved depending on the compound and he's tested dozens of them with very very

trace quantities mean subperceptual quantities.

You do not need any hallucination, any sort of reality distortion to achieve the anti-inflammatory effects.

>> So like a micro doing >> Yeah.

>> a micro doing of it >> even less than what someone would consider a micro dose like a a nano dose.

>> Wow.

>> It's remarkable. And part of my reasons for looking at like the fasting, the ketogenic diet, also looking at cold exposure, and most recently, this is a whole separate topic obviously for

another time. I'll be having a scientist

another time. I'll be having a scientist on this podcast soon, super credible, very very wellsighted to talk about vag nerve stimulation. But when you look at

nerve stimulation. But when you look at how fasting, right, I was talking about this old Soviet work looking at schizophrenia. Okay, interesting ketosis

schizophrenia. Okay, interesting ketosis for epilepsy and also all sorts of psychiatric conditions, but also things

like potentially rheumatoid arthritis or any number of Crohn's disease, let's say in the case of like vag nerve stimulation. My theory also with

stimulation. My theory also with psychedelics is that in a lot of cases the anti-depressive effects, anti-depressant effects, the anxolytic effects, this would be true for

exogenous ketones as well may be largely I don't think it's a trivial piece of the puzzle mediated by anti-inflammatory effects addressing chronic inflammation including neuroinflammation. Totally.

including neuroinflammation. Totally.

>> As you said, right, if you're chronically suffering from neuroinflammation does not bode well for later life with Alzheimer's and Parkinson's and things like this. So,

I'm trying to throw everything the sort of the kitchen sink at this to to see what these subjective and then measurable objective effects are. It's like okay if I did

are. It's like okay if I did intermittent fasting and I'm doing then cold exposure which by the way past a certain point does seem to shift from sympathetic to parasympathetic activation

particularly with certain breathing patterns like okay if I did that during the intermittent fast I'm taking the sulfurophane right doing all that stuff and then the exercise we talked about

and let's call it probably every quarter I used to do a three-day fast I don't think I'd do a seven-day every every quarter that probably once a year just looking at like okay and then like the

curcumin right if we threw four or five at this problem and didn't get too crazy go America like more is better like we did the minimal effective dose but

recognize there might be a synergistic effect like what happens and what can we measure so I'd like to do and for I'm in the position where I could spend a lot of money just to see like okay if we take

out my white blood cells and then look at their ability to produce cytoines right after certain interventions. Like,

oh, okay, cool. Like, let's spend the money. Let's see what happens after you

money. Let's see what happens after you do this stuff for a couple of weeks.

Very, very, very, very interested in all this. Let's do this, Rhonda. Where can

this. Let's do this, Rhonda. Where can

people find you, find what you're up to, get into all things Rhonda Patrick.

>> I have a podcast.

>> You can find it on Spotify, Apple Podcast, YouTube. It's called Found My

Podcast, YouTube. It's called Found My Fitness. You can also just search Rhonda

Fitness. You can also just search Rhonda Patrick.

>> One of the OGs. You've been doing you've been doing it for a while now.

>> Doing it for a while. Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> And I've got a website, foundmyfitness.com.

foundmyfitness.com.

>> You can find all my stuff there. You can

follow me on Twitter or sorry, X.

>> I still say Twitter.

>> I still do it. I still do it. You can

follow me on X or Instagram. Found my

fitness. All one word. Or look, just search my name, Dr. Rhonda Patrick.

>> And you have a newsletter.

>> I have a newsletter. Yeah. I send out a weekly email that covers some fascinating, you know, new either science health fitness nutrition

related study. And usually it's

related study. And usually it's applicable. Sometimes it's something

applicable. Sometimes it's something that's misunderstood in the in the media and uh break it down every week. I sent

you the creatine one. Yeah. You know, we covered a vitamin D dementia one as well. I mean, a lot of different

well. I mean, a lot of different fascinating studies. So, you can again

fascinating studies. So, you can again find that on my website, foundmyfitness.com.

foundmyfitness.com.

You can sign up for the newsletter there.

>> Awesome. Yeah, I took so many notes. As

always, I always take a lot of notes when we have our conversations, not necessarily on the podcast, but also in our text exchanges. Very actionable. I

so appreciate what you do in the world.

You've called a lot of things early.

Looking at our timeline, it's just been wild to look back and I'm like, "Wow, April 2014 talking about the stuff that now all the fitness influencers are ranting and

raving about today in 2025." It's like, yeah, you called you've called a lot of things early, and I appreciate your

ability to simplify without mangling, simplify without disfiguring the science. I really respect that. It's not

science. I really respect that. It's not

easy to do. It is such a service to people who care about being scientific literate, but they also care about and benefit from someone who can take

what could be impenetrable and translate it without mistransating it into something that they can test with

limited downside and plausible or supported upside. I just

think it's it's such a tremendous service. So, I appreciate you, Rhonda. I

service. So, I appreciate you, Rhonda. I

really do.

>> I appreciate you, too, Tim. Thank you

for all you do and your podcasts have been great. I've listened to them over

been great. I've listened to them over the years. You're one of the few

the years. You're one of the few podcasts that I've listened to. You've

got great, insightful, thoughtful questions and I've read your books, so I appreciate all you do. So, the feelings mutual and I'm glad we get to still have conversations over 10 years later.

>> I know. I love it. Yeah, the long game.

It's fun to play the long game. So, nice

to see you, Rhonda. Everyone, we will put links to everything. Rhonda Patrick

in the show notes. Check her out. You

will not be disappointed. And as always, until next time, be just a bit kinder than is necessary to others, but also to

yourself. And thank you for tuning in.

yourself. And thank you for tuning in.