[00:00:00] Luke: Well, David, you have quite the educational pedigree here. John Hopkins, Duke. What did you study?

[00:00:10] David: At Duke, you study basketball.

[00:00:13] Luke: Oh, okay.

[00:00:13] David: Yeah.

[00:00:13] Luke: How to play it or how to--

[00:00:17] David: Yeah. Actually, when I went through, they didn't have minors, and so the joke was everybody minored in basketball. But yeah, I studied biomedical engineering and electrical engineering at Duke.

[00:00:32] Luke: Oh, cool. Cool, cool. Tell me about the tip you might have for tinnitus.

[00:00:39] David: Yeah. I'm trying to remember the name of this. It's not a PEMF, but it was a mat that we got, and it had a probe. And so it's a different frequency probe in that-- one of my friends specifically, that's the only thing that moved the needle on his. And so you just hold up the probe to your--

[00:01:06] Luke: Send me a link, man. I'm willing to try anything at this point. It's a mystery that I haven't solved. I have a couple of interviews coming up with experts, and oftentimes I am doing shows selfishly in a way to solve problems that I'm trying to overcome and just hoping there's enough people out there that are like, oh, damn, I have that. Cool. He found a solution that works. And that's one of the things I enjoy about doing what I do, is I get to continue to go on my healing journey and take some other people with me.

[00:01:37] David: Yeah.

[00:01:38] Luke: So my ears perk up when someone's like, oh yeah, I heard someone found a way to fix that. It's a really weird issue because, obviously, it's brain related, and we don't know what the hell's going on in there. You know what I mean? There's so many variables. It wasn't that long ago we didn't even believe in neuroplasticity, or we weren't even aware it existed. That was not that long ago, and we were sure about that. So it's funny the way science and research progress, and we learn so much more as we go.

[00:02:08] David: Yeah. And you couldn't regenerate neurons, and now you can.

[00:02:14] Luke: I was glad to hear that because when I was a kid, I did quite a bit of drugs, and I always felt like, man, I would've been much smarter. Back in the '80s, as they would talk about if you used marijuana, you would kill your brain cells, and they'd never come back, and you'd be a dimwitted, Neanderthal forever. And when that latest research started immersion, I was like, cool, maybe I can grow some back. It seems like you can. I feel like I've restored some of that.

[00:02:43] David: Let's get some stuff that makes BDNF, and you're good to go.

[00:02:48] Luke: We're going to talk about that. So one of the things I like to do is dive into the science of unique molecules, substances, compounds that really move the needle for our health and longevity that are lesser known and emerging. So everyone knows you need your vitamin E, your retinol, your vitamin C.

[00:03:15] I think by now we figured out that if you can't get stuff from food that you can take supplements, your B vitamins and so on. The list is endless. But then there's this other category of compounds that we're going to talk about today that are at least at some point derived from food, which is your area of expertise.

[00:03:36] And you guys at Mara Labs seem to have zeroed in on some of my favorites and the ones I find most interesting and also, which we'll unpack later, found a way to make them more bioavailable. So over time, we discover things like quercetin, for example, or berberine, and everyone gets all excited because there's some research that's valid.

[00:04:02] And then later on, we learn that's fine, but you're spending a bunch of money on these supplements that your body doesn't identify and you can't absorb, therefore, it nullifies the excitement about what they can do for you, because something in a Petri dish is different than the way the biochemistry of the body reacts to it and either utilizes it or not.

[00:04:22] So I want to talk about some of the things you guys are up to, and we'll start with the sulforaphane, but quercetin, berberine, resveratrol, and I might've even missed something.

[00:04:36] David: The curcumin.

[00:04:37] Luke: Curcumin. Yeah, yeah. So those are the things I want to talk about today. But let's start with the sulforaphane, which is a really hard word for me to pronounce.

[00:04:45] David: Sulforaphane. Say it with us.

[00:04:48] Luke: I was practicing this morning. I was like, it has the word sulfur in it, which since it's derived from broccoli, that makes sense. But yeah, I'm going to learn it one of these days. So how did you first become interested in that particular compound?

[00:05:01] David: Yeah. First of all, thank you for having me on. It's really great to be here today. So my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer back in 2012, and so we actually had read about sulforaphane in different studies, and so went out to buy some, but what was on the market, it was not sulforaphane. It called sulforaphane glucosinolate, and actually bought a lot of it before I realized that was the precursion molecule.

[00:05:36] And then we did a shotgun approach to her cancer care, and that didn't really work, and so it spread. Then we ended up taking some cells from her cancer, growing them in our lab, and doing more personalized approach where we put 60 different things, supplements, in the Petri dish to see what killed her type of cancer.

[00:06:01] And sulforaphane was number three in directly killing her type of cancer. So went out to buy it again. It didn't exist in a supplement form because it's not stable. So historically, if you try to put broccoli extract that has sulforaphane in capsules, it degrades and you don't get it.

[00:06:28] Basically, it degrades within weeks. That's why people grow broccoli sprouts, is because it's a form that you can use, you can juice, or whatever, masticate it. And you get sulforaphane in a usable amount that makes a difference. Might as well dive into this now because the whole precursor molecule is what most broccoli supplements all but really two ours, and another one doesn't have sulforaphane in the capsule.

[00:07:07] They have glucoraphanin which is also called sulforaphane glucosinolate. And a lot of them say it in advertising. We have stabilized sulforaphane. Amazon, everyone will say they have sulforaphane. You turn it around the back. Even some more bold companies will actually say sulforaphane on the ingredients.

[00:07:31] You get their certificate of analysis. It's sulforaphane glucosinolate. So it may be deceptive. It may be ignorance. Who knows? It's probably a little bit of both. But most people, they come across our supplement. It's 50 bucks. This one's 20 bucks. I'm going to go with this one.

[00:07:53] And it's like, well, why don't you just flush your money down the toilet? Because that's essentially what-- it does nothing. Buy some good seeds, make some broccoli sprouts. You would get much more sulforaphane than if you take these other capsules.

[00:08:09] So anyway, we basically ended up just growing-- I joke we had a broccoli sprout operation that could supply 10 families, but we juiced every day. And occasionally, they would go bad. You get the mold in there. Or you're traveling. At the time, I had a one and 3-year-old, and so it's hectic to do everything.

[00:08:38] Luke: I totally forgot, dude. I had a sprouting operation when I got into it back in, I don't know, early 2000s, and I was so excited. I bought the best sprout growing device and all that. I lasted for two weeks and then gave up. It's not very practical for at least.

[00:08:57] David: Yeah. It was life and death, so we made it work. My friend who actually grew Marcell in our lab, his name's John Gilday. I was like, it sure be nice if we could stabilize sulforaphane so we could put it in the capsule. Fast forward two, three years, John comes to my wife, Mara and I, and he is like, I've stabilized it.

[00:09:26] And we're like, you're kidding me. Basically, he'd been working on it for years, and so he sent it to a third party lab. Sure enough, he'd stabilized it. And at the time, we were both with another supplement company called Restore, which is now Ion.

[00:09:45] I got supplement, and we just didn't want to bring it in, and it was just easier to let it lie. But Mara was like, we got to get this out there because the research is clear. It's a game changer. And so she pulled the trigger and raising the seed money, and then ended up taking a turn for the worst. And then she passed in September, 2017, and we ended up getting the seed money in and starting the company in early 2018 and have not looked back since.

[00:10:19] Luke: Hence the name Mara Labs

[00:10:20] David: Mara Labs after my sweetie.

[00:10:23] Luke: I knew that about you from my research, and I just can't imagine that. I don't know how one lives through that grief. And I also just lack experience with people close to me dying as of yet, knock on wood. But when I heard that, I'm just like, how do you even go on? Sidetrack here. And if you don't want to get into it, I totally respect that, but what's that been like for you as a human and just dealing with that emotionally and carrying on?

[00:10:59] David: Yeah. In retrospect, I would've started the company a little bit past, not as fast. But yeah, it was about-- and my boys were five and seven or seven and, let's see, nine when she died. I'm a stuffer. I stuff my emotions and don't cry. But there was no stuffing. It was just spontaneous, at the most inopportune times, like, blah.

[00:11:31] And I think part of it is just letting the emotions out and being real. But I have faith, and so having that outlook that this is not all there is, and I'll see her again is certainly, um, important. I think also it's very helpful that my boys are doing well. I have a great family, Mara's family. Her mom's in town. My parents are close. One of her sisters is close. The other one, she has an identical twin who's in Santa Barbara, and we--

[00:12:12] Luke: Oh wow.

[00:12:13] David: Yeah. After Mara died, we actually went out there a lot and took up surfing. We all are swimmers. And so that was an easy step and very fun. And so emotionally, the first year was very rough. And then after the first anniversary, the first Christmas, first of everything is over, for me, still bitter, still hard, but it was just different.

[00:12:51] Luke: I've heard people share how they've dealt with loss like this, and it seems to be that if you don't stuff it and bypass it and you summon the courage to feel it with hurt that it's almost like a well where if you just allow it to process and process and process, eventually you hit the bottom of the well.

[00:13:21] And I'm sure it's never like, oh, this is great, but there seems to come a point at which that acceptance kicks in when you've felt all there is to feel about it. Has that been your experience to some degree?

[00:13:37] David:  Yeah. I think that's a good way to put it. Now what happens instead of being overcome with emotion and sobbing, it's like, how did that happen? Because we had done so much, and we were a step ahead of it until we weren't. And just like, how is this my life?

[00:13:55] A mission of our company is, to cultivate lifestyles of wellness for generations to thrive. My family's doing well, thankfully. My boys are doing well. But what if Mara was still here? And she was here to see my kids graduate high school and to be a resource for them as they had kids. It just presumably would be a much richer option, but it's not an option for us. It can be an option for others.

[00:14:33] It's a multi-generational mission. We don't want grandparents. You have the stereotypical armchair grandparent who can't move. And then you have the ones that actually are on the floor and engaging with the grandkids, playing Legos, or whatever. And so that's our vision. So a lot of our products are anti-aging and really move the needle with the aging aspect.

[00:15:05] Luke: Awesome. Yeah, I think too, the thing you touched on of having faith is such a huge part of it. I honestly don't know how anyone deals with major life challenges without a framework that there's more to reality than we can perceive. You know what I mean? We were talking about documentaries. I watched one. The production value was really low. I think it was a bit dated, and I don't remember the name, so forgive me on the show notes folks, but it was a series about people that had had near-death experiences.

[00:15:43] And I have a book over there, which is like a bible of near-death experiences that I've just thumbed through here and there. I haven't really read it, read it, but it was really interesting, the universality of their experiences despite the various circumstances of their physical deaths and the duration of time that their heart wasn't beating and that they were clinically dead.

[00:16:09] But the thing that was universal about it is that they all said it was the best thing ever. They didn't want to come back, and not all of them, but the majority of them were immediately met by their loved ones who had already passed. An atheist might say, oh, that's just a hallucination from the DMT in your brain. I don't tend to abide by that.

[00:16:31] Just based on some experiences I've had in life where I go, oh, okay. Yeah, you have a soul, and there's no such thing as death. I interviewed a guy the other day that said something beautiful.  We were talking about reincarnation, and he said, many people believe in the afterlife, but it's really not the afterlife. It's the other life.

[00:16:51] There's just versions of you essentially. And I don't know, just philosophical contemplation like that brings me a lot of peace and solace and knowing you still have to go through the human emotions and the attachment and, like you described, living your life now and imagining what it would be like if she was here and all of that. But I think it would be a dismal life if you really just had a finite perspective that this physical world, our physical body is all there is, and then it just ends. That's just how do you even deal with anything?

[00:17:26] David: Yeah, no, I think that's right. And we were talking about the World War II trip my boys and I went in September to Europe to look at and just the documentaries we watched ahead of time. And on the soldier side, the US soldiers, vast majority of them had a faith. There's fear, but there was this idea of a greater good and a faith that allowed them to do some things that were pretty crazy dangerous. And the bravery and the idea that if they died, there was something more.

[00:18:12] Luke: Well, thank you for sharing that and indulging me. I'm always working on just expanding my capacity as a person. So I love talking to people that have gone through something difficult that I've not yet experienced taking cues.

[00:18:25] I take notes. When this happens-- it's not an if. It's a when for people that we love-- to arm myself with the best possible attitude about it. I'm curious. You said that this one was the third compound that you felt were effective in the cancer cells. What were the other two?

[00:18:45] David: Yeah. You'll be shocked at how few people ask that question, follow up question. You win the star. You got a gold star.

[00:18:54] Luke: You got to know, man. Was one of them by chance phycocyanin?

[00:19:00] David: It was not.

[00:19:00] Luke: Okay. Do you know what that is?

[00:19:02] David: I don't even know what that is.

[00:19:03] Luke: It's the blue pigment in spirulina. Oh, interesting. And I interviewed a really brilliant woman the other day who was talking about-- and actually, she showed me some slides of cancer cells in a Petri dish, and they put this blue pigment in there, and it nukes some. It's crazy.

[00:19:18] David: Yeah. That may not have been one that we put on, but I would love to get my hands on some. A lot of our assays, how we test our supplements, we put them on these breast cancer cells called MCF-7. We do a lot of our synergy studies. So do the supplements, work together, that sort of thing. So anyway, we're always testing. So it'd be great to get another toy to test with.

[00:19:52] Luke: Yeah, I'd love to see the outcome of that. So what were the other two?

[00:19:56] David: Vitamin C and curcumin.

[00:20:01] Luke: Oh wow. Interesting. Yeah, the vitamin C makes sense, the Linus Pauling work and these high dose vitamin C IVs and stuff.

[00:20:11] David: Yeah. We did so many. That was probably her lifeline, was with a lot of vitamin C IVs. And then, yeah, the curcumin. And you read about the curcumin studies. We did this, putting it directly on her cells. But a lot of our research was like, first of all, what's the best curcumin to use? Not much. If you just use straight curcumin, less than 1% gets through the gut barrier, so not enough to really do much as far as getting to the cells.

[00:20:50] Luke: You can't just eat a chunk of turmeric.

[00:20:52] David: Yeah. There are supplements that have ground up turmeric in it. And so I think about 5% of turmeric has the actual curcumin in it. I'm talking, though, if you get it refined, so it's 95% pure or very heavily purified, only five or less than 1% of that gets through the gut barrier. And people feel a difference with non-bioavailable curcumin.

[00:21:31] And I think that that's true in that a lot of that curcumin actually is staying in. If it doesn't get through, it stays in the gut. Goes through the colon, small intestines, and those cells are getting the benefit because it's directly on, and a lot of inflammation, a lot of important stuff, immunity, and your immune system is in your gut. So I do think there is a place for non-bioavailable curcumin. But the problem is a lot of the brands say theirs is bioavailable, and it's just not.

[00:22:06] Luke: Yeah. We'll actually just skip around and get into that now. So years ago, I started hearing about the benefits of curcumin. And I learned that it was derived from turmeric, which, by the way, it has an R in it. So many people call it turmeric. It drives me crazy. Turmeric, turmeric, whatever. It has an r folks. Anyway, I digress. That's my OCD kicking in.

[00:22:34] And so then in the health space, we started to learn, oh, this compound's really good for you, but it has low bioavailability. And then so supplement brands and their marketing started saying, well, we found research that if you add a black pepper extract to it, that then it activates it.

[00:22:51] And then some time went by, and then I started seeing information in the blogosphere and podsphere that that doesn't really do much and that that's fake news. What's your perspective on making it bioavailable because that's one of Mara Lab's claim to fame on all of your stuff, is that you've done research and are able to verify its bioavailability? So tell us a bit about that one.

[00:23:15] David: Yeah, the black pepper, I do think that on-- so there are really two issues. Is the curcumin getting through your gut barrier? And then the second is, what's going on after it gets through? Is it actually getting to the cells? Is it impacting the pathway, which is NF-κB, which is the pathway that all the pharmacists-- it's the Holy Grail that the pharmaceutical companies are going after when they create an anti-inflammatory.

[00:23:47] And so the first part, does it get through, these companies with black pepper, that can be an irritant. And so it irritates the gut lining, and more can get through than just regular curcumin.  In the studies, the most bioavailable curcumin is NovaSOL. The reason it's bioavailable is it's 97% detergent.

[00:24:18] Luke: What?

[00:24:18] David: It's polysorbate 60. And it's 3% curcumin. And nobody's talking about that. So they're the one to do the head-to-head with, but we're not just looking at bioavailability. We actually have a measure of inflammation. Is it actually improving inflammation? And I'm trying to make sure I don't actually get a letter with a lawsuit on it, so I may--

[00:24:54] Luke: You could be as cryptic as need be. That's one of the frustrating things about conducting these conversations with people that manufacture and sell health-related products, is that due to the regulations, you can't make "medical claims". So it is frustrating for me because I'm like, no, say the thing. If we were off mic, you'd be able to tell me exactly what it does and do so ethically and authentically.

[00:25:24] I always feel like, ah, man. Your hands are tied. And I get it. Also, somebody needs to regulate snake oil salespeople. I don't want to waste my money on things that don't work and have false claims and things. But in the cases where there is legitimate research and the benefits are verifiable and have been proven, it's frustrating to not be able to share that information with people that have high inflammation or are dealing with something like cancer. And you can't say, yeah, take this thing. It's going to help. We've proven so.

[00:25:57] David: Yeah. And so what we did was we took actually a large amount. So I think we took gram of regular curcumin, gram of [Inaudible], gram of [Inaudible]. Having that much detergent in your gut, actually what it does is it strips the gut bacteria of the lipopolysaccharides. And LPS is a toxin, and so you can get a pretty-- if you take that much, you can get a of that product. You can get the runs, and you can be really sick. You get sick. It also did not decrease inflammation. It increased inflammation.

[00:26:44] Luke: Has the opposite effect.

[00:26:46] David: It is funny, but it's also like, really? That's the gold standard? It's a little bit frustrating that people aren't talking about that. They're talking about bioavailability so much. They're not talking about functionality, like what's it actually doing? So anyway, there are some other ones. Mariva was the first market. That's the liposomal, the dried liposomal. That's about three times more bioavailability.

[00:27:21] In end of the day, what we're trying to do is we want the next best thing besides an IV. We want as much as possible to get the curcumin through the gut barrier to the cells, impacting the NF-κB, so you can feel the difference. So people with joint pain love our product. You can take two at night and wake up-- a lot of people wake up the next morning and can notice a tangible difference in their joint pain. It's like the proofs in the pudding.

[00:28:01] Luke: Awesome. Well, that's very interesting information about the curcumin. One of the things I love to do on the show is to debunk things and help people not waste their money. Because I've been into the supplements for, I don't know, 20-- actually, no. Even when I was a really unhealthy person, I was taking vitamins from 7-Eleven.

[00:28:22] But I would say, in a more educated way, probably 27, 30 years, or something, and spent so much money. And then down the road, learned that I was just buying expensive pee. You know what I mean? It's like super frustrating. So I like to save people from that. But going back to the curcumin, you really got my attention with the proven effects on inflammation and joint pain. And it reminds me Austin sent me some of your stuff, a sample pack of each one, or whatever, and I burned through it very quickly just to try it out, but I didn't know why I was taking any one of them, so I didn't track like, ooh, if I take their curcumin product, is my knee pain or back pain less? So I'm going to try it again and do a dedicated trial of it to see how that works because that's very compelling. What are some of the other known and proven benefits of curcumin before we move on to some of the other--

[00:29:23] David: Yeah. and I will say, with the curcumin, actually, you're talking about expensive urine because ours gets through your gut barrier into your bloodstream. It will look like you're dehydrated when you'll pee it out. It doesn't mean that it didn't get to your cells. It means those are the byproducts, and it means it actually did get through and it is working. And that won't happen with the others. If it doesn't get through the gut barrier, you poop it out.

[00:30:00] So yeah, curcumin, there's another pathway that it helps with called Nrf2, which is more-- so curcumin is the best natural molecule at turning off the pro-inflammatory pathway NF-κB. It does other stuff, though, so it's good for brain health. It's good for cardiovascular, it's good for this Nrf2 pathway, which sulforaphane in the broccoli is also good for. Not a 100% of our curcumin doesn't get through the gut barrier. Some of it's still left, and there's a modulation of the gut microbiome too on a positive side, so all of those things.

[00:30:54] Luke: Cool, cool. All right. With the sulfur-- God.

[00:30:58] David: Sulforaphane

[00:31:00] Luke: Sulforaphane. I don't know some words, man, just don't. I just can't do it.

[00:31:03] David: You got it.

[00:31:05] Luke: With that one, it's interesting when you were talking about juicing the sprouts and making the sprouts. It reminded me of the old-school Gerson Cancer treatments.

[00:31:16] David: Oh yeah.

[00:31:16] Luke: There was a lot of juicing of sprouts, and I didn't really know why. I thought, oh, maybe it makes you more alkaline or whatever it was. I never really looked into it because I, thank God, never had cancer, but yeah, I was unaware that that's what we're going for.

[00:31:34] David: Yeah. Gerson's a little different. Gerson is hardcore. It's a volume juicing, whereas if you have enough broccoli sprouts, two of our capsules would be the equivalent of like two and a half ounces of broccoli sprouts. The interesting thing too, Luke, is not all broccoli seeds have the ability to make sulforaphane. On Amazon, we're looking for sources of organic seed because there's really not-- we use so much seed. It's really hard to find organic seed.

[00:32:12] So we use organic seed when we can, but then we also use other good sources that maybe might not be certified organic. But we were looking for sources when we bought five different brands off of Amazon and none of them-- this was in 2020-- made sulforaphane. And so we're like, whoa, what the heck? I think nine months later, we did the same study. We did seven different brands, and six of the seven did. And some of them were the same brands.

[00:32:58] And so it's just like, what was that? So I think because of that and because people want seeds that they know actually work, we sell our seeds. We sell our seeds on our website, not to be a seed company, but just to give people the option. And so basically, half pound will equate roughly 400 milligrams of sulforaphane.

[00:33:24] Luke: Oh, interesting.

[00:33:25] David: That's at the least.

[00:33:27] Luke: Do you think some of them lack that ingredient due to being hybridized, and breeding, and things like that? They just--

[00:33:37] David: Has to.

[00:33:37] Luke: Inadvertently bred out or something?

[00:33:39] David: Has to. It's one of those shocking things that's just like you swallow hard and be like, okay, glad we test.

[00:33:49] Luke: What about the-- and I'm not an expert in this particular area, but from what I understand, brussels sprouts, kale, watercress, broccoli, broccolini are all basically the same genus with a different personality and slightly different flavor profile. But back before they were hybridized, they were essentially just one plant, whichever one it was. Do any of the other brother and sister plants contain this stuff, or is broccoli specifically where you have to go to get it?

[00:34:24] David: So there are cousin molecules to sulforaphane that are slightly different, but are they're called-- so basically, if you have a head of broccoli, it has this precursion molecule to sulforaphane called glucoraphanin. It's stable. You start chewing the broccoli. You break the cell wallet, releases an enzyme that cleaves a glucose off of that molecule and create sulforaphane. Well, cauliflower has a cousin molecule that the similar reaction occurs.

[00:35:04] Watercress has a similar molecule, and those precursor molecules, they're called glucosinolates. Once that glucose molecule is cleaved, those molecules are called isothiocyanates. Those ones are not stable. Our broccoli product is called Broccoli Plus. And it's plus because we read a paper where they put sulforaphane. And the one from watercress, it's called phenylethyl isothiocyanate. It has a phenol-ethyl group.

[00:35:41] Luke: You're really good at pronouncing these difficult words.

[00:35:44] David: Well, it's been seven years, so I've had a little bit of practice. If you put them together, you get a three to five-- it's basically a five times effect versus sulforaphane alone. And that effect is stimulating NRF-2. That's responsible for what's called the antioxidant response system.

[00:36:08] Over 200 genes get turned on and stay on for 72 hours. You get antioxidants pumping out for 72 hours. And so if you think about vitamin C, you get one vitamin C molecule canceling out one prooxidant. With sulforaphane, it's not an antioxidant. It's creating them in your body naturally.

[00:36:33] I think that's a pretty cool thing. The Nrf2 is also responsible for phase two detoxification. So basically, similar to how curcumin is the best at turning off NF-κB, sulforaphane's the best at turning on Nrf2. And so Nrf2 is responsible for antioxidant response system. It's responsible for phase two detoxification, but it works in all three phases. And so you hear these docs take my detox protocol and, unfortunately, a lot of them stimulate phase one, and you get what's called the detox flu. You feel sick.

[00:37:17] Luke: Yeah. The Herxheimer reaction.

[00:37:19] David: Yeah. And so what actually sulforaphane does is it slows phase one, speeds up phase two. So phase one is basically you're making the toxin less toxic. Phase two, you're making it water soluble so you can basically start excreting it. And then phase three is binding excreting. And so it does all three.

[00:37:47] And so there are a lot of Hopkins studies, some great studies of Hopkins looking at metals. There's one that they partnered in Beijing with-- if you've been there, huge air pollution. And so they just gave these sulforaphane beverages from broccoli sprouts because Hopkins actually discovered it in 1992. They discovered sulforaphane. They weren't able to stabilize it.

[00:38:16] So they had created this huge broccoli sprout growing operation for the studies. It's called the ChemoProtective Institute up at Johns Hopkins. And so this study, they showed that just drinking this beverage, about 10, 15 milligrams of sulforaphane, they could pee out a huge amount of toxins. So that's the detox.

[00:38:42] Luke: What a trip! So if this compound is encouraging your body to produce more of its own antioxidants, is one of them glutathione? I'm thinking about the sulfur content in broccoli and those other, what do call them? Cruciferous vegetables? Is that what they're called? Cruciferous?

[00:39:01] David: Cruciferous.

[00:39:02] Luke: And glutathione, if you take it as a supplement, it smells like sulfur. I use these MitoZen, and it's too much information. I'm sorry. It's just funny though. It's a great product, but MitoZen makes these glutathione suppositories, high dose, which is great because you get a longer blood plasma than you would even from an IV, but they're notorious for giving you sulfur farts, rotten egg farts. So I'm familiar with the sulfur personality of glutathione, you could say. Is there a relationship here between that particular antioxidants?

[00:39:35] David: Yeah. Yeah, it definitely-- the NRF two pathway does increase glutathione.

[00:39:42] Luke: So it increases the glutathione production within your body.

[00:39:46] David: It does.

[00:39:46] Luke: Oh cool.

[00:39:47] David: Yeah. And so right now, I've been doing this-- have you heard of GlyNAC?

[00:39:54] Luke: No.

[00:39:54] David: Glycine with NAC?

[00:39:57] Luke: Oh yeah. I heard someone talking to about that on a podcast the other day.

[00:40:00] David: So two studies, one, two years ago, and the other one came out this year, create on 70 somethings doing-- it's a lot. It's eight grams of each, so it's a ton. But over a 12-week period, I think-- maybe it's 16 weeks, and it just reversed a lot of age-related markers, big time. And those are the building blocks of glutathione. And so I've been doing that with the broccoli, has been, I think, really helpful.

[00:40:36] Luke: That's cool. Is there a company that comes to mind that makes a combo product of the glycine and NAC?

[00:40:46] David: Not without a filler. So I was actually--

[00:40:49] Luke: Goddamn, these supplement companies, man.

[00:40:50] David: So I was taking 35 capsules to get the 16 grams, and so I told my guys-- because we don't use filler, so I was like, make me some without filler. Because I was taking half of the stuff, so it dropped it to 20 capsules instead of 35 capsules. So we make it, but I make it for me. I can get you some there.

[00:41:16] Luke: Have you thought about adding that to your suite of products?

[00:41:21] David: We've talked about it, but the only value add would be we don't use filler. And then you have to take 20 a day. We just give people these baggies, these gallon bags. Anyway, it's something we've talked about. How many people, a, want to you take that much?

[00:41:48] Luke: Exceedingly few.

[00:41:49] David: Yeah.

[00:41:50] Luke: Yeah. I'll turn my wife onto supplements, and even if they're too big, she won't take them. Or if she has to take too many. I'm like, here's your dose, and it's five capsules. I'm like, I'm not eating five of those.

[00:42:03] David: I'm pretty disciplined, but this past week was my worst week where-- you have to take it throughout the day because if you come at night and you're faced with 20 capsules right before bed, it's just like, oh man. I think there's three nights this past week, which is the first time that's happened since it started in August, where it's just like, I don't care. I'm not doing it.

[00:42:30] Luke: Remember a couple of years ago when there was some regulation around NAC that was supposed to take effect and so I--

[00:42:40] David: You loaded up?

[00:42:40] Luke: Yeah, I went full hoarder. I have a cabinet of NAC. And then now I go to the health food store, and I'm like, it's right there on the shelf.

[00:42:48] David: This is my perspective on what happened. I'm not saying it's the gospel truth, however, my perspective. So basically, one of the guy I took when-- the first day, I took those 20 capsules. I'm a swimmer, swim with my boys, and they're getting a little bit faster than me. And so I'm having to like really work at it now. And my shoulder, for two months, it'd been killing me. Less killing, more nagging.

[00:43:17] And I have stuff that helps with inflammation, so I'm taking it. I'm rubbing it on topically with DMSO. I'm just working it, and it's still there. And so I take this glycine NAC, 16 grams. And then the next day, poof, gone. The next morning, completely gone. And I'm like, whoa.

[00:43:44] And so another friend of mine, actually the husband of one of our customer service people, his friend, and he's into trying stuff. So have him try this. I didn't know this. She told me after he'd had this little asthmatic cough for about two months. Couldn't get rid of it. He was taking all sorts of stuff, even with some antibiotics and stuff.

[00:44:13] First, one dose, the next day, completely gone. Well, I was talking to John Gilday. He was like, yeah, that's actually one of the things that NAC was really good for COVID because it broke down the FibroGen or the fibroids that the inflammatory response was creating. And that's why it was taken off the market by the FDA, so that they can then roll it into a pharmaceutical. So basically, you have this supplement that's working. FDA's like, oh, this is working. This is actually working.

[00:44:57] Luke: God forbid people get healthy on their own.

[00:45:00] David: And so the supplement industry, actually-- I don't know if this has happened before, but there was this huge response by people and the supplement industry and people who take supplements, and they reversed it. But you still can't buy NAC on Amazon because they have their pharmaceutical arm now, and I think it's going to come out as a pharmaceutical maybe. I don't know.

[00:45:27] Luke: That's interesting. So it was like the ivermectin of the supplement world. I remember seeing things. I think it's eased up now, but an MD would prescribe someone ivermectin, and they'd go down to CVS and fill the prescription. They wouldn't fill it.

[00:45:41] David: That happened to me.

[00:45:42] Luke: And I'm like, what is happening?

[00:45:44] David: Yeah. That happened to me. I was so sick. CVS is right by my house. This pharmacist comes out. He's just like, I'm not filling this for you because it's not-- that's not your job to-- doctors, there are off-label uses for every pharmaceutical. It's not your job, but it wasn't his decision. It was CVS's decision. And I was so sick. I'm like, I'm so mad at you right now, but I'm just going to wait. So I just walked away and went down a little bit further down the street. Do you guys have Wegmans?

[00:46:32] Luke: I'm familiar with Wegman's. I don't know if we have them in Texas, but I've seen them, I think, in-- actually, you're from Virginia. I went to Wegman's in DC.

[00:46:42] David: Yeah.

[00:46:42] Luke: Is it Wegmans?

[00:46:44] David: Wegmans.

[00:46:44] Luke: Wegmans. Yeah, yeah.

[00:46:46] David: Take it there. They're like, yeah, sure. We'll fill it. It was 120 bucks. I'm like, oh. I'm like, now I know. This is a pure profit center. In the third world, it's pennies. Now I get mine out of Tennessee. There's a compounding pharmaceutical to get it for 30 bucks.

[00:47:11] Luke: Yeah, people found their ways around that I even, at some point in the height of that scare bought some of the horse paste, the apple flavor horse paste on Amazon, I still have in the refrigerator.

[00:47:23] David: Yeah. My mother-in-law got it. And that's actually what I took first because it's the same stuff. It probably has GMO corn oil that it's--

[00:47:34] Luke: Not ideal

[00:47:37] David: But accessible. Yeah, I do feel obliged to say since ivermectin is a topic that has been, I guess-- what's a word for it?

[00:47:56] Luke: Propagandized.

[00:47:59] David: Yeah, there's some propaganda to it that it's been looked at as not in reality if you think that works. But the reality of the situation is if you look at the peer-reviewed studies, a load of them now, if you go into science literature, it works. The literature wasn't fully developed like it is now on it, but there were some, I think, one or two decent studies, but a lot more anecdotal evidence that it was working.

[00:48:40] I was about as sick as I've ever been, and I took the first dose, went to bed, and that next morning, I was probably 40% better. I was like, thank you. Oh, again, anecdotal, but that was my experience. And it's a lot of other people's experience too, but fast forward two years and there's a body of data. So I think that that's where I'm just like, let the data make decision. They make the decision decisions versus politicians.

[00:49:15] Luke: Yeah, 100%. The way my brain works is when something is suppressed it just makes me think that it works.

[00:49:23] David: So you're that guy.

[00:49:25] Luke: Yeah, 100%. If these captured agencies really cared about people's health, they would do things very differently. You just look at how money is squandered in so many different ways, geopolitically, and then you look at a problem, any health problem or homelessness or any of the things that are troubling our society. If money's the answer to those problems, at least, could be so easily and quickly fixed or remedied, or at least funded, for example, and they're not.

[00:49:58] Therefore they don't care. In the past three years, it's like the first thing I notice is why is there no advice about adequate sleep, getting sunlight, getting your vitamin D, fitness, not being obese, just the basic-- why is there no encouragement to just live a healthier life? It's like, oh, no, no, we can't talk about that. That's a conspiracy theory. The only solution is the one that we want you to apply. And so when anything like that happens, I'm just highly suspect. And that's a big clue that I'm on my own, and I'm going to have to figure this out, which is how I've lived most of my life.

[00:50:41] And I think many people listening to this show at this point, probably share that perspective. Just personal responsibility, health sovereignty. There's great medical professionals, and experts, and scientists out there. Sure. And thank God for them, people like you that are doing great work in your lab. But there is also a lot of disinformation and a lot of nefarious stuff going on.

[00:51:07] David: Yeah.

[00:51:07] Luke: There's a bit of both.

[00:51:09] David: My oldest son is studying the constitution, and there's the idea of self-governing where you're talking about you taking responsibility for your health. That concept is unfortunately not common nowadays. It's like, doc, tell me what pill to take. You mentioned obesity and exercise, and I think bringing up the topic of obesity, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, in the context of our berberine product, maybe something we can talk about.

[00:51:47] Luke: Oh, cool. Let's do. I want to make sure that I get all my questions in on this one before we move on, but I'm very interested in berberine because I think I've had a lot of expensive pee with berberine too, which we'll find out. But there was something that I read, and it might be in relation to the detox pathways that you're referring to or the added glutathione production.

[00:52:13] What's the relationship between glyphosate? This is a ubiquitous issue now that thankfully more people are becoming aware of. But still, it's in just about everything. I was listening to RFK Jr. Podcast yesterday, and this is something I knew, but he just articulated it in a really succinct way, where in commercial conventional wheat farming, they discovered that they could, at the end of harvest, spray glyphosate on the wheat crops to desiccate it and dry it out and increase the profitability and their margins because of the speed with which they can--

[00:52:57] David: They get growing season. That's why they do it in the northern climates.

[00:53:02] Luke: Okay.

[00:53:02] David: They don't do it in the southern climates.

[00:53:04] Luke: Because even if it was just sprayed for its intended use, you could say maybe so it gets washed off with rain, and maybe there's not that much present. But if you're spraying it and then cutting it and putting it into donuts, then you got a real problem.

[00:53:23] David: Yeah. That, what you outlined, is you can get some of the more toxic, more glyphosate rich foods from wheat, but thankfully, there's not a ton of them. There may be more doing it now, but that conversation's been going on for a decade now. And so the issue with that is basically, glyphosate, what you outlined with that, you're getting a mega dose.

[00:54:03] So that's doing some damage. But typically, most of us are just getting microdosed daily. And so you go to, let's say, Five Guys or McDonald's, depending on the oil that's used for your fries, it'll probably be a little bit in, if it's vegetable oil, which it probably is, there'll be some, which soybeans or canola oil, it'll have a bit in there.

[00:54:29] Again, these genetically modified crops, they spray to increase the yield. So they spray, kill the weeds, the crops don't die, but then they can grow and you get, in theory, a larger yield so that, again, in theory, you're feeding the nation, which, again, that's why the USSR crumbled, is they couldn't feed their population. So the idea of feeding your population is big.

[00:54:56] This is a solution for better, for worse, probably for worse, I think we'd agree that they've come up with. So from a health standpoint, what the heck is it doing? And so our research has shown-- basically, there are three things. One is it's increasing the amount of glyphosate you get in a regular meal. That maybe it's slightly high.

[00:55:27] You're eating genetically modified foods, and you're getting a microdose exposure. That amount, basically, one of the things it does is it increases the gaps in your tight junction. It's opening your gut barrier. And that's bad because your gut barrier keeps stuff that shouldn't be in. It keeps it out.

[00:55:56] And so what happens is if your gut barrier is open long term, you can get these allergic responses or maybe intolerances, you hear people, I'm intolerant to this. And then that can roll into allergy. And then if, as far as an allergic reaction, are often on that can then develop into autoimmune. And so there's just this funnel effect of things that happen.

[00:56:34] Anyway, so it degrades your tight junctions. It degrades your body's cell to cell ability to communicate through what are called gap junctions. So if you cut your hand, how does your body know to reform and connect the skin? If you think about it, that's a pretty crazy cool thing that it just does normally. It's communicating. All those cells are communicating, and it's saying, okay, we need more material here and here.

[00:57:15] And so what glyphosate does is it decreases your body's ability to communicate through gap junctions, which are these connections between cells networked all through your body. In medicine, there's the guy who studies kidneys, the guy who studies heart, brain. But the reality is we're functionally coupled. We're whole beings. Everything communicates.

[00:57:41] And these gap junctions are part of that communications network. Glyphosate turns that off, and that's really bad. The third thing it does is it drops Nrf2 production by about 30%, and that essentially turns it off. And what that does is, again, I talked about Nrf2 being the pathway that gets toxins out of your body. All of a sudden, if your Nrf2 pathway is turned off, all these toxins become that much more toxic. Glyphosate, because of that, it's the mother of all toxins, I think. Actually, I didn't come up with that. I think Jeffrey Smith, if you know Jeffrey, came up with that.

[00:58:28] But it makes every toxin more toxic because your body can't get rid of it as easily. So what's the solution? Thankfully, when we did these studies on tight junctions, on gap junctions and Nrf2 and glyphosate, we also put our product broccoli on the same cells to ensure a reversal of the effect. So sulforaphane, Nrf2--

[00:58:59] Luke: You just gave me an excuse to eat pizza.

[00:59:01] David: Well, that's the gluten. Gluten does increase your tight junctions as well. Yeah. So basically, the master regulator of tight junctions is Nrf2. Sulforaphane is the best natural molecule at stimulating Nrf2. And so it's basically really good at keeping those tight junctions intact. And it reverses the glyphosates degradation similar with Nrf2. It actually turns back on its production and gap junctions. Again, it reestablishes the communication network.

[00:59:45] That's the very speedy description of those studies that are a bit more nuanced. But again, John Gilday is our brains of the operation. And so we talk through a-- it'd be good cool to see what's glyphosate do with this. What does it do? And so he walks through them and is able to show us.

[01:00:09] Luke: You reminded me because you both worked on the ION product, formerly known as Restore. I remember when that hit the scene, there was a lot of buzz about that. A few years ago, I interviewed Zach Bush in San Diego. Yeah, he's been on a few times now. We'll put everything you guys in the show notes, by the way, at lukestorey.com/mara, M-A-R-A. We'll link to the Zach Bush interviews.

[01:00:33] But anyway, we did this great interview toward the beginning of the COVID situation. And he was just talking about viruses are everywhere. They're fine. Don't freak out. It's a great conversation. Even retroactively, I recommend people listen to it. But anyway, we do this conversation. We're getting to know each other, having a great time. Hey, let's all go out to eat. And we're in suburban area of San Diego. There's no like, organic places around.

[01:00:57] So we end up at an Italian joint and dude orders pasta, and then they bring bread, and he's eating the bread. And I'm looking. I go, Zach, dude, you know how much glyphosate's on that? And he's like, no, I take my ION every day. I'm good. I'm sure he doesn't eat like that all the time, but talking about practice what you preach, there must be something to that because he has the body of knowledge that would signal to oneself, like, oh, hey, that's off the menu. I'll get some fish, or steak, or whatever that is not gluten.

[01:01:31] And he was just having a great time living his life. It was helpful for me because I would say more so than the now tend to lean on the orthorexic side of being afraid of the environment and everything I eat and being so hypervigilant about it. But I thought that was interesting. And after he told me that, then I started really upping my game with the ION, especially if I was eating something suspect.

[01:01:54] I'd take a shot of it before or after and maybe follow with some activated charcoal or something like that, because it's just difficult to live your life in the modern world and try to be so controlling about every little thing. So I'm always looking for add-ons to the strategy that make life less constrictive.

[01:02:15] David: A funny aside on ION, which was then Restore-- so my background in science is Mara was diagnosed with cancer, and she was a nurse, and so she had seen what chemotherapy did to people. And she's like, I don't want to do chemo. Can you look at natural molecules that would be a natural chemo? And so I was like, sure. And so we're heading down this integrative path, not just poo-pooing traditional, but also not saying it's all right. And then I was like, whatever we do there, we just promised ourselves it has to be a breadth of literature backing it. I don't want to do crazy stuff. And so we wind up in Zach Bush's office back in 2012, and he's just a country doctor at that point, and he--  really nice guy-- wrote on this no labeled, white, Boston round plastic bottle, two tablespoons twice a day. And there are no studies on this.

[01:03:33] He's like, no, it's brand new stuff. And so we're driving back up to where we lived. And  I call up John Gilday. He's like, hey, John. Just met this guy. Gave us this bottle. Can I give it to you so you can just make sure it's not poisonous. Just give me something. He's like, yeah, bring it by. So I brought it by, and Zach actually had a notebook of soil science papers that I gave it to him too, but it wasn't on this product.

[01:04:14] And so long story short, the next week, John, who is never sick, he's like-- once in a two-year period gets sick-- he's sick. He's in bed, and he's flipping through this full science papers thinking about this product, and here's this Audible, from God. This is the antidote to glyphosate.

[01:04:42] And he's like, dude, this never happens. So it gets better and figures out some-- and sure enough, he tests stuff. He's sick in bed, and so he's figuring out how he's going to test this. And so he does and comes back, and sure enough, it was very good at, again, the tight junction.

[01:05:07] Luke: Really?

[01:05:07] David: Yeah.

[01:05:08] Luke: Cool.

[01:05:10] David: Yeah. Mara was at the center of that.

[01:05:14] Luke: Oh, that's so interesting. Wow. Do you think there's any legitimate utility in taking a couple of activated charcoal capsules after one eats a bunch of gluten at a standard restaurant where the likelihood of it being full of glyphosate is high? Obviously, we're talking about tightening those junctions and making the gut less permeable. But I always think about, oh, just taking like a bentonite clay, or charcoal, or something, to suck it up on the way out.

[01:05:51] David: Yeah, yeah. I actually am a fan of activated charcoal. I think in terms of toxins, yeah. The issue with glyphosate is it's water soluble, so it may just go it through, whereas the activated charcoal would get rid of the stuff that's left in the gut.

[01:06:15] Luke: Oh, okay. You might have instantly absorbed the water soluble glyphosate. Okay. Noted.

[01:06:22] David: Yeah. I haven't done a lot of research on the clay, and somebody asked me about Shilajit, and I have seen-- I can't say [Inaudible] is bad, but a couple of the ones I looked into, I'm like, yeah, I don't think I would do that, but there's so much out there.

[01:06:41] Luke: Cool. Noted. All right. Let me just make sure I got everything I wanted out of that one. God, there's a lot to the sulforaphane. But I do want to cover some other stuff. So I think--

[01:06:58] David: Let me just throw out.

[01:07:00] Luke: Did we miss the glowingly big movie parts here?

[01:07:04] David: So, BDNF is at the center of brain health. It helps protect existing neurons. It helps grow new neurons. Sulforaphane in broccoli actually upregulates BNDF. And so about 25% of people who take our product have very vivid dreams at night.

[01:07:37] Luke: Oh, interesting.

[01:07:37] David: And that's BDNF. And so, when I was doing customer support early on, I'd get people calling in, Hey, it's not working. We have a very generous no questions asked, money back guarantee because we want people to try it because we know it works, but we also know everybody's different.

[01:07:57] And some people may, and may not, notice a difference and so that's fine. And so this guy was like, Hey, I want my money back. It doesn't work. It's like, okay, it's not a problem. Hey, let me ask you, have you had vivid dreams recently? And he just paused. He's like, no way. He's like, that's this. He's like, yeah.

[01:08:16] And so I explained to him. And he's like, that’s amazing. So anyway, BDNF, brain health, very important topic, especially now. And there are some-- we can't talk about specific diagnosis, but mood-related issues. There's a whole vein of literature on mood-related issues that sulforaphane is good for. And then one of my favorites is balding at the--

[01:08:48] Luke: Oh, you got my attention now.

[01:08:50] David: The DHT, the type of testosterone that leads to balding, basically the sulforaphane, downregulates that. And so I would be bald right now, I think.

[01:09:04] Luke: Really?

[01:09:05] David: Yeah, without it, I think.

[01:09:07] Luke: All right. I'm getting on the mega dose. I do my best to not get caught up on vanity, but I don't know. There's something about the receding hairline that is-- it's hard as a guy, at least this guy.

[01:09:22] David: So autophagy, basically helping cells that need to be shown the door, that need to die, that are having trouble dying. Those cells can have trouble dying. They can lead to cancer cells. Sulforaphane actually helps promote autophagy, which is the programmed death of those similar with mitophagy mitochondrial.

[01:09:53] Fasting is good for mitophagy too. So when we don't eat, one of the benefits of fasting is you actually kill off the mitochondria and the soles for that matter that need to be killed off. Well, in this scenario, if you're not fasting, sulforaphane, basically, does the same thing. Fasting, anti-aging, both of those aspects of sulforaphane on anti-aging.

[01:10:23] Mentioned, watercress before. So John, our scientist, developed an assay through a buccal swab in your cheek to measure Nrf2 activation. And so he can show competitor products don't activate Nrf2 whereas ours does. And one of the reasons it does is that PEITC, that chemical from watercress, that we put in it as well. And that's a pretty unique thing that, again, nobody's talking about, but we think it's really at the center of why our product is the best.

[01:11:04] Luke: That's badass. So it upregulates mitophagy and autophagy.

[01:11:11] David: Yeah, both of them.

[01:11:11] Luke: Wow. That's badass. I didn't know that.

[01:11:14] David: Yeah, so it has about five other anti-aging things it does that we won't go into, but I can--

[01:11:23] Luke: That's incredible. Wow. I knew I had to talk to you for some reason and now I'm learning why. Okay. But I do, in the interest of time, want to cover some other things. I think the next thing we were going to talk about was the QuercElite.

[01:11:40] David: We can talk about QuercElite.

[01:11:42] Luke: The quercetin, your version of it is QuercElite. And in my notes here I see like, as it says on your site-- and, by the way, thank you for putting all the PubMed links on your site too. I'm the geek that will go in and be like, all right, they're saying it does this thing. Is there any research to support this? But this is another one that's bioavailable.

[01:12:02] There's definitely a market intention to designate these products as a percentage bioavailable or more bioavailable. And Quercetin is one of those ones, another one of these compounds that I learned about years ago, and learned that it was most present in capers. And so I started buying jars of capers and just pounding those. And then I heard--

[01:12:27] David: Onion skins

[01:12:27] Luke: Oh really?

[01:12:28] David: Yeah.

[01:12:28] Luke: And then I heard, yeah, that's fine, but you're not going to absorb much of it. So again, it's like, ah, God, here's this thing that's been proven to do great things for the body, and how many capers can one eat? Right?

[01:12:38] David: Yeah. In our company, we all save the onion skins. It's the most nutritional part of the onion and then we'll throw it into the broths and then in a cheesecloth, because I think that form actually does get through, but it tastes nasty if it's just by itself. It's also good if you like dying Easter eggs, right?

[01:13:03] Luke: Right.

[01:13:04] David: So yeah, it's not bioavailable. I think with quercetin, I think less than 5% gets through. And so what are the things that it does? So one is, there are things we can say so with seasonal sneezy issues that, basically helps nip those in the bud.

[01:13:39] So basically friend of mine-- this was before we did our QuercElite. Basically John had made this a 1.0 version. Some friends came over and this girl, this daughter of our friend's couldn't even go outside because of the reaction she was having to the pollen. And I just put some powder in this 50-ounce test tube, shook it up with some water, had her down at, and 15 minutes it was a complete reversal.

[01:14:21] And so the issues is that if you're in that reaction, you have to take a bit more than the two that we recommend. If you're a getting ahead of it until you're not in the reaction, two should be fine to maintain. But if you're in that and you need to want to get over it, maybe it'll take two to four hours until you notice the shift.

[01:14:50] The other thing that quercetin does is there are cells that are called the zombie cells, the senescent cells. So quercetin is a senolytic. So it will show those cells, like, I hope those cells die. So the senescent cells, it secretes things that kill every cell around it, and so it's very pro aging. And so the quercetin helps kill those cells. So those are the two things we talk about with quercetin.

[01:15:25] Luke: That's super cool. We have something here in Texas, I don't know if y'all have this spec where you're from called cedar fever.

[01:15:33] David: No, don't know that.

[01:15:34] Luke: Oh my God. There's a shitload of cedar trees here. Cedar trees are cool. They have a great energy. I like them. I like the way they smell. I walk by and grab their needles, and they have a really nice terpene central oil to them. So they don't bother me. But last year, my wife, Alyson, got hit with this. We didn't know what was going on. And then started asking around, and people are like, oh yeah, that's cedar fever. Many people get here.

[01:15:59] One person gets it. The other one doesn't. It was like she had Lyme disease or something. She was wrecked so much to the point where finally, we just had to leave. I drove her down to the coast for a few days just to get a reprieve, somewhere there are no trade winds carrying this pollen. It's a real thing, man, and the people that get it tend to get it really bad.

[01:16:21] So I'm extremely glad to hear about that. And I have noticed a lot of your, I guess I can say the word because I don't sell anything, but a lot of people that get these reactions to things in the environment that plants make, a lot of the products, the natural products will contain that quercetin, as you call it, quercetin. I think we have to agree that we pronounce things differently. Tomato, tomato.

[01:16:47] David: Core, core. Yeah.

[01:16:48] Luke: And so you'll look at the ingredient deck of a lot of things that are over the counter at the health food store for this. And we tried a bunch of them, and nothing really moved the needle. Nothing helped. Even the homeopathics where somebody takes the juniper berries and does a dilution of them or whatever, it was great marketing. You read the body. You're like, ah, this is the silver bullet here.

[01:17:15] And really nothing worked except just leaving town, because, like you said, with that particular issue there, and I've not thankfully suffered from that in my life, but it seems once it gets a hold and you're in that histamine reaction, you're toast. But if you can get ahead of it, it seems like you have a much better chance of staving it off than trying to retroactively get yourself out of it once it takes hold.

[01:17:40] Do you know what the relationship between the quercetin and the histamine response is? How does it work, if you happen to know? If it's too hard to dance around, it's fine. I understand.

[01:18:02] David: There's some dancing and some rustiness.

[01:18:05] Luke: Okay.

[01:18:05] David: Combination of both.

[01:18:08] Luke: Anyway, you give us your anecdotal story that s helpful for that. I'm going to bank on that, and I'm going to--

[01:18:14] David: Yeah. And all of this stuff, if people want to try it, it's the type of thing where we want things to be a win-win. And so we have a 100-day money back guarantee. Just try it. If you're like, it didn't work, we are not going to be offended, and you can just get your money back. We just want people to try stuff because a lot of people--

[01:18:38] Luke: I appreciate that. I had the guys from BiOptimizers on the other day, and they're one of our longtime sponsors on the show, and they have, I think, a year money back guarantee. And I asked them. I was like, how do you guys stay in business? And they're like, we just don't get many returns. It's really rare because their stuff is high quality and it works. And I thought, man, that should be the gold standard in the supplement industry, is some-- a few people have a 30-day, I guess, here and there, but it's, I think, less the norm.

[01:19:08] But what a great insurance for people that are spending their hard-earned money on something and then it just sits in the cabinet because they didn't get a noticeable effect from it. So I like that policy. And on that note, I have in my notes here too, you guys have a discount for the listeners, which I always appreciate. If you guys go to mara-labs.com/lukestorey, you can save up to 28%, which is really cool.

[01:19:33] All right, let's talk about berberine.

[01:19:36] David: Berberine.

[01:19:37] Luke: Yeah. And there's another one. Again, not to be a broken record here, but I showed you my old bottle I've had for years in there, and I think I had high cholesterol, or blood sugar problems, or something, and functional medicine doctors, oh, you need to get on berberine.

[01:19:49] And so I did, and then I kind of forgot about it, found the bottle in the pantry, got on it again, and then started learning that this is one of those ones too where the bioavailability is an issue. So maybe tell us about this particular compound, what some of its benefits are, and why some are easier to assimilate than others.

[01:20:13] David: Yeah. And so I think that the actual study showed 0.6%, 0.68% of berberine gets to the gut barrier. And so very, very little of it gets through the gut barrier. And so what berberine does and what people have probably-- if you've heard of it, you've heard it in the context of regulating blood glucose, and the blood glucose spikes, and that sort of thing.

[01:20:42] And so basically regular berberine, though, it actually takes about six to eight weeks for that regulation to kick in. And so with our product, we call it BerbElite. We did this study. We basically take two capsules at-- so basically, you have dinner. Don't eat overnight, skip breakfast, take two BerbElites, and by noon, you'll be in a light ketosis.

[01:21:17] Luke: Really?

[01:21:18] David: Yeah.

[01:21:19] Luke: Whoa. What if you stack it with exogenous ketones? I love this Ketone-IQ drink. I don't love the flavor. I don't love it like I love a tasty beverage, but I had two already today. It's my secret weapon for energy, mental clarity. I'm just obsessed. Do you think there'd be any added bonus to stacking those two?

[01:21:40] David: Yeah. So the whole idea of being in ketosis is that you are using ketones as fuel. So typically, how energy production works and how energy usage works is you use glucose in your cells for energy. So one glucose yields one ATP, adenosine triphosphate, is through the Krebs cycle, which is in your mitochondria, which why your mitochondria is the energy production center of your body and why mitophagy is so important, the killing of exists old mitochondria to allow growth of new mitochondria.

[01:22:27] And so with ketones, though, if you actually are keto adapted and you can use the ketones as fuel in that same crib cycle, you can put one ketone in and you could get 1.5 ATP out. So it's more efficient. The issue though is it takes time. It takes even a month or so of being in ketosis to really fully adapt to using ketones well. And so the person who did that example of being in ketosis by noon, if they weren't keto adapted, they probably wouldn't use, I think it's half, 0.5, was one of the measures of it that's coming to mind.

[01:23:15] It's true you're in ketosis, but your body's not adapted necessarily to use everything. So if you throw that drink on there, yeah, they might use some, but again, it depends on your adaptation to using ketones. And I think it's important to talk through, because we were talking earlier. There's huge obesity, huge metabolic syndrome in the country, and type 2 diabetes. And so if we think about what's really going on there, you have-- basically, if people have diabetes, they have trouble processing their glucose. So you have insulin. Normal people, you eat a carbohydrate meal, a sugary meal, you get glucose in your blood. Well, insulin is produced. It's the signal to every cell to turn on and receive glucose.

[01:24:22] It gets into the cell. It's processed. It's utilized. But with people with type 2 diabetes, there's a sensitivity. Receptors on those cells are desensitized. And so when the insulin's there, those cells aren't getting in the same amount of glucose. And so what's going on is they're starving.

[01:24:51] What's this metabolic syndrome? You have high glucose. You have high insulin, and you're not able to process that insulin. And so what can happen is when you have both of those high, it's your body's signal to start saving it, so start saving the energy stores as glycogen. So glycogen goes into your muscles. It can go into your liver. But once that's filled up, it goes into fat.

[01:25:25] And so the glucose gets processed, turns into fat. And so one of the things with berberine, that's good. And let me back up too, before we talk about berberine, things that are pro-- the bad thing about having glucose in your blood is it's anti everything healthy because what you wind up with is things called glycation in products that are-- it's raw, like pro-oxidants, and it's basically rust.

[01:26:13] You're basically rusting inside, advanced glycation in products. And so having all that glucose in your blood basically leads to inflammation. It can lead to the diabetes and super fast aging when you're getting all this rust. And so things that are pro insulin are typically not good for you. Things that drop your insulin are typically pro health, pro longevity, so inter berberine.

[01:26:52] So berberine, basically, I suggest people take it at night because it can process glucose. The issue with nighttime, if you eat late at night, once your melatonin kicks in, it rests your insulin production. And so you basically, if you eat a sugary meal or what have you, that glucose will be in your body all night. If you take two berberine, it actually can help begin processing that glucose.

[01:27:29] The other thing too is we talk about exercise. So going back to how energy is stored, it's stored in your muscle. It's stored in your liver. That's why exercise good, is that you're burning the glycogen in your muscles. You're burning the glycogen in your liver. And that's also what can happen with fasting. If you do a multi-day fast, the glycogen stores get burned but.

[01:28:02] It basically allows for room for glucose to go. And so that's why when we age, having more muscle is important, because the muscle is the way we regulate the glucose. And so anyway, berberine, if you take it at night after let's say a sugary-- a late meal doesn't even have to be super sugary, that glucose is not going to sit in your blood all night.

[01:28:32] And so that's, again, really good. I was just looking at berberine, uh, for glucose and ketosis, and we had heard about it actually after Mara died. It was about five years ago. And it was like, this is amazing. But I fanned out to people who are using it and asked for testimonials. It's like, hey, we're trying to get this product out there. Can you guys just share? Clearly, you like it because you keep ordering it. What's going on? What are you using it for? And 75% of the people were using it for sleep. I'm like, whoa. What's that? And so I go to PubMed and type in Berberine sleep? There's a paper that comes up, berberine, better than-- is it Vicodin-- as sleep aid.

[01:29:33] Luke: Vicodin is a painkiller.

[01:29:34] David: So what's the sleep aid?

[01:29:36] Luke: Oh, not Valium.

[01:29:38] David: Valium.

[01:29:39] Luke: Oh, Valium.

[01:29:40] David: Better than Valium.

[01:29:41] Luke: Benzodiazepine. Yeah.

[01:29:42] David: Yeah. They both begin with a v.

[01:29:44] Luke: Yeah. So the funny thing about Vicodin as an opiate is opiates actually make your sleep shitier. I've learned that the hard way.

[01:29:53] David: Yeah.

[01:29:54] Luke: Back in the day.

[01:29:55] David: Valium. So basically, what it's doing is it's actually, this is just regular berberine too. It's not even ours, but it basically increases dopamine by 25%. It's increasing the--

[01:30:11] Luke: What? Even with the crappy absorption, regular berberine?

[01:30:14] David: It's in the gut. It's all gut related. So I think we haven't measured ours. Ours may do it better, but yeah, this was just with regular berberine. And then serotonin, 30%. And a separate study interestingly, it increases oxytocin 15%.

[01:30:34] Luke: Really?

[01:30:35] David: Yeah.

[01:30:35] Luke: That's crazy.

[01:30:37] David: So people really like it for sleep, and that's part of the reason. I think that the anti-inflammatory, like getting the blood glucose out, dropping inflammation is important, but all those other factors are important too.

[01:30:51] Luke: Is there any evidence that berberine can be helpful with sugar cravings? So it sounds like it's a good hack after one's eating some carbs or sugar and you got a high blood glucose, but something that I'll say struggle with because I don't fight it, I just do it and probably shouldn't, but at night, after 9:00 PM you can't stop me from eating sugar.

[01:31:14] It's like the angel and the devil on the shoulders, and the angel's like, don't do it. You don't need that. Just go to bed. And most nights, the devil wins, and I'm going to eat some form of sugar. And it's not a great habit. I wonder if, after dinner, taking some berberine would help folks with the actual onset of wanting sugar in as much as it's helpful after one has eaten.

[01:31:39] David: Yeah, I think there is some evidence to that. Uh, yeah. Did I see a sauna in here, or is that somewhere else?

[01:31:52] Luke: Yeah, right there.

[01:31:53] David: Yeah, I thought so. Get in that baby and stay in there as long as you can. You'll just get knocked out. No sugar cravings.

[01:32:02] Luke: Really? That's cool because I usually take my saunas in the morning. I did one this morning. Yeah.

[01:32:07] David: I do it at night. When I do it at night, I have a great sleep.

[01:32:12] Luke: I'm going to try that. I'm going to try that. Not that I've never done that, but I typically do it in the morning. But it's maybe counterintuitive to me because I'm always looking to drop my body temperature at night.

[01:32:25] David: But it does.

[01:32:26] Luke: Does it?

[01:32:26] David: It does.

[01:32:27] Luke: Really?

[01:32:27] David: Yeah. So cold dips in the morning, which actually helps raise your body temperature.

[01:32:32] Luke: I'm doing that on the daily.

[01:32:34] David: Then saunas in the evening will help lower it.

[01:32:38] Luke: That's so crazy.

[01:32:39] That's funny. That's very counterintuitive. Yeah. Because I'm always thinking, okay, I need to start getting really cold before I go to bed. I have my Chilisleep Dark Pro, so my bed's super cold. Thank God, I could never live in Texas without that thing, but that's cool. I'm going to try that. I could take some berberine, then take a sauna, then go to bed.

[01:33:00] David: Go to bed. Sleep like a baby.

[01:33:02] Luke: And you guys also have a sleep aid product. That's what it's got valerian and passion flower, that kind of stuff?

[01:33:10] David: Yeah, it has ashwagandha. So basically, just like curcumin, there are a million curcumin products out there. And a friend of mine calls it the curcumin wars. Everyone says they have the best product. There are a lot of sleep products out there. And we just wanted to offer one that didn't have melatonin because most of the supplement industry, the biggest category of supplement industry is sleep. The biggest ingredient in supplements in sleep is melatonin, by far. But it's a hormone. I'm very pro melatonin. I like melatonin.

[01:33:44] Luke: Yeah, me too.

[01:33:45] David: But there are people that just can't-- they can't do it. And I think it's a growing number. And so we were trying to offer things that aren't on the market that we like, so that's our MO. And so we wanted a product that-- we have the Oura Ring. So we know increases deep sleep. That is not currently out there. Ashwagandha helps get sleep. It has broccoli powder in there for the BDNF. It has berberine for serotonin and dopamine.

[01:34:25] And then it has some serotonin precursors, tryptophan, 5 ATP, as well as it's a sleep and mood. So some people who have mood issues can't sleep. Some people who can't sleep tend to develop mood issues. And so what comes first, the cub or the horse, chicken or the egg?

[01:34:44] A lot of people who have mood issues can't methylate their B vitamins. So we have a methylated B6, and then a methyl donor. And so we couldn't fit-- you talked about your wife not liking big capsules. We are very pro small capsule mainly because what I walked through with Mara, sick people can't take-- its not sure. Sick people can't take big capsules.

[01:35:08] And so we want as small a capsule as possible for people so as many people as possible can take it if they want to. And so we keep it in a small capsule. But the difficulty is you can't get that much stuff in there. And so we have a methyl donor, and so in a reaction, if you have a lot of reagent, it can drive the methylation of unmethylated other B vitamins. So that's the rationale there. So it's sleep and mood.

[01:35:35] Luke: Awesome. I love it. That's the first one I got of yours, and I went through it in a very short period. I liked it. Yeah.

[01:35:42] David: Yeah. Did you notice anything with your-- I see you have Oura Ring.

[01:35:45] Luke: I didn't test it with the Oura Ring, but I did find it helpful for sleep, which is why I burned through it super-fast. I don't know the way I work, and I don't recommend this for people listening. If a bottle says take three, I'll start the first night with 10. I'm a dumb ass like that. But I want to push the threshold, and then if I wake up, in that case, I don't remember waking up groggy, but that could be a side effect of taking too much of something that relaxes you. And then I'll scale it back until I find the sweet spot. I did find it to be helpful. Yeah.

[01:36:21] David: I'll say I'll occasionally wake up at the 3:00 AM hour, and I'll have-- I keep a BrocElite, a BerbElite, and SleepElite next to my bed. And if I wake up, I'll take them. And inevitably nine times out of 10, I won't just go back to sleep. I'll have the best sleep of the night in that span of time. I'll wake up 6:30, 7:00-ish. Won't be like, oh, can't get up. I'll be like, oh, that was the best, that sort of thing.

[01:36:57] Luke: That's awesome. I'm going to try that. Yeah, I do have bouts where I wake up around that 3:00 or 4:00 thing energized and have to put on a podcast or something to fall back asleep. It's annoying.

[01:37:09] David: We'll say, with berberine too, one of the most mind-boggling studies, anti-aging studies that John and I have read. John read it, sent it to me. He is like, you got to read this. So basically, they did. It was a mouse study. They aged mice with chemotherapy, all of them. And then half of them, they gave berberine to. Again, regular berberine.

[01:37:35] I'll have to look back. A lot of these studies, they either squirted into their abdominal cavity or given IV. So I can't exactly remember how they bypassed the bioavailable issue, but probably IV. They lived 80% longer than the mice that didn't get it, which is just like, what?

[01:37:57] Luke: That's insane.

[01:37:59] David: Yes, it is insane. We've never seen a study like that. So again, we think, they didn't say in that study, but we think it's against senescence. If you think, what is chemotherapy doing? It's creating a ton of senescent cells that then, potentially, berberine is showing the door, getting them to die.

[01:38:25] Luke: Badass. All right. The last thing, I think those famous last words-- I always think it's the last thing, and then I think of more interesting things to talk about, but resveratrol. That's been one of the heavy hitters on the anti-aging scene for a while. I think some of the products I use have some of it in there, here and there. It's something I see on labels. It's not one that I've researched a lot. It's just you hear about the Blue Zones or people in France that drink tons of red wine and it's been attributed to their longevity and so on, but I don't really know a lot about it. It just seems to be smart people like you and others are big fans. So I want to learn more.

[01:39:07] David: Yeah. Have you followed David Sinclair's research?

[01:39:10] Luke: No, I haven't.

[01:39:11] David: He's the guy.

[01:39:12] Luke: I hear the name.

[01:39:14] David: Yeah. He's worth a follow, worth getting his book that came out a couple of years ago. But he's out of Harvard, and he actually had the resveratrol company sold to big pharma for three quarters of a billion. And don't quote me on that. That's what I'm remembering. But then they just went belly up because what they're trying to do was create a synthetic resveratrol.

[01:39:41] And so I think he had research showing resveratrol does is anti-aging anyway. If you go onto anti-aging, like I'm on a Facebook group and everyone's poo poo resveratrol because it didn't work. It didn't work. The company went out of business. I'm just like, guys, it's like apples and oranges. They weren't trying to market resveratrol. They were trying to create a synthetic version.

[01:40:09] So you can't say that resveratrol doesn't work. So basically, what it does is there's these different pathways called sirtuins, and SIRT1 is the specific one that resveratrol works against. And so that's the aging pathway. So it helps with the SIRT1. Sinclair showed that. He's like, your children will live to 120 or longer.

[01:41:00] It's going to be common. What he's doing is he is reversing aging. It's not just anti-aging. He has the formula to move it backwards. It's sci-fi. But John, again has read all of his stuff, the fine print and everything. John is trying to figure out the [Inaudible] because a lot of them-- I think there're four or five compounds he's using that most of them are biologics, synthetics.

[01:41:37] So John's trying to do find the natural equivalents to do the same research. But yeah, it's upon us. So resveratrol, great antiaging. The issue is, as with all of them, it's not bioavailable. So typically, you read Sinclair takes a gram a day. Again, what ours does is we combine it. We attach it to a protein. So our technology is we have a protein that we attach a sea-based carbohydrate to, and we create a novel molecule that we then attach these phytochemicals too.

[01:42:22] Resveratrol basically gets to the gut barrier. The other issue is that the resveratrol-- there's the first pass metabolism, and so ours stays in the circulation a little bit longer so it can get to these cells.

[01:42:38] Luke: Do you guys have patents on any of these?

[01:42:41] David: So that molecule, we have a patent pending on.

[01:42:44] Luke: Oh, cool.

[01:42:45] David: So that's our technology. Hopefully we'll get it.

[01:42:49] Luke: I'm imagining your laboratory. I'm the guy that watches the how we make stuff shows and all that. I love to see behind the curtain. What I'm imagining it to be is this mad scientist, your partner John's in there with beakers and test tubes. Is it like I imagine, how you guys are doing this research and developing these novel ways to deliver these compounds?

[01:43:16] David: It's cool because he's been in the industry so long. He can go on Amazon or eBay. He's like, oh, this plate reader used to be a $100,000, and it's for 2,000. And he's like, get it. Then we get all this equipment that's world class that people have-- there may be two upgrades ago, but he can still use it and do cutting-edge stuff, or we have a microscope that was 300,000 that we got for 10,000, stuff like that. So it's just pretty cool.

[01:43:57] Luke: So cool. Yeah. I love geeking out on science in that way. I think because I'm not a scientific or mathematically-inclined person, but I really enjoy people that are because I'm not. Fascinating.

[01:44:11] David: Yeah. Before we had Mara labs, I basically converted my kids' playroom into the lab. And so we were buying this equipment. So basically, with her cancer, what we did was we wanted to figure out, when you give her a curcumin product that we know kills her type of cancer, how do you know it's working?

[01:44:40] And so we got this thing called a digital PCR, and I found a unique marker on her cancer called a SNP, a single nuclear head polymorphism that was basically her bio biomarker, so that if it killed the cells, the genetic material root lysed, and we would be able to measure how much lysed.

[01:45:01] So it's again, personalized medicine, but I had to buy this. And the guy came to, but they didn't sell to anybody. So I had a hood, a microscope, a plate reader, incubator, all in this. I was literally a 100 square feet. So this guy comes in, and he's like, this is the most amazing room, because usually, you have a room. You have a big room, and it was all concentrated, and this a 100 square foot.

[01:45:35] Luke: Dude, I love it. I love it.

[01:45:36] David: That was the mad science. Now we're a bit more mainstream.

[01:45:39] Luke: You guys have legitimized yourself a bit since then. With the resveratrol, as I understand, that's derived from grape skins. Is that correct?

[01:45:50] David: Yeah. So the grape skins, the grape seeds have it. And then ours comes from a Japanese knot wood, is the source that's just readily available.

[01:46:02] Luke: Oh, cool. And what does berberine come from?

[01:46:06] David: Yeah, it's a plant. So it's actually similar to-- it's Ayurvedic and so Indian-Chinese 3000, 5,000 years old. Been used for gut stuff for a long time. Similarly, with curcumin, has been around forever. So it's ancient.

[01:46:26] Luke: It's its own plant. Oh, okay. Interesting. Man, so cool. So cool. Thank you so much, man. I love deep diving on this stuff, and it's so fortuitous that we got to cover so many of my favorite anti-aging compounds in one conversation because oftentimes someone-- I don't know if I can have a whole podcast about berberine. You know what I mean? Maybe I could, if someone knows enough, but these are all things I've been interested in and using, just like I said, because I hear online, oh, it's good for you. All right, I'll take it.

[01:47:03] David: And what are the two that we're missing that you like?

[01:47:06] Luke: Urolithin A and spermidine. Those are two that are very interesting. And incidentally, I have done shows dedicated to either one of those, but they're novel, heavy-hitting, well-researched anti-aging compounds that I take on a regular basis. With spermidine, interesting about that -- and I don't know that I can solely attribute this to spermidine, but it's known to increase sperm counts.

[01:47:37] It's present in natto, the fermented soybeans. That's the highest food, but it's difficult to get a lot of it from food unless you eat a lot of natto. And most people don't like natto because it smells and tastes like feet. But anyway, I did a sperm test because we want to have a baby, and I might as well check because it wasn't really happening for us. Sperms, just annihilated, gone, zero. Total f on all metrics of sperm measurement.

[01:48:06] Then I learned that taking saunas is really horrible for sperm production, as is exogenous testosterone, which is counterintuitive. I had just started taking it. Never taken testosterone. I thought, ah, I'm going to give it a shot, see how I feel. I'm taking a very low dose, weekly, intramuscular shot, and I learned about the testosterone, so I stopped saunas and stopped testosterone.

[01:48:27] I eventually started doing saunas again because I figured out you could use an ice pack to solve that particular problem. Not going into specifics. But anyway, I tested, and then I started mega dosing spermidine, crazy amounts that, I don't know, you're not recommended even to take. I don't think there's a downside to it, but it's probably overkill and diminishing returns, etc.

[01:48:50] Tested two months later, and I'm like an 18-year-old. I don't know if you could just do that from stopping testosterone and stopping saunas. I suspect it had something to do with the spermidine. So that was interesting. And it's also very useful for autophagy too. There's a lot of studies on that. So I think between those two and all the stuff you guys are doing, if you want to age more gracefully, that's a great stack, all of that.

[01:49:18] And then also the NAC glycine thing too. I was not really that hip to it until you explained that, but I think that could be another one to add in there. Because my goal is always just to live with as much vitality as possible and to hopefully not get any diseases between now and the time I check out of this body.

[01:49:40] I'm not so concerned about how long I'm here, just that while I'm here, I can enjoy my life and be of service. But also, I'm not mad if I live longer and have more time here to develop myself, which is, for me, the purpose of my life, is to evolve here. So this area, I think, is becoming more interesting to me. I just turned 53 the other day.

[01:50:01] David: Oh my gosh.

[01:50:03] Luke: Yeah. So forgive people that are younger and listening to this and they're like, dude, I'm 22. I'm not worried about longevity. But trust me. You will be. You hit 50, and all of a sudden, you start counting down, well wait, the average life expectancy is how much, and I'm 50?

[01:50:17] It becomes more meaningful, I think, as you get older, to just want to feel good. So I appreciate the work you guys are doing and that you're creating unique and innovative products. And those are the only people I like to have on the show because, like I said, you can go on Amazon and buy 50 million curcumin or berberine products, and God bless them, but they're probably not really going to move the needle. So when I find someone that's doing it in a way that's unique and compelling, I'm really excited to talk about it.

[01:50:44] David: Well, it's been a pleasure to be here. Thank you again for having me.

[01:50:48] Luke: Yeah. Right on. All right, so I'm going to remind people, go to maralabs.com/lukestorey. Get yourself up to 28% discount. Now before we go-- and we'll put that as a clickable link in the show notes for you folks too. Before we go, I got one last question for you. Who have been three teachers or teachings that have influenced your life or your work that you'd like to share with us?

[01:51:17] David: All right. Linus Paul Ling did the vitamin C research. He's the only guy that actually won the Nobel Prize twice.

[01:51:31] Luke: Really?

[01:51:31] David: Yeah.

[01:51:31] Luke: I didn't know that. That's cool.

[01:51:34] David: He won it twice. Of course. The Mayo Clinic did an oral vitamin C study and try to debunk his stuff. But yeah, vitamin C and IV vitamin C in cancer, there's no such thing as a silver bullet or a monotherapy, but that's as closest it comes. So his research's great. I've been doing a lot of the idea of omega-3-omega-6 ratios. I think latest research out is having about eight grams a day, which is a lot, is really pro longevity, pro health span.

[01:52:30] And one of the ladies that did that early on 1930s, Joanna Budwig, was big. She was from Germany. Probably would've won the Nobel if she was not a woman. But she actually figured out that if you combine flax seed oil, which is high omega-3s with cottage cheese, it makes its own bioavailable form. So yeah, you just blend it, and it creates a chemical reaction. And it's a bioavailable omega-3. And so she was big with cancers.

[01:53:14] Luke: What about the estrogenic properties of flaxseed? Is that a concern for you?

[01:53:19] David: So if you actually do it with the shells, you can do it without shells. You can do it with shells. They're called-- I'm blanking on the-- but that chemical is actually very pro testosterone.

[01:53:36] Luke: Oh, really?

[01:53:37] David: Yeah. And so you can get a clear flax seed, or you can get a dirty one, and I apologize that I can't remember what, but Barlean's is actually the brand to get.

[01:53:50] Luke: Okay.

[01:53:50] David: The trusted brand. I'm a big Joel Salatin fan. He's not that old, but he's a local where I'm at.

[01:54:01] Luke: Oh, really?

[01:54:02] David: Yeah.

[01:54:03] Luke: I've always wanted to go see his farm.

[01:54:05] David: It's a pretty sweet farm.

[01:54:06] Luke: Yeah.

[01:54:06] David: If you can make it up there.

[01:54:08] Luke: Polyface Farm?

[01:54:09] David: Polyface. Yeah. So his thing is-- actually, that whole movie where he's introduced, Michael Pollan, he's the guy that narrates it and has the famous quote of like, don't buy food where you get your gas. Yeah.

[01:54:33] Luke: Sage advice.

[01:54:36] David: Yeah. I've met Joel, talked to him on my podcast, and just his view of local and that if you go and shake hands with a farmer that makes your food, you know where it's coming from. And I think that's half the issue, is we don't know where our food's coming from, especially the oils.

[01:55:01] You go out. To eat even if it's an organic restaurant, the oils are a big question mark, and they're typically omega-6, pro-omega-6, which is probably rancid, and pro oxidants, and maybe even genetically modified. I think that the idea of food security, knowing where your food's coming from is important.

[01:55:29] Luke: 100%. Yeah. It's one of the cool things about living here in Texas. There's quite a few regenerative farms around that are making waves. And even a lot of the local farmers that might not even be part of that scene, you can find them at the farmer's market and you get raw E2 dairy and grass-finished beef. I've talked to these guys, and these are old cowboy hat wearing Texas ranchers, and I think, oh, here comes the hippie from California that's going to start grilling them.

[01:55:59] And they all, so far, have passed with flying colors. I ask them about not only the feed and whether it's g-ass finished and all that, but if they're vaccinating the animals and some fairly nuanced questions, and they're like, are you kidding me, man? Hell, no. They're old school.

[01:56:17] They figured out that not only are their animal products better for you, better for the environment, but also better for the bottom line. I think that's the thing that's starting to catch on, is like, man, these poor farmers on all these subsidies and stuff, it's just criminal what they're doing to these families. And the suicide rates for farmers, it's just diabolical.

[01:56:40] David: It is. Yeah. Have you followed much with the Weston Price Foundation?

[01:56:44] Luke: Yeah, I'm somewhat familiar. Yeah.

[01:56:46] David: So he was a dentist, again, '20s, '30s, but he was from Philly and did the original world microbiome research where these kids had lots of cavities. And so he's just started feeding them all lunch that was predominantly a salad and showed the shifting of their oral health over a period of time.

[01:57:16] But now that foundation, the Weston Price Foundation, they have a website, drinkrealmilk.com, where you can locate any of your real raw milk near you.

[01:57:30] Luke: Oh, cool.

[01:57:31] David: Yeah, it's a finder that's national. It's mainly raw milk, but they have a conference that we were at in Kansas City a couple of weeks ago, and just salt of the earth people. And that meal I didn't, have to worry about-- it was like this letdown. Actually, these people are more militant about eating than I am.

[01:58:00] Luke: Right.

[01:58:00] David: And so I knew everything was okay.

[01:58:03] Luke: Yeah, yeah. That's the thing. When you look at the Weston A Price photography, when he traveled around and visited these people, you see these big broad smiles and healthy teeth and fully developed jaws and ripped low body fat, it's incredible. If you just ab a photo of someone like that with a malnourished or undernourished person who's on the average American diet, yeah, it's brutal. It's brutal.

[01:58:35] And it's crazy that it's that simple. We're talking about some more exotic ways to improve your health. Personally, I don't believe that in today's world with the toxins to which we're exposed and add EMF and chemtrails, and blue light, and all the assaults that we face every day, I don't know that you could just eat nutrient-dense food from your local farm and thrive. I think we're maybe past that point because most of us grew up, for the first 30, 40, maybe even 50 years, eating Cheerios and whatever.

[01:59:08] David: TV dinners.

[01:59:09] Luke: Yeah. So it's like, I don't know. Maybe if your parents and your grandparents and your great-grandparents were eating from the farm and then you want to do that too, you might be all right. But I think it is wise of us to hedge our bets a little bit and add some things in like we've described today.

[01:59:28] David: There's those natives that he took those pictures of too. One of the other contrasting things is they could poop on demand whereas the average New Yorker, it's once every two days.

[01:59:43] Luke: Right. I didn't know that. That's funny. I remember when I first got into this health stuff, this is in the late '90s, and colon hydrotherapy was a really big deal. And I was following this health expert who was a proponent of a raw food, vegan diet, which I tried the vegetarian at least for a while, and it didn't work for me. My health declined somewhat dramatically, especially my teeth for that matter, because I was getting no fat-soluble vitamins, no vitamin K2, no retinol, and so on.

[02:00:15] But one thing he really had right was colon health. And he would talk about this study that he would cite, was how indigenous peoples-- I don't remember if they were in the Amazon, or Africa, or wherever they were, but just people that weren't eating an adulterated diet would defecate about 20 to 30 minutes after each meal. They're defecating the meal prior.

[02:00:40] And that's how a normal humanoid digestive system is supposed to work. And at that time, I was one of the examples you gave in New York. I'm like, they're going three, four times a day? I'm going three or four times a week at that point. So that was one of the big things that really started to turn my health around, was getting the elimination. Just that was a huge needle mover.

[02:01:06] David: Yeah. And the big buzzword nowadays is the Ozempic with blood glucose, GLP-1. What it's also doing, it's slowing your digestive. And so those say you pooped once a day, that might be once every other day. We talked about decreasing glucose being pro health, increasing glucose being anti health, and it's increasing blood glucose, or insulin, excuse me, insulin. It's increasing insulin, is part of what it's doing.

[02:01:41] And Forbes had an article Berberine Nature's Ozempic. And for those reasons, I wrote a blogger. I was like, no, it's not. I didn't say no. I wrote out the points and it's like, you make your decision. And I think a lot of people were like, yeah, it's. It's like, no, I don't think it's.

[02:02:07] Luke: Cool, cool. Before we go, you mentioned you had a podcast. I didn't even know that. You want to give us a shout out? Is it up and running and active to tune in?

[02:02:14] David: Yeah. Mara Labs Podcast. We are on Spotify and we have a blog, and we put all of our podcasts on our blog. We're not as diligent as you. I think we've done a couple this year. We did about 20 last year. But we do have one we're releasing soon.

[02:02:41] Luke: Awesome. All right. We'll put that in the show notes with everything else we've talked about at lukestorey.com/mara. Man, thank you so much for taking the time to deep dive with me today. I appreciate it. It's great to meet you.

[02:02:51] David: Great to be here. Good to meet you, Luke. Thank you.

[02:02:53] Luke: Right on.

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