Dr, Charles Brenner (FAQs), who discovered Nicotinamide Riboside “NR” (FAQs) (Reviews) as an NAD boosting vitamin joined the BulletProof Radio Podcast to discuss his latest research. Key quotes from the hour long interview:

On Dr Brenner’s Approach to Life

“Well, I would say aging better involves managing stress, sleeping, and eating well, staying physically active, mentally challenged and probably socially engaged.

“But increasingly, we have evidence that keeping one’s NAD up with NR (TRU Niagen) is protecting us against some of the inevitable stresses of life.

“But you got to start off by managing stress, staying active, eating right, and trying to have a positive attitude.”

On the Importance of Keeping Up Your NAD

“NAD is the central regulator of metabolism.

“There’s actually 4 NAD coenzymes.

“These coenzymes are essentially required for all the metabolic transformations that occur in every cell in every tissue.

“You wouldn’t live without them. There is no life without them.

“Conversion of our fuels, protein, fat, and carbohydrate into energy requires NAD — similarly maintaining our blood glucose at night….

“This (NAD) is required for all of our muscles to work and for ideas to be transmitted along our nerves and for us to hear…

On NAD Coming Under Attack with Stress

“…it’s been widely reported that in multiple tissues, our NAD declines in aging.

“NAD declines much more sharply in the conditions of metabolic stress that I’ve described with alcohol, overnutrition, noise, sun damage and then these real disease models like nerve degeneration and heart disease.

“…there’s also a decline in metabolism and cognitive function and resiliency.

“…potentially, by keeping our NAD and NADPH high through aging we can stay more active. It’s potentially a virtuous cycle where if you enjoy exercise and activity more, you’re going to do it more if you recover more easily…

“NAD is under attack in some of these stress conditions and declines in aging.”

On Impact of Boosting NAD with NR (TRU Niagen) to Age Better

“The basic idea is by boosting our NAD with Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) we’re maintaining a higher level of resiliency against damage.

“We’re going to basically age better.

“I still think that we’re going to age.

“I don’t know whether you’re going to get to 180, because there’s not a lot of human examples of people getting beyond 120.

But there’s a lot of examples of people being very debilitated in their 70s, 80s, and 90s. That’s what we really want to avoid.

“We want to square the curve so that people are living more capable lives for a longer period of time, and are aging better essentially. I think that NR has a definite role in that.

“It’s (NR, TRU Niagen) an over-the-counter supplement.

“It’s being tested for diseases and conditions.

On What Time of Day Dr Brenner Takes NR

“The research that we’ve done on it shows that there’s a diurnal (daily) function of NAD. There’s a daytime peak and a nighttime peak.

“The daytime peak is normally coming from our digestion of food. We eat food in the morning and our NAD gets broken down into NR and Nicotinamide and Nicotinic acid. You’re boosting your daytime NADP by taking NR in the morning.

“Some people including myself take their daily dose of NR split into an AM and a PM dose.

On NR Dosing

“I would say that at the so-called recommended dose, which is 225-millimeter capsules most people take it in the morning.

“What you’re getting is an improvement. It’s like an antivirus software that’s running. It’s running in the background.

“If you didn’t get a cold this winter or a bunch of your friends got colds, if you just experience less time zone disruption than your work partner or travel mate, that’s kind of your effect.

“You were a bit more resilient.

“But as people get to higher doses like the folks in this recently published University of Colorado study who were taking a half a gram in the morning and a half a gram in the evening, those are more of a therapeutic dose.

“The therapeutic trials that are going on in at least I think 16 sites around the world are tending to use doses that are higher.

On Time it Takes NR to Impact People

“For people that know their mile time or their swim time or they have something of a health complaint like, gee, I wish I could sleep a little bit better or I wish that I could focus a little bit better in the afternoon and they keep a journal, when they try Nicotinamide Riboside (NR)…

“….probably by the second or third week — and some people notice something on the first day.

“But most of us notice something in this second or third week that they’re just functioning at a sort of higher level. That’s something that you can sort of notice if you keep a journal.

On NR Safety

“I want to say that it’s safe. We’ve very extensively tested it for safety. Placebo control trials show that taking 1 gram a day does not cause adverse events. It’s not been tested in every possible combination with every possible genotype of a human being or every possible medication that a person could be on, but people can try it.

On NR and Alcohol Consumption

“….Binging (Alcohol), not so good…

“…the liver loves taking up Nicotinamide Riboside (NR, TRU Niagen).

“I would say that if you were like going into Passover Seder or some other reason why you’re going to have 4 glasses of wine just as I did on Friday night last week, preparing your body with a little bit more NR is probably a pretty good idea.

On NR and Neuroprotection

“…we’ve done a lot of neuroprotection things with Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) in mice and rats and orally available NR is neuroprotective. I mean that’s been shown in peer reviewed studies.

On NR Impact on Hair, Nails, Workout Recovery, Jet Lag

“One of the things that you will notice, it’s a little on the trivial side, but it’s noticeable is that hair and fingernails grow faster.

“…people do notice that their fingernails grow faster and stronger

“Then, people that workout typically find that a recovery happens more reliably, faster and that they can hop on a plane and adjust to a timezone disruption better than the person in the seat next to them.

On NR & Beating Jet Lag

“Because NAD is circadian, almost everybody takes Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) in the morning when they get up. This is one of those things where if you already know enough about circadian regulation to stay up until 10pm in wherever you’re flying to if you can and then take melatonin if you need it and then get out and get some bright sunlight in the morning. You want to reset with the bright sunlight and Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) in the morning on arrival. That would be the most evidence-based way to use this product.”

On NR and Sleeping Better

“This is extremely anecdotal for me, but I’m one of the people that thinks that he has a sleep benefit of taking NR. Again, that’s not been clinically tested, but that’s something that we’re very interested in.

On NR & Blood Pressure

“But there was one (study) that was just published in, I think, the end of March of 2018. It was at one gram of NR per day. What was found is that the folks on trial who were prehypertensive meaning that their systolic blood pressure was between 120 and 139.9 so they were not medicated for hypertension, they got about a 10-millimeter of mercury benefit so a 10-point drop in their systolic blood pressure by being on this high-dose NR.

On Athletes Taking NR

“…we do know anecdotally of a lot of athletes and even teams that are using Nicotinamide Riboside (NR).

On NR Available Orally not Intravenously

“NR’s not available intravenously. We’ve commercialized it as an oral product. We’ve shown it that it’s orally available.

Listen to the full PODCAST below.

Read a TRANSCRIPT of the podcast HERE.

RELATED:

  • FAQs on taking NAD boosting vitamin supplement Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) can be found HERE.

FOLLOW us on Twitter @RaisingNAD