Dr. Charles Brenner, who discovered Nicotinamide Riboside “NR” (FAQs) (Reviews) as an NAD boosting vitamin and is actively studying NR’s impact on the treatment of COVID-19 recently joined PRECISIONE: The Healthcast podcast to discuss his latest research. Key quotes and podcast embedded below:

On COVID-19 Attacking and Decimating NAD Levels

“Many conditions of metabolic stress disturb the NAD system and disturb cellular resiliency and function…

And what we’ve discovered is that when coronaviruses gain entry into animal cells they disturb the NAD system. They disturb the central catalyst of metabolism.

And the host is trying to use its NAD to defeat viral replication and the host NAD system gets depleted and altered by viral entry.

So we think there are clues to building cellular resistance against viral infection. And this would be boosting the innate immunity not only to coronaviruses but to many other viruses that we’ve shown attack the NAD system.

This is not vaccine technology….but building resiliency and resistance to the virus is something that we are focusing on”

On the Use of NR to Prevent COVID-19 Infection

“…OUR PRIMARY INTEREST and our first publication in the coronavirus realm relates to building defense against the initial infection and the initial establishment of the disease. So it would be more of a PREVENTATIVE STRATEGY.

On the Use of NR in the Treatment of COVID-19

“There’s potentially uses of Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) in COVID-19 treatment as well because there’s evidence from small clinical trials that healthy older people given high doses of Niagen (NR) have lower levels of inflammatory markers — and as you know the cytokine storm is a component of COVID-19 disease”

On Taking NR to Raise NAD in Times of Stress

“But it’s very clear from the work that we’ve already put out on the bioRxiv and that’s in peer review that coronaviruses attack the NAD system in what we consider an actionable way — so potentially a repairable way that would allow greater innate immune defense.

Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) is an NAD precursor (booster) vitamin. It’s something you can take as a supplement. It’s been commercialized as Niagen and it allows your cells to get back up to the NAD levels that they need in order to run optimally.

NAD comes under attack under conditions of metabolic stress — neurodegeneration, obesity, diabetes, central brain injury, viral infection, sun damage, sunburn, DNA damage, reactive oxygen species disturb the NAD system.

So there’s a call for more NAD precursors (boosters) when cells are under metabolic stress.

“Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) is a largest piece of NAD that can get into cells and restore the NAD that our cells need in order to self repair”

On the Quick and Dramatic Impact of Taking NR

“Human clinical trials that we’ve run and others have run have shown that within a number of hours oral Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) is converted into higher blood NAD and within a week the blood NAD is at a higher level, and within 2 weeks it’s at the higher plateau that is achievable at particular doses of NR safely.

So we think that boosting NAD has a use case in basically optimizing health.

The message coming out (from recent studies) is that it looks as though Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) can potentially improve markers of inflammation in as little as 3 weeks, can improve body composition in women in as little as 6 weeks, and start clearing fatty liver in about 12 weeks in men.

And guess what? None of this has been combined with exercise yet. And we all know that increasing physical activity should really be the standard of care for all of us. It’s to combine NR with exercise”

On the Safety of Taking NR

“We know NR is safe up to 1 or 2 grams a day.

The manufacturing process for Niagen is a clean one that has undergone safety review and it’s a compound that’s generally regarded as safe. It’s a new dietary ingredient. And there’ve been studies in which it’s even been considered a new investigative drug application.

We’re excited about the future of Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) research and we want to establish an evidence based use case for supplementation with NR to prevent and treat conditions of metabolic stress and many types of metabolic stress”

On Dr. Brenner’s Publication of NAD / NR / COVID-19 Findings

“Well, we’ve made our first publication. It’s online at the bioRxiv. If you follow me on Twitter @CharlesMBrenner you’ll see links to our first coronavirus paper.

bioRxiv is where scientists put their newest work that is in the process of peer review. And our work is under peer review for vetting by others in the scientific community.

But the work is out there and it shows very specifically how different coronaviruses including SARS COV-2, the causative agent of COV-19 , how when it infects ferrets and even a human patient that died of the disease the NAD system is very specifically disregulated.

A bunch of genes go up, they’re trying to defend against the virus and a bunch of genes go down. And this tells us the ways in which we may be able to defend cellular health by boosting the NAD system.

We show in a number of different ways that the NAD system is under attack by these coronaviruses.

“You have upcoming work on how flu virus and other viruses affect the NAD system”

On Evidence NAD Levels Decline with Age

“I can measure striking attacks on the NAD system in conditions of metabolic stress like sun damage, alcohol, fatty liver, neurodegeneration.

And, yes, there’s evidence that NAD declines in aging.

But I’m not convinced that it isn’t episodic. Maybe it’s that cumulative episodes of sun damage and bacterial and viral infection and overeating and alcohol are really the root cause of NAD decline in aging.

I’m not sure it’s time itself that’s the cause of NAD decline and for certain it’s conditions of metabolic stress that attack the NAD system.

But it is a repairable thing“

On Avoiding Taking NMN, Niacin, Nicotinamide, Intravenous NAD

“I’ve heard lots of people are buying something called NMN. There’s no evidence basis for that whatsoever because we know from animal studies and cellular studies that NMN has to be converted to NR in order to enter cells. There’s no safety dossier on NMN either.

So, NR is the safety tested, evidence based way to boost NAD.

Unlike Niacin it doesn’t cause a flush.

Unlike Nicotinamide it won’t inhibit some of the enzymes that we’re trying to activate.

So, no, I would not advocate for intravenous NAD or other approaches to NAD boosting that don’t have a safety dossier”

On NR and Post Partum

“This process is a metabolic disruption and disturbs the NAD system.

It turns out that mice and rats, if we support the lactating new mom, with Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) we can improve her milk quality, we can improve her postpartum weight loss, and we can improve the neurodevelopment of her offspring into their adulthood.

So, we have a very exciting project with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in order to understand that process further.

We want to understand it more in animals and then we want to put an NAD boosting strategy potentially into human clinical trials with moms in low and moderate income countries and who are clearly under metabolic stress when they’ve had a new baby in non-optimum conditions”

On NR and Cancer

“We’re interested in a number of types of cancer that disturb the NAD system. We’re interested in virtually every type of neuropathy, diabetic neuropathy, chemotherapeutic neuropathy, some kinds of central brain injury that affect the NAD system”

Listen to the podcast below:

RELATED:

  • FAQs on taking NAD boosting vitamin supplement Nicotinamide Riboside (NR) can be found HERE.
  • NR supplementation may have helped sufferers of these diseases & conditions (Consumer Reviews)

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