The researchers expanded on their earlier work with yeast and found that a novel mechanism also applies to mammals.  One of SIRT1’s duties is to stand guard over gene switches to ensure only those that are relevant to healthy function of that type of cell are activated.  When a cell is stressed by toxins, free radicals, germs, UV radiation, inflammation, or something else it can cause DNA damage.  Under these circumstances SIRT1 leaves its guard post and helps out with emergency DNA repair.  While SIRT1 is gone from guard duty genes can activate that should not, causing cell dysregulation and aging.  In a healthy situation, once SIRT1 finishes DNA repair then it returns to guard duty and re-establishes proper gene regulation that may have gone awry while it was gone.

The researchers proved that one common theme of aging is that SIRT1 is not on guard duty adequately.  Aging is invariably accompanied by too many wrong gene signals activated too often.  The greater the DNA damage the faster the aging, due in no small part to the improper gene activation (not necessarily the DNA damage itself).

The researchers also found that giving resveratrol to mice that lacked adequate SIRT1 for proper guard duty restored their gene signals to healthy and reversed aging.  This is a major breakthrough in anti-aging science. 

There has been an effort to try to better measure these functional thyroid problems.  A new calculation has emerged that is based on multiplying your T4 score by your TSH score.  TSH tells you how hard your brain is working to signal your thyroid to go.  As it rises, even within the normal range, it means your brain is trying to get more thyroid hormone into action. 

T4 levels usually drop in a frank hypothyroidism, as your thyroid gland just can’t make enough hormone.  However, before that happens, T4 levels actually rise.  This is a sign that T4 isn’t getting converted to T3 at the proper rate, in turn making cells behave as if they are receiving “hypothyroid-like directions” as not enough active thyroid hormone (T3) is signaling the cells.  This is the sluggish state of thyroid function, and as TSH levels rise out of the normal range it is called subclinical hypothyroidism. 

Even before subclinical hypothyroidism we have sluggish thyroid, which is accurately reflected by a rise in TSH (even within the normal range) and a rise in T4.  This shows “thyroid resistance” similar to the idea of insulin resistance.  The T4/TSH product is rapidly gaining credibility as a way to predict this early stage of thyroid trouble.

A new study just out shows that the T4/TSH product is a very accurate predictor of diastolic blood pressure (the lower number), as it progresses from completely healthy into various shades of elevated blood pressure.  This relationship held true regardless of insulin resistance or body mass index, indicating it is an independent risk variable for elevated blood pressure and consequent cardiovascular disease.  This information is important because it shows one of the very first types of changes that happen to a healthy person that start them in the wrong direction on a path of ever-worsening cardiovascular symptoms and problems.
The most common reason for elevating T4 and sluggish thyroid is a lack of the nutrient selenium that is needed to convert the T4 into T3, along with a lack of antioxidants to protect the thyroid gland and liver (the main site of T4 to T3 conversion).  These issues are easily compensated for with good thyroid support nutrition.

Using advanced technology (CD spectroscopy, photo-induced cross-linking of unmodified proteins, thioflavin T fluorescence, size exclusion chromatography, and electron microscopy) the researchers identified how grape seed extracts prevented the formation of disease-related amyloid β-protein (Aβ40 and Aβ42).

The researchers found that it was rather simple.  The grape seed extracts simply prevented amyloid proteins from folding into shapes that form plaque.  If they can’t fold they can’t form.  While these are animal studies and human trials will now get under way, the research is significant to tens of millions of Americans.

The authors summarized their findings “If the Aß proteins can’t assemble, toxic aggregates can’t form, and thus there is no toxicity. Our work in the laboratory, and Mt. Sinai’s Dr. Giulio Pasinetti’s work in mice, suggest that administration of the compound to Alzheimer’s patients might block the development of these toxic aggregates, prevent disease development and also ameliorate existing disease.”

Elevated triglycerides interfere with leptin getting into your brain properly.  Triglycerides are little fat blobs.  Too many in your circulation is like having too many trucks on the freeway, slowing things down and generally getting in the way.  This is the first time a large study has directly linked them to strokes in a linear fashion (as the number goes up so does the stroke risk). 

The reason for the stroke increase was not explained by the study.  Once leptin resistance is induced by high nonfasting triglycerides then the surplus leptin communicates to leptin receptors on your platelets and makes them stickier.  This results in a combination of too much sludge in your circulation along with platelets that are primed to clot inappropriately.  I have been warning of this problem for years.  This study confirms it in a large population.

Exercise helps break down triglycerides to use as muscle fuel, which is one reason consistent exercise is invariably associated with better cardiovascular health.  In addition to the diet and exercise foundation, many nutrients have a favorable impact on helping triglycerides get out of your blood.  Those with extensive triglyceride-lowering science include DHA, pantethine, niacin, and chromium.  There are many others.  Any nutrient support that helps you manage leptin more effectively will assist you.

Cellular detoxification is also working in harmony with the overall flow of trash out of your body.  Excess cellular waste products and waste products of large tissues (like lactic acid from muscle use) must flow through your lymph and to your liver or directly to your liver through circulation, must be processed by your liver, sent out through urine or in most cases sent into your digestive tract in bile and then out.  Glitches in any step of this plumbing process cause a back up and prevent efficient garbage collection and removal.  Excess garbage then triggers inflammatory and free radical damage and leads to poor health. 

This is not a simple “clean” or “dirty” issue.  You are not going to do some magical detoxification program and never worry about it again.  It is more like the plumbing in your house.  You use it every day and never think about it unless the toilet gets clogged.  It is also correct to think about the issue in varying levels of clean or dirty, a sliding scale ranging from super clean to super dirty.  The cleaner your system runs, the healthier you are likely to be.  There is a reason why garbage strikes in major cities never last very long.

Cellular detoxification systems are occurring in the context of the health of your overall plumbing function.  If cells have extra waste products they can dump them into the fluids outside themselves and small particles will go back into your venous circulation and large particles are carted off by your lymph system. 

Your cells actually try to recycle waste and reuse what they can, a system of economy that society should follow.  The idea is that rather than having a truck come by and pick up the garbage or the recycling, your house would have its own recycling center that actually converts the unusable back in to something useable, and only puts the extra out for collection.  Your cells use protease enzymes (like those found in bromelain or papain) to break down trash within the cells and them assemble various molecules back into something that can be used.

The new study shows that this process is more difficult for no-longer-needed proteins (waste products) naturally embedded in cell membranes.  The problem is that these proteins are no ordinary form of “trash.” They are signaling molecules that are telling your cell how to behave.  They are only supposed to work for a short period of time; otherwise the signal they are sending is not appropriate and can actually cause inflammation, free radical damage, or serious cellular malfunction.  The new research was the first to identify how this process works and how various signaling molecules act as the recycling crew for these cell-membrane proteins.  The researchers believe that the failure of this system to work properly is a fundamental cause of many health problems due to mutated or poorly functioning cells.  I would agree.

In addition to keeping your overall plumbing in good working order, this information suggests that the health of your cell membranes, especially the fluidity of them, is a vital aspect of cellular detoxification.  Diets high in junk food, junk fat, processed food, chemical additives, and sugar are known to make cell membranes less fluid.  This means that these foods, even if they don’t have direct toxicity (which most of them do), are indirectly causing cellular toxicity by making poor quality cell membranes that are not capable of recycling trash properly.

On the flip side of this coin are various fatty acids, fat soluble antioxidants, and other fatty-related nutrients that clearly keep cell membranes in better health.  These include fatty acids like DHA, phosphatidylserine (which also contains phosphatidylcholine), the alkylglyerols of shark liver oil, tocotrienols, etc.  It can now be understood that improving cell membrane health, which will take place over a period of months with appropriate nutrient support, is another key to the detoxification equation and a better quality of health.

When these get out of balance they cause inflammation, toxicity, immune system incompetence, and a host of other problems.

Researchers have now identified that the endothelial cells that line your digestive tract sense the type of bacteria that are present in your digestive tract.  In response to this perception, instructions are then given to form lymph tissue that is specific to keeping that particular foreign type of cell in check (a customized police force). 

Disruption of the integrity of your digestive tract lining, which is a goal of Candida overgrowth, H. pylori overgrowth, or any hostile gang of foreigners, is an essential step for them to disrupt natural immunity and set up shop as a hostile force.

This information places a new emphasis on the health of the lining of your digestive tract as an integral part of healthy digestive balance.  Now that idea is not particularly new, but in the past we have thought of it in the context of reducing leaky gut and general inflammation.  We can now understand that it is also vital in helping to restore proper immune system competence, as cells along a healthy digestive lining are needed in order to properly inform the immune system’s basic lymph structure. 

Nutrients like quercetin and grape seed extracts helps to reduce inflammation on the lining of your digestive tract.  Nutrients like glutamine and N-acetyl-glucosamine help to repair the lining of your GI tract.  This information is crucial for someone with recurring or ongoing intestinal issues and will help many people “get over the hump” in terms of getting their digestion on a better path to health.

The experiment involved teaching video game playing skills to mostly women who don’t play such games.  The research showed that “When trained in the morning subjects showed an 8 percentage point improvement in accuracy immediately after training. However after 12 waking hours following training, subjects lost half of that improvement when tested in the evening. When subjects were tested the next morning 24 hours after training, they showed a 10 percentage point improvement over their pre-test performance.”

The researchers said their testing indicated that sleep is helpful for consolidation of learning and may help with language processes such as reading and writing as well as eye-hand skills such as tennis. 

From my own personal experience I also think sleep helps integrate newly learned complex technical information into one’s existing knowledge base.  I also think that one of my favorite dietary supplements, phosphatidylserine (PS) helps improve this process.

For years I have given PS to children, teens, and adults who wanted to remember what they were studying better.  It is really quite amazing when someone has to cram a lot of information into their head in a short period of time.  I have always had people take it before study.  And many people seeking to generally improve learning take it on a regular basis.

Three or four months ago I decided to start taking one capsule of PS at bed to see if it helps sleep in any way.  My reason for trying this was an anti-aging strategy for my brain.  As we age, receptors in our brains decline and our subconscious brains do not process hormone signals and a lot of other signals anywhere near as well as when we are younger.  I knew from the stress-related research on PS that it was capable of restoring brain receptors for hormones, so I thought by taking it at bed it might have some type of general reparative function that would be anti-aging on brain structure.

In my work I am constantly reading new science, integrating it into what I already know, as well as writing about it.  Often what I read and translate is extremely complex biochemistry where the implications are not all that obvious upon first reading.  I often begin writing about something during the day and take another crack at it in the morning.  I have noticed since I started taking PS at bed that I wake up with the information much more integrated, often seeing relationships to other things I know that I did not see the day before when I was first learning the information.  I never really thought of it until I saw this new study, but I always consider morning my best writing time.  It sure makes sense to me that a good night’s sleep is a great learning time!  This also indicates that those who do not sleep well will have much more trouble learning and retaining information.

Those patients with very low vitamin D levels (vitamin D <20 ng/mL) Had a very high rate of statin-related muscle pain (62.1%) compared to those who had vitamin D scores >30 (17.6%).

At a heart meeting where statin pushing has gone wild, this type of information is annoying.  It would mean that every person to be given a statin should first be checked for vitamin D status so as to prevent unnecessary injury.  Never mind that many elderly people on statins are deficient in vitamin D.  This valid precaution is likely to go in one ear and out the other, viewed as an inconvenience to the system of fast-food drug prescribing.