Nicotine, Nitric Oxide, and the Anti-Aging Revolution: Miracle or Myth?

Join us on this groundbreaking episode as we delve into the fascinating and controversial world of Nitric Oxide with Nathan Bryan PhD, the foremost expert on all things related to this powerful molecule. Dr. Bryan has dedicated his career to understanding Nitric Oxide, a signaling molecule produced naturally by our bodies yet also found as a toxic free radical in industrial pollution.

In this episode, Dr. Bryan tackles the dual nature of Nitric Oxide – exploring its life-saving cardiovascular benefits while addressing its potential toxic threats. He discusses the molecule's significant role in our health and well-being, revealing how it functions as a double-edged sword.

We dive deep into the latest research that suggests Nitric Oxide could be a miracle drug for cognitive function and mental health. Dr. Bryan shares insights into how declining Nitric Oxide production contributes to age-related diseases and what new treatments are on the horizon to mitigate these effects.

The conversation takes a surprising turn as we explore the role of nicotine, often considered a neuroprotective agent, in modulating Nitric Oxide levels. Dr. Bryan provides an expert analysis of whether nicotine's rising popularity in the anti-aging community is warranted or misguided.

Dr. Bryan emphasizes the importance of diet and lifestyle in maintaining optimal Nitric Oxide levels. He sheds light on how modern processed foods and environmental factors are diminishing our body's ability to produce this crucial molecule. Learn about natural precursor nutrients and the best foods to boost your Nitric Oxide levels naturally.

The episode also delves into the hidden dangers of everyday products like mouthwash and antacids that inhibit Nitric Oxide production. Dr. Bryan discusses the need for increased public awareness and regulation of these products, especially considering the role of Nitric Oxide in degenerative diseases.

We explore recent studies suggesting a unique mitochondrial Nitric Oxide Synthase (NOS) variant that could revolutionize our understanding of cellular metabolism and mitochondrial function. Dr. Bryan offers his perspective on this exciting and potentially transformative research.

The discussion wouldn't be complete without addressing the long-term health risks associated with dietary nitrates and nitrites, linked to carcinogenic nitrosamines. Dr. Bryan provides practical measures to mitigate these risks while promoting the benefits of Nitric Oxide.

Finally, Dr. Bryan shares insights into the most exciting and controversial hypotheses currently being explored in Nitric Oxide research. Discover how these cutting-edge ideas might shape the future of medicine and revolutionize healthcare practices, particularly in underserved communities.

Don't miss this enlightening episode packed with expert knowledge, controversial insights, and actionable advice from Dr. Nathan Bryan. Whether you're a health enthusiast, a medical professional, or simply curious about the science behind Nitric Oxide, this episode is sure to captivate and inform. Tune in and join the conversation!

For more information on Dr. Nathans products and continued research, please click HERE

We are two sports chiropractors, seeking knowledge from some of the best resources in the world of health. From our perspective, health is more than just “Crackin Backs” but a deep dive into physical, mental, and nutritional well-being philosophies.

Join us as we talk to some of the greatest minds and discover some of the most incredible gems you can use to maintain a higher level of health. Crackin Backs Podcast

Transcript

Dr. Spencer Baron: 0:00

Welcome to today's episode where we dive deep into a molecule that is as controversial as it is celebrated nitric oxide. Today we're joined by Dr. Nathan Bryan. He is a leading expert in nitric oxide. Is it a miracle drug boosting your heart and brain or a toxic menace lurking in pollution? What's the real deal with its role in aging, mental health and even your diet? Buckle up because we're about to uncover the shocking truth and hidden controversies that change the way you think about this tiny but mighty molecule. Stay tuned. Hey, welcome to the show, Dr. Nathan Bryan, I am very excited about having a conversation with you about something that is so near and dear to you. I want to jump in and start talking about nitric oxide, you seem to be such an authority and expert on it. I looked at your bio, you have like 90 something published papers, and lectures and everything on it. So we can't wait to hear what you have to say. Welcome to the show.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:13

Thanks very much good to be with you unitary.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:15

Good, good. So why nitric oxide? Tell us from the start what turned you on about this molecule?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:23

Yeah, you know, it's an interesting story. Because when I was a student at University of Texas, I was working on a degree in biochemistry. And after my inorganic chemistry course, I told myself, I never want to deal with nitrogen based chemistry again. And then, you know, fast forward a couple of years, and I was a first year student at LSU School of Medicine, working on a PhD in Molecular and Cellular Physiology. And, you know, this, the Nobel Prize had just been awarded for this molecule, nitric oxide. So the scientific community was, you know, excited about it, but there was still a lot of unanswered questions. And then, you know, I trained under a pharmacologist, who had been in the nitric oxide field for, for the previous 20 years. And, you know, it was intriguing to me, and that was, you know, the fact that the body naturally produced a gas that act as a signaling molecule was a completely new paradigm and signal transduction. So, here we are, you know, 30 years later, and I'm still studying this molecule and trying to figure out more about it. So I never got away from nitrogen based chemistry, like, I got deeper.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 2:30

You know, it's funny, but chemistry is definitely not my strong point. But I'm absolutely fascinated, and Dr. Terry Brown can vouch for the same thing. So we're gonna we're gonna try to keep up with you on this, but we have a bunch of questions that we're curious about. So, you know, I went through a lot of literature and did several searches, and it just seems like, you know, just almost like with anything else, there's the good and the evil. Can you share, you know, what your findings are about value and importance? And, you know, sometimes there's too little, and that's a problem. Sometimes there's too much, and that's a problem. Tell me how you feel overall, and then we'll go deeper?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 3:13

Yeah, well, let's, I mean, it's just like any molecule dose dictates the poison, right? We know, you know, water is essential. But you know, water can kill you, if you drink too much over a short period of time, causes hypotonic lysis, is similar with nitric oxide. But, you know, we once thought that there were two conditions too little nitric oxide was, was bad too much nitric oxide could potentially be bad. But we really haven't found a clinical situation where there were too much nitric oxide being produced is an issue. So most of the data are supporting the fact that it's really the loss of nitric oxide and insufficient nitric oxide production, that leads to the onset and progression of chronic disease. But there are toxicities to nitric oxide and one is low blood pressure. So it'll lead to you know, systemic vasodilation loss of perfusion pressure. And then the other concern we have is a condition called met hemoglobin EMIA. And too much nitric oxide will will oxidize the iron of hemoglobin and basically limit the oxygen carrying capacity of the red blood cell. So in in no clinical conditions, you know, once thought that sepsis if a patient became septic, you know, you get a drop in blood pressure, you lose perfusion pressure, and it leads to end organ failure and death. But in the 90s, they questioned this and tested this because they gave nos inhibitors in compounds or drugs that inhibit the production of nitric oxide during sepsis, with the hope that you could, you know, increase or improve mortality and prevent the loss of blood pressure. And what those clinical studies revealed is that if you give a septic patient a inhibitor, the molecule that produced that inhibits the production of nitric oxide actually get worse. So that tells us that there's really not any clinical situation where an inhibition of nitric oxide would be beneficial. And in fact, what we have to do is restore the production of this molecule restore the signaling aspects. And then in that case, what we're finding is there's really not a clinical indication where nitric oxide would not be beneficial. When delivered at the right dose at the right time.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 5:34

We would like to thank Guardian grains for sponsoring the crackenback podcast. These ancient grains are made to keep your gut happy and healthy. Check the description below for a link to their many food products. So the body naturally makes nitric oxide and as you get older, doesn't do as well Correct?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 5:58

Well, that's if you look at the kind of population they study. So to answer your first question, yes, it's naturally produced, there's at least two pathways where the body makes nitric oxide one is in the lining of the blood vessel. The other is from the bacteria that live in and on our body. And so if you look at the endothelial production of nitric oxide, that's really where it starts to show that the older we get, the less we make through this enzyme. But now we know that that doesn't have to be the case, we can accelerate that loss or we can decelerate that loss and basically prevent the age related decline in nitric oxide production. What we're finding is if we can prevent the age related loss of nitric oxide production, we can prevent age related disease.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 6:40

Okay, I think you just answered a question that came up last week. And we I read an article that said that they did a study with mouthwash and they took they had a group do twice a day, using like Listerine type of mouthwash twice a day. And at the end of two months, or three months, their blood pressure went up across the term statistically, so what you just said just now, the body produces a certain amount, but the enzymes, how is is there a mechanism there that would have an effect on nitric oxide?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 7:26

Well, the study you're referring to in the antiseptics, is really shutting down the production of nitric oxide by the oral bacteria, which we and others published many years ago that that's responsible or contributes to the regulation of systemic blood pressure. So they're completely two different mechanisms. So in the the enzyme that's found in the lining of the blood vessel, this enzyme converts l arginine, which is a semi essential amino acid. And through a very complex biochemical reactions and five electron oxidation, it forms nitric oxide gas, but this is a kinetically and energetically very unfavorable reaction. And then the other pathway is kind of a reduction. So you know, in biochemistry, there's always oxidation and reduction, there's a gain of electrons, loss of electrons. So the bacteria are performing a two electron reduction of inorganic nitrate, which is found in our green leafy vegetables in certain dietary patterns, and makes either nitride or andorre, nitric oxide in the mouth in the lumen of the stomach, that can regulate systemic blood pressure. So yeah, we were finding that whether it's in you know, we published a study in 2019, where we took young, healthy normotensive patients, we gave them mouthwash twice a day for seven days. And after seven days, in some cases, we saw a 26 millimeter increase in blood pressure. We didn't change their diet, we didn't change these were unmedicated young, healthy individuals with a good diet. We didn't change your diet, we didn't do anything. All we did was kill the bacteria in their mouth and their blood pressure, whatever that is, and it's, you know, it's fascinating, because if you look at the numbers, you know, and I did, we published that study, we kind of look at the statistics, you know, two out of three Americans use mouthwash every day. And there's two out of three Americans who have an unsafe elevation in blood pressure. So that's no long, it's not a coincidence. It's causal. Wow. And you know, there's there's something called resistant hypertension, right? So if you go to your doctor, you have high blood pressure, he puts you on a prescription medication for blood pressure. And yet we know that 50% of the people that are given blood pressure medications don't respond with better blood pressure. You call that resistant hypertension because you're resistant pharmacotherapy. And so what we're finding is that resistant hypertension is due to oral dysbiosis. So of course, you're not going to respond to you know, ACE inhibitors ARB use or calcium channel antagonists because the reason for your hypertension isn't due to rain and angiotensin. It's not due to calcium issues. It's, it's because you're eradicating the oral bacterium. And if you just stop using mouthwash, get rid of fluoride in your toothpaste allow the bacteria to repopulate. Now all of a sudden, you can normalize your blood pressure.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 10:18

Have you found that any all mouthwashes are like this? Or is it like the Listerine versus the scope? Or is there all of them?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 10:27

Well, it's anything that says antiseptic. So what we use in our clinical studies, and we've used like Listerine and scope, but really, it's the core hexylene Because that's kind of a very stringent, chemical antiseptic, you know, it's used as a surgical scrub. It's used as a prescription medication in dental medicine for chronic halitosis and for severe periodontal gingivitis. But you know, anything that's antiseptic, you know, if you look at, I don't watch TV, but when the commercials say that, you know, this mouthwash eliminates 99.99% of the bacteria, and they actually advertise this as a benefit, believe them. I mean, but it's not a good thing. It's causing an increase in blood pressure. You know, it was on the Dr. Show a couple of years ago, we were reported that if you use mouthwash, you also lose the protective benefits of exercise. I mean, think about that. Well, so I mean, this is remarkable, because now this you can actually start a new conversation that's never been had in the history of western medicine is, how do we get patients off of prescription drugs. And if you can restore the microbiome, and you can restore blood pressure, then ACE inhibitors, go away, Arby's, go away. And think about that. Now you now you know, Americans are way over medicated polypharmacy, and your body cannot operate and regenerate and heal if you're chronically on prescription medication.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 11:51

high percent of this guy, okay. Let me let me let me, we're gonna dive in here. So we were just talking about mouthwash. What about antibiotics and things like that? How, how aggressive is that? No, it's

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 12:07

like, it's the same thing. An antibiotic is designed to kill bacteria. Right. And, you know, there's different classes of antibiotics that are, you know, targeting different class of pathogenic infectious bacteria. But we all know that there's collateral damage, there's 200 million prescriptions written for antibiotics every year. And so there's there's enormous damage to not just the gut microbiome, but you know, you're killing the oral microbiome. And so, you know, there's a reason we don't take an antibiotic every day, for our entire life because of the known consequences on destroying the microbiome causing systemic disease. So the same principles apply, why would we use an oral antibiotic in the form of mouthwash or antiseptic every day, because it's destroying the bad bacteria, but it was also destroying the good bacteria and their consequences of that. You lose nitric oxide, your blood pressure goes up, you develop erectile dysfunction. So you may have, you know, fresh breath, but you're not going to be able to do anything with it.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 13:13

I figured we were gonna get into that a little bit. Let's just go right into it. So yeah, another thing because it seems like there's so much propaganda in the news, and there's so much and that and people have to understand the pharmaceutical company is very, very powerful. And they, they're, they're gonna while squashed up, that's gonna take profits out of their pocket. And so, and I'm not saying that all pharmacology is bad. But you know, this is get realistic. But the other the other thing about nitric oxide people talk about, well, you know, nitric oxide is a pollution, it's, you know, it's a free it's a considered a toxic free radical. How do you discuss the balance of that one?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 13:54

Well, I think like, the data or the data, right, but here's the problem I have as a basic scientist, is that there's always there's usually a misinterpretation of data. So is nitric oxide a free radical? Yes. Is it toxic and damaging? Absolutely not. Because when free radicals, by definition means that this has an unpaired, electron and etc, orbital. And then free radicals are known historically to scavenge electrons or pulling electrons off of other molecules to stabilize that unpaired electron. And it causes an oxidation, it's a loss of electrons. So when you steal an electron from a molecule, it leads to oxidative stress, oxidation of that molecule. And oxygen radicals do that. It's things like superoxide and hydroxyl radical. But if you look at the physical chemistry of nitric oxide, and this is where it's very important to understand physical chemistry, because nitric oxide is one nitrogen and one oxygen. And there's a dipole moment there. There's a polarity in that bond. So what nitric oxide does is it donate It's an electron to kind of stabilize it. So any electron donating species is a reducing agent. It's donating an electron. It's antioxidant, anti inflammatory by nature. And so nitric oxide is a is a free radical. Yeah, but part of its antioxidant effects is it scavenges things like hydroxyl radical, it Skaven does superoxide radical. So it prevents oxidative stress. It's very potent anti inflammatory agent. So there is no toxicity or damaging aspects of nitric oxide.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 15:36

Okay, so this is probably a really good time that our listeners or viewers are probably curious. Okay, how do I, you know, nitric oxide is our body creates it as we get older, doesn't as much, how would we supplement? I know, it was a big thing amongst bodybuilders and things like that, but you don't hear as much about it. About how well what would somebody do now to improve their nitric oxide levels?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 16:08

Well, you know, it's the source of my daily frustration, looking at these companies in these products that are marketing to consumers, that these products produce nitric oxide, I've tested probably every nitric oxide product on the market. And I can confidently say that about 99, or greater percent of the products on the market do absolutely nothing for nitric oxide. And so what you have to do is, we have to answer some very important questions in biochemistry and physiology before you can even start to contemplate developing a nitric oxide product, whether it's a supplement or whether it's drug therapy. So number one, we have to understand how the human body makes nitric oxide. We understand that today. Number two, we got to understand what goes wrong and people that can't make nitric oxide. Because until you understand the individual pathologies, or what's leading to that person's nitric oxide deficiency, how in the hell can you fix it, and just throwing some amino acids and antioxidants in a bag and appeal and colonic nitric oxide is not only naive, but it can be dangerous. Because here's the deal, if you have an uncoupled nos, which means you have endothelial dysfunction. So the endothelial cells are the cells that line all blood vessels throughout the body. In those endothelial cells are really endocrine glands, right? They're secreting molecules that signal, but it also maintains a barrier function to keep, you know, fat lipids monocytes neutrophils from getting out of the blood vessels and into the interim, which then leads to plaque deposition, plaque instability, plaque rupture, and the number one killer of men and women worldwide. So we understand what goes wrong in that enzyme, that enzyme becomes uncoupled no longer produces nitric oxide. So we're never out of arginine. So supplementing arginine never made sense to restore nitric oxide. Because the in again, you have to understand the biochemistry. The amount of Arginine you need to saturate the binding site of the nitric oxide synthase enzyme is only five micromolar. But even in the sickest of sickest patients, they have intracellular and circulating concentrations of Arginine of 100 to 200 micromolar. So 20 to 40 times more than what's needed to bind the enzyme to make nitric oxide. So you're never out of arginine, you've lost the ability to to convert arginine to nitric oxide. And I tell people, so this is this becomes very simple. So any product that contains arginine or citrulline on the market, just save your money. These are semi essential amino acids. You don't need them, you never have to supplement them. They're made through the urea cycle. You get it from the breakdown of proteins, whether you're eating plant or animal proteins. So that eliminates probably 95% of the nitric oxide products on the market. Save your money they do absolutely. And then you know there's over the past 15 years there's been an emergence of deep products beetroot beetroot powder is beetroot juice. And again, I've tested those and again, we use a lot of these beat products as placebos in our clinical trials. Because they're dead beats that's all they are. All they do is turn your poop and your pee pink and red and make people think they're having gastric bleeds or gastric cancer, bladder cancer. And it's just from the beach. And so what we're what we're what we're finding is that now you get these companies that are selling you gummies and Chews and beets and pomegranates and great I mean, yeah, for God's sakes, the last thing Americans need are gummies and Chews and more sugar. And in fact, so those products are causing oral dysbiosis they're leading to endothelial dysfunction, and so get rid of gummies and shoes. There's nothing super about these products, trust me. And so that's kind of the the landscape of nitric oxide. But number one, if you're if you're giving nitrate or you're giving using food as a kind of a means to restore nitric oxide production, it requires the right oral bacteria. And as we mentioned, two out of three Americans are using mouthwash. The other problem is you have to have stomach acid being produced in order for this pathway to be active, and 200 million prescriptions written for antacids every year and that's not even counting the over the counter purchases. You can get Prilosec Prevacid, Nexium over the counter now. And if you shut down stomach acid production, this leads to complete inhibition of nitric oxide production. So again, you can kind of naively give beads give nitrate but if you if your patients using mouthwash if they have fluoride in their toothpaste, if they can make stomach acid, then you basically just excrete nitrate in the sweat in the urine and the feces, and it goes to the body completely unchanged. Nitrate is completely inert in humans. So those are your those are your nitric oxide product categories right there, the beet root products typically don't work arginine citrulline products, if you have any little dysfunction, the basis of your nitric oxide deficiency is you've lost the ability to utilize that to make nitric oxide giving more is not going to give you more nitric oxide. In fact, if you give high dose arginine to post in for our patients, for patients with preferred disease, those clinical studies revealed that it actually increased mortality. Intermittent claudication get worse. And post infarct stiffening actually get worse in these patients. So in those clinical studies, it was recommended that arginine should not be used in post infarct patients, or patients with peripheral disease. And now it's expanded anybody within the fetal dysfunction, you should not be administered LRG.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 22:00

I want to interject something and kind of highlight we just said because my son was a professional mountain bike racer, and you'd be you probably wouldn't be shocked. But beet juice was handed out to so many professional athletes at the start of a race, and by nutritionists, by team doctors, by team managers at the professional world cup level. And you're you're saying absolutely no for these endurance athletes? Well, you know, Santa Olympics. Ya

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 22:30

know, when the Olympics, we made a affirming and beat powder, we've been making a fermented beet powder. For years, they basically actually delivers nitric oxide, we had a number of professional NCAA programs, the entire US Olympic team was using our B product, the one that I made in because what we do is we pre convert it. So we're not relying on individual person's own microbiome, because if that's the case, then everybody would have a different response. So what we do is we ferment it, we pre convert it now when you put this beet powder in water, it starts generating nitric oxide immediately. And so when you consume that we're actually producing nitric oxide. In you see the benefits of it, it's certainly improves athletic performance and improves sexual performance and improves cognition, brain performance. And so those particular bead products that I produced based on my 25 years of research and development, those products actually work. And how do we know they work because we can detect nitric oxide gas coming off those products when we put it in water. And we can do serial blood draws from the people who take it and see an increase in in plasma levels of these metabolites. So we actually have objective clinical measures of nitric oxide being produced in the products that we manufacture. Actually,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 23:51

you brought up a good point, the mic, one of my questions was going to be how would someone know? Is there a biomarker? Is it to determine, you know, if they're having nitric oxide or not, you know, the levels aren't sufficient for their activity? Or is there a way to identify it other than serial blood draws? And so

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 24:19

yeah, you know, in the research lab, we've done this for 30 years where we can measure take peripheral blood and we can look at different oxidative metabolites of nitric oxide and nitric oxide down the tiles are proteins. But clinically, the answer is no. There's no clinical labs that can determine nitric oxide. And because nitric oxide is a gas once it's produced, it's gone in less than a second. So we can't we can we can kind of measure the oxidative metabolites of this. And years ago, about 15 years ago, I developed a celebrate test strip. It was really the first and only kind of non invasive point of care diagnostic for nitric oxide. So we use that clinically for you know 50 In years, but now what we're finding is I don't use them anymore because of oral infections. So patients who have active oral infections have a false positive. So they'll light up that test strip, turn it bright pink. And it's reflective of an active oral infection. But yet systemically, they're completely devoid of nitric oxide. So what I tell people is that we have to rely on symptoms. So if you have erectile dysfunction, your body's not making nitric oxide. If you have an increase in blood pressure, anything above 120 over 80, then your body's compromising its ability to make nitric oxide, the higher the pressure, the less nitric oxide. If you can't walk up a flight of steps, or walk briskly for 10 1215 minutes without getting short of breath and chest pain and lethargic, then your body can't make nitric oxide. If you lose in your memory, you can't get blood flow to the brain. And that's a symptom of nitric oxide deficiency. And now in 2009, we published it nitric oxide is part of the insulin signaling pathway. So if you're developing, if you're insulin resistant, then your body can't make nitric oxide to potentiate insulin signaling and bring glucose into the cell. So those are the kind of the four or five top symptoms of nitric oxide deficiency. And so, you know, we have nine out of 10 Americans are metabolically and fit. Two out of three Americans have either high blood pressure or pre hypertension. You know, what is it 70% of Americans are overweight, 50% obese. I mean, I tell people all the time, there's only so there's really no need to test. Because there's only two people in the world who need nitric oxide. There's people who are sick and want to get well, or there's people who will and don't want to get sick. If you fall with one of those two categories, then just take it you don't need to test.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 26:50

All right, I got a question for all those people listening that couldn't get past high school chemistry. And they hear nitric oxide. And then you're talking about mouthwash, you're talking about how important the oral cavities are, or the oral microbiomes. And yet, you'll hear people go well, I go the dusts and they give me nitrous oxide to put me to sleep to work. So now we're dealing with nitrous oxide in a dentist office, you're seeing how important that nitric oxide Can you explain the difference of wet nitrous nitrates and why dose you're using it and how that affects the by? Yeah,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 27:30

they sound very similar but really that's their own their own similarities in the name. So nitrous oxide is laughing gas. Yeah, right. It's in two Oh, so it's two nitrogen one oxygen as the chemical structure. Nitric oxide is one nitrogen one oxygen. So nitrous oxide is an anesthetic. laughing gas puts you to sleep. Nitric oxide is the gas that was described by Galen back 2000 years ago, as the breath of life the gas that animated the human. So nitric oxide is what you know, dilates blood vessels improves oxygen delivery to every organ tissue and cell on the body. It mitigates inflammation. It induces mitochondrial biogenesis and mobilizes our stem cells we can repair and replace this functional cells that prevents telomere shortening extends longevity extends lifespan stem cell span. So really, nitric oxide is the holy grail in longevity and anti aging medicine.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 28:32

All right, so you mentioned dilation, blood flow to organs. So and we also were talking about Big Pharma and how it can capitalize this stuff. So let's go to the obvious ghosts in the room Viagra. Yeah, they created Viagra, too. And it just, they took a molecule just went for it to the point where it's on NASCAR cars, right? So let's talk about that one, because that was causing a lot of heart conditions and all that. So people started going, Oh, this is great. Oh, this is really bad. Can you let's talk about how pharma changed the world of nitric oxide. Well,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 29:13

via drugs like Viagra, Cialis, and Levitra, which are the brand names. Broadly, they're classified as what we call phospho de esterase inhibitors. So most drugs are inhibitors of biochemical reactions. They're inhibiting some process in the cell or in the human body. So in these drugs aren't nitric oxide donors? I think there's a misconception by a lot of physicians out there they go, Oh, yeah. Viagra produces nitric oxide. That's not the case at all. It has no effect on nitric oxide production, in fact, but what it does is it potentiate nitric oxide signaling. So when nitric oxide is produced in the lining of the blood vessel, again, it's a gas and part of that gas diffuses into the smooth muscle, and there's always smooth muscle that surrounds every blood vessel. So when Smooth muscle relaxes it dilates the blood vessel and slid muscle constricts or contracts that constricts the blood vessel. So nitric oxide binds to an enzyme, and I'm gonna get a little bit deep in about chemistry. But I think it's important because you have to understand the mechanism of action of these drugs. Nitric oxide activates an enzyme called one low cyclase. And then this enzyme produces a second messenger called cyclic GMP or cyclic guanosine monophosphate. And then that leads to the mobilization of calcium leads to smooth muscle relaxation and vasodilation. But in any kind of biochemical reaction, there's a switch on and then there's a switch off. And it's the phospho bestiaries enzymes that degrade cyclic GMP. So nitric oxide turns the switch on in the PDE. Five inhibitors, keep it on. Right and this is the reason you're warned against the four hour erection and safe drop in blood pressure in all the disclaimers with these drugs. Right. So the action, the pharmacological action of Viagra is absolutely dependent upon the body's ability to produce nitric oxide to activate that signal. And you know, these drugs were approved in 1998. So they've been on the market for, what, 26 years now. And the statistics tell us that 50% of the men that are prescribed Viagra don't respond with better erections. They don't respond with better urinary symptoms of bph. And so why do these people not respond? It's because they're not making enough nitric oxide to activate guanylyl cyclase to lead to any accumulation of cyclic GMP. So now what that what that told us 20 years ago was that erectile dysfunction is a symptom of nitric oxide deficiency. It's not a symptom of overactive phospho bestiaries enzyme. But yet, if you improve nitric oxide production, you can turn non responders into responders. If you restore nitric oxide production, you can actually titrate down the dose of these drugs, making them safer, and yet more effective, or best case scenario, you restore nitric oxide production to the extent that there's no need for PT five inhibition therapy. And that's our gold understanding physiology and biochemistry is let's give the body what it needs removed from the body when it doesn't need let the body do its job. And in that model, there's no need for drug therapy. We're never missing an enzyme that inhibits phosphoglycerate sins, and we're never missing an enzyme that inhibits cholesterol synthesis. Right? So it's it can't contribute to optimal health.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 32:46

So wasn't Viagra and Cialis? Weren't they for benign prostatic hypertrophy? Or wasn't that really what they were more clinically for originally, originally,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 33:03

you know, I believe was Pfizer who first started developing these classic PDE five inhibitors, and the original indication was for ischemic heart disease. So the idea was, and this was the work of Fred Mira, who shared the Nobel Prize was the nitrogen containing molecules, including nitric oxide, can activate guanylate cyclase, improved increased cyclic GMP, and that would lead to smooth muscle relaxation and vasodilation. So in patients with ischemic heart disease, who have you know, an obstruction in the coronary arteries, and they've lost in there's less blood flow getting through than if you gave a vaso dilator or something that caused vasodilation then you could, you know, give it to these patients alleviate the ischemic pain known as angina. And then the other indication they were going after was pulmonary hypertension. You know, could you selectively dilate the pulmonary arteries, and lead to better perfusion and better matching of ventilation to perfusion. But when they realized that the men subjects that were enrolled in these initial studies came back and reported that they had, you know, improving erectile function, then obviously, for obvious reasons, they abandoned ischemic heart disease, hypertension, and when for an indication for erectile dysfunction. You know, these drugs have been very successful billions of dollars a year. But again, they only work in 50% of the men in which they're prescribed. But then then there was also evidence coming out of these and kind of some interesting clinical observations on improvements in urinary symptoms of BPA. So now, I believe there's an improved indication for PDE five inhibitors for for BPH. Isn't

Dr. Spencer Baron: 34:42

that what Flomax that Flomax?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 34:47

Max I think is a different class of drugs for BPH so these are things like you know, there's there's cyclic GMP activators and stimulators. I got I can't remember the classes you know, we worked on was 1520 years ago. Or you can just give, you know, the the generics, the PDE, five inhibitors of sildenafil that's not a field for urinary symptoms of bph and seen improvement. But again, you have to have some level of nitric oxide being produced in order for those drugs to work.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 35:21

You know, I have to interject up there. I know it's stupid, but that's the way my brain goes, I was at a NASCAR race and, and I saw the Viagra car come around, and he couldn't hold the car up on the the bank turns it kept falling down. And we happen to have the the mic or the headsets, you could hear the drivers talk to the pit crew. And all they kept saying is I can't keep it up. I can't keep it up. Well, I start cracking up because here's the Viagra car. While all the guys are all the I'm sorry for all those listeners, by my, all the bubbles in the room were like, well, it's a shock. It's this and they're trying to analyze the car, and why this car couldn't stay in the turn. And all I could think about this is not good for their sponsor. And so, yeah, but it's amazing how pharmacology was like that, you know, I always say follow the money, whether it's anything, you know, they don't care if if it's healthy for you or not. They just want to make money. And you got to give people asking better questions, I guess. Yeah. But

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 36:25

like the the job of any drug. And I'm not, I'm not against drug therapy, I think there's certain drugs that have a very important clinical use in certain patients at certain times. But you know, it's always risk benefit. What's the risk of me taking this drug? What, what's the benefit it's going to provide? And if you look at, you know, most drug commercials that are advertised, it's a 62nd commercial, but 45 seconds of that 60 seconds, are the disclaimers in the side effects. And so if anybody with any objective sense about it would actually listen and read the fine print, nobody in their right mind would would take these drugs, they certainly wouldn't take biologics, like you know, the monoclonal antibodies, all these other drugs, if you look at the side effects and understand the side effects and understand the mechanism of those drugs, then most of the time that risk far outweigh any benefit they're going to provide.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 37:20

So you started to mention earlier about supplementing to improve nitric oxide levels, especially in the in the aging population. Could you elaborate more on maybe natural approaches, and you know what someone could do now? And then I have another question about nicotine for you in just a moment.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 37:46

Yeah, so what I tell people and what I try to inform them is to restore nitric oxide production, you only got to do two things, stop doing the things that disrupted or inhibited and then start doing the things that promoted and activated. So we can take those one by one. So number one, what is that? As we discussed, you have to stop using mouthwash. Because it's an antiseptic, and kills the good bacteria disrupts nitric oxide production. Number two, you have to get rid of fluoride, fluoride in your toothpaste, fluoride in your drinking water. Fluoride is a neurotoxin, it's antiseptic. The reason they put it in two places to kill the bacteria. The reason they put it in the water supply is to kill the bacteria in the pipes. That fluoride is, you know, it causes hypothyroidism. It's a neurotoxin and sent antiseptic. So that's two. And then the third one is you have to get off. In essence, if you're taking in acids, specifically, the proton pump inhibitors, there's data now showing people have been on PPIs for three to five years 40% higher incidence of heart attack, stroke and Alzheimer's. And why shutting down nitric oxide production and causing increased Death Events heart attack strokes and Alzheimer's. So if you if you get rid of fluoride, if you stop using mouthwash and you get off of acids, number one, that's gonna save you money. In number two, now you've released the brakes on the body's ability to produce nitric oxide in your body can start making nitric oxide on its own. And then we can actually activate that or stimulate that, you know, moderate physical exercise, up to say 20 to 30 minutes of moderate physical exercise a day. Now we're finding, you know, two to three minutes several times throughout the day of high intensity interval training, you know, just stop what you're doing and for 60 seconds or 120 seconds, just do squats or lunges, get your heart rate up, you know, nasal breathing activates the enzyme in the nasal sinuses in the epithelium and produce nitric oxide if the enzyme is coupled. There when someone green leafy vegetables, and then 2030 minutes of sunlight exposure day, and there you have it, and then you got to remove your body any toxins if you've got heavy metal burdens, it'll, it'll scavenge nitric oxide even though it's being produced viral infections you know Chronic inflammation was shut down. So I always tell people that people get sick for two reasons and two reasons only, your body's missing something that it needs are exposed to a toxin that's interfering with some metabolism. So if you eliminate toxins from the body replete missing nutrients, the body heals itself. And that's what we're regenerative beings by nature. So we just got to get out of the way.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 40:24

It's a great recipe, that really, really fantastic.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 40:27

And then you know, we actually make products that make 30 years in the research lab, we actually make products that if your body can't make nitric oxide, then my products do it for you. So we're not dependent upon the oral bacteria. And in fact, we restore the oral bacteria. And we recover the loss enzyme. So everything that we do, from a product standpoint, whether it's supplements, or some of our drugs were taken through the FDA now is that if your body can make nitric oxide, then we're providing a source of nitric oxide that restores and recapitulates nitric oxide signaling. But we've also put technology in there that recovers the NOS enzyme. So we improve endothelial function in because we're making an orally disintegrating tablet that sits on your tongue and moves around in your mouth for five to six minutes. It's selectively killing the pathogenic bacteria. And it's restoring the good nitrate reducers and the nitrogen producing bacteria. So we're actually our products actually improve the body's ability to make nitric oxide on its own.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 41:26

nicotine. Nicotine has been a hot subject lately, not from a cigarette smoking perspective, but the nicotine itself void of all the other chemicals that are in there. It's been considered neuroprotective. It's now becoming more popular amongst anti aging community because of its vaso dilatory effects. So how does that interplay with nitric oxide and what are the benefits or detriments?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 41:55

Well, I think it's complete opposite when when nicotine binds to the nicotinic receptors, it typically leads to vasoconstriction. So that's why chronic smokers I mean, there's tons of toxins and chemicals and toxicants in cigarette smoke. But one of the things that nicotine does itself is it vaso constricts. So if you're if you're if you're taking nicotine, it's leading to some vasoconstriction. So we want to offset any vaso dilatory effects of nitric oxide.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 42:27

Hence, why the smokers have terrible skin. They'd like

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 42:32

poor circulation. Yeah. Right. Is

Dr. Terry Weyman: 42:34

there any benefits to taking a nicotine supplement or a tablet?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 42:40

You know, I haven't really delved into that much. But I know that you know, in certainly in the biohacking and longevity, there's some there's some, you know, lip service to nicotine in providing some benefit. But you know, I think everything in moderation. I think too much, you know, like, micro dosing may have a completely different effect than normal levels that would, you know, be found in either smokeless tobacco, or even cigarettes. So it's, I think it's going to be dose dependent, because you can just kind of like methylene blue, and it was never a big fan of methylene blue, because we've used it for 25 years in the research lab to completely inhibit nitric oxide production, and nitric oxide signaling. And then methylene, blue is this big fad, people are using it. And look, it's, you know, probably doing that chronically every day is not a good idea, because anything that disrupts nitric oxide production or signaling leads to advanced aging leads to the rapid onset of Alzheimer's, heart attack, stroke, cardiovascular disease, so that wouldn't be a good thing.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 43:44

It's funny, you mentioned that because they actually, some of these methylene blue people are saying it does the opposite as she is anti aging. And you're saying that as she ages? Well,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 43:55

I've been on several podcasts with these people who are pro methylene blue. And the truth is at the doses that they're delivering, we just don't have any clinical data. You know, but certainly in the research lab, when we if we wanted to specifically inhibit nitric oxide production, or specifically inhibit the vasodilation. Due to nitric oxide production, we would always give methylene blue because that completely inhibits the vaso dilatory effects of nitric oxide. Now there, there are certain other, you know, mechanisms of methylene. Blue is inducing mitochondrial biogenesis. You know, it's an oxidant at the end of the day. And so if you, you know, there's this whole concept of hormesis brief periods of, you know, insult or injury that would elicit some immune response or an upregulation in any oxidative defense, that would induce some signaling cascade. Maybe it's doing that at these micro doses. But all I know from speaking of 30 years of basic science research, methylene blue and certain doses completely shut down nitric oxide production. So I just Some people, you just have to be aware, understand what you're doing, understand the consequences of all these things. And the other problem I have with this simple biohackers movement is you've got biohackers, who many times have high school education, but they certainly have no advanced degree in science, medicine, no clinical experience, but yet they're out there, they have this huge following. And they're making kind of medical recommendations or advice on physiology and biochemistry to which they have no understanding of, and that can be very dangerous.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 45:38

That's, that's why we're doing this podcast. So I, it's funny, there was an incident that happened several months, actually, last year, at some point my, our offices connected to a very big gym. And my associate doctor was walking in, and he said, Oh, my gosh, I just saw an empty package of Viagra near the doorway. I wonder, you know, somebody must be shedding new light on getting a pump, you know, in the gym. And then I started hearing about that, you know, bodybuilders were using Viagra or Cialis to get a better pump in the gym or so. But absolutely. Now, isn't there isn't there? There may be some published papers, I was looking at a bunch of papers over the past couple days in preparation for our discussion. And, and, you know, there were some that said that elevated nitric oxide can inhibit testosterone or muscle growth. So how does that interplay help or hinder? You know, if if someone's exercising, and for the purpose of getting a better pump?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 46:59

Well, like it's all about improving, being able to regulate blood flow upon demand. Right, so if you have any fetal dysfunction, you start to exercise. And the best example of this is in the heart, you know, because the heart even under resting conditions is 100%. Oxygen extraction, can't recruit capillaries, you can extract more oxygen. So when you start to exercise, the only way to increase oxygen delivery to the heart is dilation of the coronary arteries. But if you have any female dysfunction, you have advanced coronary disease, when you start to exercise, you can dilate the coronary arteries, and you can't maintain an exercise regimen, you see changes in electrical activity, and that's diagnostic for ischemic heart disease. And the same thing happens in the skeletal muscle, you know, if you're doing resistance exercise, you know, it's pumping down. So there's there's temporary ischemia when you're doing muscle training, so when the muscles contract, it's shutting down blood supply to the vessels. And so anything that's going to lead to vasodilation is going to lead to better oxygen delivery. If you can better deliver oxygen to the mitochondria, you will prevent, you know, this anaerobic, you know, production of lactic acid, you can extend the oxygen gradient. So it makes sense physiologically, why athletes and there's even published clinical data out there that it enhances performance. Because it's improving oxygen delivery, it's improving vasodilation, you're getting better excretion of the metabolic waste products. So performance improves, recovery improves. So physiologically, there's there's a strong basis for that. And it's obviously dilating blood flows to the sixth organ. So I think it's probably dose dependent. I mean, if you're going to work out, you may be a little bit socially embarrassed, if you're walking around with with an erection while you're trying to be in the gym, you get a lot of attention. But you have to be careful.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 48:47

It's great. You can hang a dumbbell off of it.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 48:54

It can is your Is there too much. I mean, you were a very pill, take a pill, society, you know, we're, we're everybody wants don't mean wants to put in the work. They rather just take a pill and take care of it. But is there is there too? Is there a limit that let's say you're you're not taking mouthwash or not taking an acid, your nose breathing, you're getting at three minutes of sun, but people want more, you know, and they've eaten the leafy green vegetables, but again, they want that pump they want more, can they if they take a supplement, even yours, whatever, can they get too much? Is there is there a balance? Yeah,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 49:31

no, of course. So we make an orally disintegrating tablet and we release a certain amount of nitric oxide of a certain period of time. So and we designed this very strategically, because number one, we know how much nitric oxide a healthy person makes in 24 hours and we can measure this from radio labeled isotopes from arginine, the citrulline and see what the total body conversion or nitric oxide being produced by the enzyme is. We've also done stoichiometric measurements of how much light Trick oxide is produced from the food we assuming we have the right oral bacteria, assuming we have sufficient stomach acid production. So at the end of the day, we got a number. And so we want to give back and you know, even in our drug company, we create a new concept called restorative physiology. So what we do we never employ pharmacology, what we do is, is physiology. So similar to vitamin D, if you have a vitamin D level of 30, and we want to get into 80, we can supplement to get that back up to 80. Right. But nitric oxide, we have to, we just have to understand the biochemistry and kind of the the absolute amounts that we make over a period of time. So when I started making a nitric oxide releasing lozenge, which by the way is the only solid dose form of nitric oxide gas. Number one, I wanted to deliver a certain amount of gas over a certain period of time. So I designed this to have a five to six resident, five to six minute resident time in the mouth. So as soon as this law is in starts, it hits the saliva, or just hits any solutions not dependent upon the bacteria, then we release about 20 to 30 parts per million nitric oxide gas. So as long as that lozenge is in your mouth, it's releasing a certain amount of nitric oxide, it's absorbed beautifully. And now for the next four or five, six hours, seven hours, when you swallow your saliva, we're gonna get a burst of nitric oxide in the lumen of the stomach. And then that goes system. And so if you take the lozenge as instructed one lozenges, once or twice a day, no problems whatsoever, we sold over 100 million of these and not a single reported adverse event. Now, if you take five six lozenges, and put them in your mouth, and all at once, you may get a little bit lightheaded, and you know, syncope, and maybe, you know, lead to an unsafe drop in blood pressure. And then the other concern is met hemoglobin EMIA. But you're gonna lose perfusion pressure and get low blood pressure long before you develop any signs of methemoglobinemia. So yeah, those dictates poison. And then in our BT product, you know, we have to put them in individual sachets because it would be much cheaper for us just to put it in a big tub. And, you know, you self dose, but you know, you you made a comment earlier, but because human nature is, oh, if one scoop is good, three is gonna be great. That's just human nature. So because our products are so potent, and they're actually active and release nitric oxide guess, then we have to basically dose these out an individual says shakes, because it's such a potent product.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 52:30

All right, let me follow that up. So let's say, do you find it one? How does the average person get tested to see if they're low, or if they're making the right amount? And number two, doesn't matter where you live. So like, if you're down in the south, we get a lot of sun and the food is different versus the Pacific Northwest versus Canada versus Europe. I mean, now we're dealing with sun, we're dealing with food content, we're dealing with, you know, environmental stuff. So how do you regulate that? And is do you have a one pill fits all type of thing? So how do you regulate that? Well,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 53:08

that's what the lozenge does. The lozenges basically provides the nitric oxide that you would get from your diet that you would get from exercising. And so we combine all that basically normalizes nitric oxide production. But you make a good point. And we published on this in 2015. Because the question was, if, if we just wanted to use diet, and we wanted to recommend our patients, well, all you got to do is go eat, you know, maybe 50 grams of spinach or, you know, a couple stalks of celery or lettuce or cabbage. And in, we went to five cities across the US, we went to Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago, New York, in Raleigh, North Carolina. And we bought vegetables, we brought it to the lab, we analyze it, and we found that there's as much as a 50 to 80 fold difference in the variability of the nitrate and in many other nutrients in the vegetables across these different corners of the US. So to your point, there's no way in hell you know what you're getting from your diet? Because it depends on what vegetable you're eating. Is it conventional, organic, how many lightning storms occurred in that area to enrich the soil and nitrogen? Or nitrate? And then what are the farming practices? So there's, there's no way we could ever standardize this. And again, that was the other motivation for creating a product that can overcome all that variability and provide for each individual, every single person that take it took it the same amount of nitric oxide release in the same way independent of stomach acid, independent of fluoride, independent of mouthwash, independent of oral bacterium, that would release nitric oxide in the exact same way. And that's what our lozenge does, and that's what our beat covered is.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 54:51

Doc, let me ask about you. You mentioned nitrates, or nitrites. And we so thoughtful about how these can be carcinogenic being that it's part of the production of nitric oxide. Are you saying that it's that nitrates are okay? Or is there risk or not? How does that affect?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 55:19

Yeah, no risk and I'm this this may be surprising to you Spencer in theory, but the media hasn't always been honest with us over the past. Nor So, I say there's there's been two really huge myths that have been perpetuated for the past 40 or 50 years in the medical literature, number one, that cholesterol causes heart disease. And number two, that nitrate causes cancer, and you should avoid cured and processed meats like bacon hot dogs. So historically, let's go back in the 1950s. It was reported that low molecular weight nitrosamines can be found in nitride cured fish. This was a 1950 study. And then it was known that nitrosamines cause cancer, the intercalate DNA cause mutations and can cause cancer. So then the nutritional epidemiologist in their infinite wisdom start going okay, if nitride forms nitrosamines nitrosamines. Form cancer, then nitride causes cancer, right? It's kind of a deductive reasoning. Yeah, the thin number one, there has to be low molecular weight a means in the food in the nitride has to nitrous aided in form nitrosamines. So let's go and again, this is some pretty complex chemistry, but you have to understand mechanistically how this happens. So primary A means there's no issue these just rearranging the alcohols, secondary A means or the issue. tertiary and quaternary means there's it's not an issue because there's too much steric hindrance to form a low molecular weight nitrosamines that can triple eight DNA and cause mutations. So it's only secondary means low molecular weight, secondary Amiens, and then in 1972, the Code of Federal Regulations changed here in the US so any food product to which nitride is added, whether it's bacon, hotdogs, ready to eat non refrigerated food, to which nitride is added, you had to add ascorbic acid, because vitamin C ascorbic acid completely inhibits any macro stated chemistry. So even if you had a secondary aiming present, the addition of superstore geometric amounts of vitamin C, now they use a richer bait completely inhibits any nitrosative chemistry. So now in Davion, test this there's no preformed nitrosamines in any nitride cured meat product, because of that. And so there's no issue whatsoever. And we published on I believe, in 2009 2008. We actually measured nitride free bacon, and then conventionally cured bacon. And nitrate free bacon had about four times more nitride in it than the conventionally cured bacon. So yeah, I mean, think about this. It's not nitride free. So what the meat companies do is they add celery salt, which is high in nitrate, in then they add a starter culture of nitrate reducing bacteria, Steph carnosa is and then the bacteria are producing nitrite that cures the meat. But because they're not adding nitrite itself, they can say, no nitrite add. But you're also getting a healthy dose of staff carnosa this bacteria. So I tell people all the time, don't buy this organically cured meat product, because number one, it's less safe. Because there's no very there's high variability in it. There's always residual bacteria from those cultures. And so just buy the regular cured bacon hotdogs or whatever, because it's safer, it's a better product. And you don't have to worry about nitrosamines in cancer. And the other issue was, was that if if nitrate cause cancer, then vegetarians would have 10 times higher rates of cancer than meat eaters. Because 85% of the nitrate and nitrite we get from our diet comes from consuming green leafy vegetables. Only 5% comes from Cuban processed meats and the other 10% comes from swallowing your own saliva. So that whole that whole myth, or that whole story actually went away. And I'll show you we reported on this. And this is a book I edited with Joel Skousen, who's chair of medicine at Harvard Medical School, but we basically put this to bed. You know this is we got a second edition that came probably 10 years ago. But this tells the whole story of nutritional epidemiology. The really the fundamental basis of nitrogen in the food supply and how it's not only doesn't cause cancer, it has To anti cancer effects, it prevents the onset and progression of cardiovascular disease, autoimmune disease. I mean, everything we want to have basically can be explained by, you know, nitric oxide being produced from the foods we eat.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:00:14

So basically what you're saying, Doc is, humans just fuck everything up. If we just went back to just eating as natural as we can, coming from the earth doing the weight camp, but the more processing we do to try and fix something, we actually create more problems.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:00:32

Now that's right, you know, and I tell people all the time, you know, I'm, I'm blessed and fortunate to live on 800 acres here in Texas, we raise our own beef, we grow our own food. You know, I do soul samples every year. I know what's in my soul, whatever is missing, I give back. And then I grow vegetables and I fertilize them. But I don't use herbicides or pesticides. And then the calves that we raised, we don't give vaccines, we don't give antibiotics. We take them from their mother. I have a nutritionist that designs a meal plan for them. I feed them for 150 days, and it's the best food on the planet.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:01:05

That's standing outstanding.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:01:08

I got one more. Terry, I

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:01:10

don't think it's I don't think it's humans. I think it's the media that screws everything. That's why

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:01:16

the people, big corporations, if you want to call it that, you know, you know, you know, in my, my family has cancer. My wife's family has Alzheimer's. You know, I was going down that meth blue rabbit hole a little bit, mainly because they were talking about avoiding Alzheimer's, you're actually saying the opposite doubt that the nitric oxide could actually help but the Alzheimer's and cognitive health.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:01:42

Yeah, in fact, we have a drug going through FDA now specifically for Alzheimer's. So we've you know, we've been very successful in the supplement nutritional, we've got topical nitric oxide products for skincare and beauty. But we were also going through the FDA, you know, I am trained as a drug discovery biochemist. So it was never my intent to develop that tree supplements that were just kind of it just happened. It's been pretty successful. It's provided a lot of people a lot of benefit. But my objective for the past 30 years was understand the mechanism of disease to the extent that we can fix it through drug therapy. But in so what we're finding what, what is Alzheimer's? If you look at the characteristics of Alzheimer's, there's low blood flow, there's focal ischemia, three to two SPECT scans, you can see that there's reduced blood flow to certain parts of the brain. And then there's insulin resistance. So Alzheimer's is considered now diabetes type three. So what do you have to do to overcome Alzheimer's? Well, you got to get blood flow to the brain. You've got to potentiate insulin signaling and get glucose into the cell, the brain likes to use glucose as a primary energy substrate. And then if you don't have blood flow, and you develop insulin resistance, then you start to get protein misfolding. What does that look like? Well, it's the amyloid plaque and the tau tangles. So all these drug companies developing drugs against tau tangles and amyloid plaque is the wrong target. Those are consequence of the disease, they're not causing the disease. So of course, these drugs aren't going to be affected. So what does nitric oxide do? Well, it restores blood flow to the brain, we see 13% increase in blood vessel diameter within 10 minutes 34% increase in blood flow to the brain. We potentiate insulin signaling we bring glucose into the cell, we prevent the inflammation, oxidative stress and immune dysfunction that we see in Alzheimer's. So the single molecule nitric oxide gets to the root cause of Alzheimer's. But again, I want to make a very important point because I'm not a big fan of Big Pharma because all drugs are either biologics, or they're synthetic compounds that inhibit about chemical reaction. And this is pharmacology. What we do is not pharmacology, we're not giving the body synthetic compounds that inhibit biochemistry. We're restoring physiology, giving back a missing molecule that's essential for regulating blood flow, insulin signaling and mitigating inflammation. And when you do this and Alzheimer's, as I mentioned, you restore blood flow you potentiate insulin signaling, we see an improvement in cognition, we can see improvement in perfusion of the brain within 30 days of taking the drug in the lozenge. So I think this is going to Well, I don't think I know this is going to be a game changer in Alzheimer's. So we've met with the FDA, we've had pre ind beatings. Now we're designing these clinical trials. for Alzheimer's. We've got a drug for ischemic heart disease, and we're making a topical drug for diabetic ulcers. But I truly believed and I'm convinced that nitric oxide will be the way we treat patients for the next 100 years. There's not a single indication we wouldn't be therapy.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:04:42

Fantastic explanation. You did mention heavy metals is a could be a prompt to do advocate checking for heavy metals prior to all that because that could be a contributing factor.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:04:57

Yeah, absolutely. Because even though we're delivering therapeutic doses as micro peroxide, if you've got a heavy metal burden, whether it's mercury, cadmium, lead, barium from all contrast or imaging, then that's going to scavenge any nitric oxide, even though we're delivering it. If you have a heavy metal burden and toxicity, then it will scavenge to the anode before it has a chance to dilate the bananas was in, in signaling the body. So yeah, you have to, again, if you address the two things we addressed already, what toxins are you exposed to including heavy metals? And then what nutrients are you missing? address those two things in the body can actually do its job. And we can help that along. But you've got to address those two fundamental concepts. What's

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:05:38

your favorite way of getting rid of heavy art or detoxify from heavy metals?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:05:44

Number one, you have to get the metals removed from your body. So if you got mercury amalgam fillings in your teeth, you have to get that removed. But then you have to mitigate the damage. Right. So I like things like binders, chlorella, spirulina glutathione. You know, if you're really toxic, you know chelation EDTA, or DTPA. IV chelation is effective. But again, you know, these key laters will, will sometimes key like, you know, essential trace minerals, and things like Selenium, chromium. Miss, you gotta be careful not to deplete essential trace minerals. At the same time, you're trying to detox the heavy metals.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:06:26

Fantastic. Thank you. Okay, we're entering one of my favorite parts of our end of our podcasts, and it's rapid fire questions. And some of the questions are just about you. And you know, some fun things that require you to be kind of quick on your feet. We have five questions. And if you're ready, I want to start with number one. Are you ready?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:06:56

I'm ready. I don't have a Scotch in front of me. But I'll be ready anyway.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:07:01

Question number one, what's, what is one finding that you've discovered in your career that still amazes you to this day,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:07:08

you know, just how resilient the human body is, you know, I see all the damage that some individuals do. And yet they're still walking around, they're still function, not optimal. But to me, the resiliency of the human body is just unlike enough study the human body for more than 30 years now, and the fact that it's so resilient. It's just obviously we have a you know, a divine Maker and Creator that's, you know, I still fascinated with

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:07:33

good question number two, what is what is one unconventional use of nitric acid that most people might find surprising?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:07:45

Well, it's it's probably unconventional to most people, but it was the first clinical indication for nitric oxide, and it was for premature babies born with pulmonary hypertension. So the lungs are some of the first last organs to develop. So premature babies, you know, have issues with pulmonary hypertension, there's a mismatch in the ventilation to perfusion, they become hypoxic. And then nitric oxide in the late 80s, early 90s, was administered clinically, through a nasal cannula to these babies. So the fact that nitric oxide was not only safe in the most susceptible high risk patient population in the world, premature babies was number one, fascinating. But number two, it completely saved their lives, reduced pulmonary pressures, allowed them to incubate develop lungs, and it saved millions of lives worldwide. So that's how the whole this whole field started. So if it's safe and effective in the most susceptible patient population in the world, then that told me early on, then we can deliver nitric oxide at the right dose, then the adult population we can really make some hay.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:08:48

Great answer. Question number three. Now, if you had to switch careers, and could not work in science, or medicine, what completely different profession would you have chosen and why?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:09:02

Well, I grew up as a rodeo cowboy. In fact, today and when we get off this when we get off this podcast, I'm going to a roping in rodeo and just up the road here a couple of hours. So yeah, in 1983, I was the number three calf Roper in my age group in the state of Texas. So I grew up roping calves today I'm a competitive team roper. So I ride horses I rope and I would probably do that for a little bit. But in science,

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:09:27

so just a little side note, I was a healer and my sons named after type Murray. Oh,

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:09:33

really? Yeah. Well, I'm a healer now. So yeah.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:09:38

It's funny because actually, you know, wrangler used to sponsor a program that we were part of years ago and believe it or not, in Florida, we have one of the one of the larger rodeo programs out here that then I was, you know, also the chiropractor for the rodeo, which was those are some serious athletes right there. You A get beat down and get right back for the next round, especially the bull riders. Question number four, if you could invent a nitric oxide based superhero, what would their powers be? And what would you name them?

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:10:19

Ooh, what their powers would be, I think they would be somewhat immortal. Because if they could produce nitric oxide for the rest of their life, they would always mobilize stem cells repair and replace, their telomeres would maintain their normal length and they would, you know, they wouldn't die. What would that problem I call it? I would call him prior plus, you know, prior plus was the Greek god of the erection

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:10:47

Yeah, Spencer is a superhero. He was Cairo man.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:10:54

I'd rather be a superhero. Oh, wait. All right. I don't even feel like asking the last question. All right. Oh, gosh, duck, I gotta tell you, you've achieved a lot in in your world of science and medicine. But what is one thing on your personal bucket list is that they have nothing to do with your career that you would like to achieve.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:11:28

That I still want to get done

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:11:31

an eight minute bull ride maybe. Now, you

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:11:34

know I did. So I've been on the back of bulls I got stepped on. And I kind of ended my career. So I figured that Ropin was a lot safer and a lot more fun for me. And I've been there done that. What is on my bucket list? You know, I've lived a very full life, I've turned I turned 50 in November, and I've traveled the world, I've, you know, I've been dead broke, I've had a lot of money. And I've been, I've been happy broke. And I've been sad, rich, and so. But you know, I think for me, what I'm still hoping to do is, you know, just accumulate more land, be good stewards of the land really be self sufficient, and teach other people how to be self sufficient, because I think what we're going to have to learn to do is be self sufficient. We can't rely on the government to take care of us. We can't rely on others to take care of us, you know, we're seeing that the the current kind of Western allopathic type of medicine is failing us. And so, really my my bucket list and my mission and objective is still to educate, inform people so that they have the information that they can maintain health maintained by that vitality. And our goal is to let them to where they never have to see a physician the rest of their life. You know, a certainly a physician that that treats sickness. You know, I think in chiropractic medicine, we're always going to need, you know, musculoskeletal balance alignment. It's a preventative, it's a prophylactic treatment. Obviously, most people wait till it's too late to learn pain. But if we can go out there, and because to me, we understand the mechanism of every single human chronic disease. We don't need more studies with only information we need to take the information that we've learned over the past 5060 years, and apply that into everyday life. Remove from the body, the toxins, replete missing nutrients, eat a balanced diet in moderation, get physical exercise, and then you can leave it to the science community to explain the mechanism that at the end of the day, it's about the benefits and the clinical application that so maybe a lame answer, but

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:13:44

not at all as sounds like with your land acquisition, you and Taylor Sheridan have a lot in common and trying to do a few things like that.

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:13:54

You know that we're I live about an hour northeast of Boston, everybody's moving you know Austin's expanding, it's busting at the seams and everybody's trying to move out into the rural America and I don't like that I don't like neighbors because I keep trying to buy up the land around me. If you buy more land then you've got a new neighbor, you got to take the then you got a new neighbor.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:14:20

I love it then. Hey, Doc, thank you so much for your time. And this was fantastic. You know, the more we can educate people on being healthy mentally, physically, nutritionally, I'll put all the links to all your products and all your stuff in our on our description. For sure for people to find it easily. But you so appreciate your time. You're a busy man, but we appreciate your time.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:14:45

Thank you. super informative. I really appreciate everything that you've shared today. Thank you. She

Dr. Nathan Bryan: 1:14:51

got it. And I thank you guys. It's been really, really fun and hopefully education.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:14:57

Thank you for listening to today's episode of The cracking backs podcast we hope you enjoyed it make sure you follow us on Instagram at cracking backs podcast catch new episodes every Monday See you next time