Mastering Nutrition

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**Mastering Nutrition**

Welcome to the Mastering Nutrition podcast.

Mastering Nutrition is hosted by Chris Masterjohn, a nutrition scientist focused on optimizing mitochondrial health, and founder of BioOptHealth, a program that uses whole genome sequencing, a comprehensive suite of biochemical data, cutting-edge research and deep scientific insights to optimize each person’s metabolism by finding their own unique unlocks.

He received his PhD in Nutritional Sciences from University of Connecticut at Storrs in 2012, served as a postdoctoral research associate in the Comparative Biosciences department of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s College of Veterinary Medicine from 2012-2014, served as Assistant Professor of Health and Nutrition Sciences at Brooklyn College from 2014-2017, and now works independently in science research and education.

Latest Episodes:

The relationship between Lp(a) and cardiovascular disease| Masterjohn Q&A Files #09 Nov 20, 2019

Show notes

Question: "Lp(a) and genetic component with relation to cholesterol and risk of cardiovascular disease."

First, I'm going to be able to give better answers to questions if they're more specific.

But to the question: Everyone seems to think that Lp(a) causes heart disease. I don't believe it.

I don't believe it because the function of Lp(a) is to clean up oxidized LDL particles. It might have other roles, but that's one of the primary ones.

So, we have two possible explanations for the correlation between Lp(a) and heart disease. Either Lp(a) causes heart disease and people with genetically elevated levels have a higher risk of heart disease, or it is correlated simply because people with more oxidized LDL particles (which does cause heart disease) have more Lp(a) to clean them up.

I'll be recording with Peter Attia on this topic, so I'll brush up on Lp(a) data beforehand and may change my viewpoint, but this is my view right now. If anyone wants to send me data to look at to revise my view, I'll happily take a look.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here:https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

If you would like to be part of the next live Ask Me Anything About Nutrition, sign up for the CMJ Masterpass, which includes access to these live Zoom sessions, premium features on all my content, and hundreds of dollars of exclusive discounts. You can sign up with a 10% lifetime discount here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/q&a

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Chris Masterjohn, PhD, is the Founder and Scientific Director of the mitochondria test Mitome.

Could magnesium hydroxide be absorbed via skin and cause hypermagnesemia? | Masterjohn Q&A Files #08 Nov 19, 2019

Show notes

"Can magnesium hydroxide be absorbed via skin?"

I don't know. I genuinely don't know.

"I've been applying milk of magnesia as a deodorant alternative in spray form for a few years now, and it works well, but I'm concerned about I might be hypermagnesemic, as I'm having low pulse, low blood pressure, and frequent bowel movements."

You might be hypermagnesemic. You should measure your magnesium status, for sure.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here:https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Chris Masterjohn, PhD, is the Founder and Scientific Director of the mitochondria test Mitome.

Concerns about long-term bicarbonate supplementation and other suggestions for raising pH | Masterjohn Q&A Files #07 Nov 18, 2019

Show notes

Concerns about long-term bicarbonate supplementation and other suggestions for raising pH

Helen Donnell says, "Your post on urine pH and exercise tolerance was a game-changer for me, but anytime I miss a dose of bicarb, I'm right back to 5. Any long-term concerns with taking bicarb two to three times a day, any suggestions for other ways to get my system pH up?"

Well, I will say in my case that I stopped taking the bicarbonate when I figured out that I had a zinc deficiency. So, for people who don't know the backstory here, Google "Masterjohn urine pH" and you'll probably get that blog post to come up. It's called "How Normalizing My Urine pH Helped Me Love Working Out Again".

The backstory in brief is, when I was going through the mold and barium toxicity crisis of turn of 2016 into 2017. I got to the point where it would take several days to recover from one workout. I couldn't afford to be laid out like this I realized while looking at some lab tests — a Genova ION Panel — had some findings that suggested pH imbalance problems. The only thing abnormal in my ION Profile was that my glutamine-to-glutamate ratio. The glutamate was really high, and the glutamine was really low.

First thought; sounds like a pH issue. I was talking with a friend of mine that led down the same rabbit hole, maybe the reason the workout is tanking me is because my system can't handle the lactic acid.

So, I started measuring my urine pH, and my urine pH was very, very low. Less than 5.

I just kept taking bicarbonate at ¼ teaspoon increments. It just wasn't going anywhere until at some point, all the sudden I shot up out of bed, and I was like I want to work. I felt amazing. I went and measured my urine pH, and it was 6.

It was like it just went nowhere until I got enough bicarbonate in. Once that happened it crossed the threshold getting into 6, and all the sudden I felt amazing. That was the first big clue. Then I replicated things over time, and found that it was a consistent effect.

What turned things around for me was when I realized that my zinc was low. That was because bicarbonate allowed me to work out consistently and gain more muscle mass. Gaining muscle made me get patches of dry skin.

Well, what do patches of dry skin mean?

It's the earliest sign of zinc deficiency. Resistance training increases muscle mass and that requires more zinc to sustain the new tissue.

What does zinc have to do with pH balance? Well, zinc is a cofactor for carbonic anhydrase, which is one of the main enzymes in regulating pH.

I started supplementing zinc and tested my plasma zinc. Even though I had been taking zinc for three days, my plasma zinc was at the level I associate with a deficiency — which is around 70. Once I started supplementing zinc, the pH problems went away.

So, zinc is definitely something I would look into. If zinc isn't your issue, I would keep going down the rabbit hole and do a comprehensive analysis like I do with Testing Nutritional Status: The Ultimate Cheat Sheet.

Harms of bicarbonate: alkalinizing the stomach is the main one. To avoid complications you want to take it as far away from food as possible. I do think that excessive chronic use and alkalizing the stomach could lead to a lower ability to kill pathogens in the stomach and lead to overgrowth of bacteria in the stomach or small intestine. I would feel more comfortable about using it as a bridge to get from point A to point B and fixing the underlying regulatory problems as the destination.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here:https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Chris Masterjohn, PhD, is the Founder and Scientific Director of the mitochondria test Mitome.

Should you be more concerned about overall fat intake or saturated fat intake with familial hypercholesterolemia?| Masterjohn Q&A Files #06 Nov 15, 2019

Show notes

Should you be more concerned about overall fat intake or saturated fat intake with familial hypercholesterolemia?

Question: "I have familial hypercholesterolemia, as well as a mutation in my Lp(a). I listened to your 2016 podcast regarding FH and have implemented a low-fat diet and am in the process of fixing thyroid issues. My question is, can you please further explain whether I should be more concerned about overall fat or saturated fat intake?"

To be clear, I am not treating anyone here. I am not a medical practitioner, so I am not treating the disease of familial hypercholesterolemia and this is just educational in nature.

As a general principle, if I'm thinking about familial hypercholesterolemia — I would be thinking more about saturated fat, with that said, I would be testing it.

First it depends on the specific saturated fatty acid, but saturated fat relative to other fats raises cholesterol levels. There are people that dispute that, but the data is super clear. This does not mean that everyone should lower their saturated fat intake because most people can probably accommodate that, right? Most people have a working system to regulate their cholesterol levels.

The thing is with the familial hypercholesterolemia, that system is broken, so you become hypersensitive to all the things that do have some effect. You will be hypersensitive to the fact that saturated fat raises cholesterol levels more so than other fats do — but I think it's more to the root of the problem, based on how these things regulate LDL receptor activity, which is what clears cholesterol from your blood and which is what is broken in familial hypercholesterolemia.

I think a lower-fat, higher-carbohydrate diet is more relevant to the root mechanism.

How do you test this? So, standard lipid panels are dirt cheap, and it is not hard to convince your doctor to order them. You don't need to get fancy. You don't need the NMR and all that other stuff. I'm not saying it doesn't have its place, but if you want to do dietary tests to see what are the big factors affecting you, you just run these standard tests every couple of months and you pick a diet to go on and stay on it for 4-8 weeks and then see what the results are.

So, you do the low-fat diet where most of your fat comes from coconut, which is the Kitavan diet, where they don't have heart disease. You can try that for 4 or 8 weeks, and then look at your cholesterol levels. Next you do the low-fat diet where most of your fat comes from olive oil, which is a more of a Mediterranean approach. You can try that and see what that does to your cholesterol levels.

You tailor your diet to your own response — because I can predict what will generally happen, but the individual person is going to have so many different genetic and other factors, that influence what they're responsive to that they just need to test it out.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here:https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Chris Masterjohn, PhD, is the Founder and Scientific Director of the mitochondria test Mitome.

How would you address normal TSH but low T4? | Masterjohn Q&A Files #05 Nov 14, 2019

Show notes

How would you address normal TSH, but low T4?

Well, the first thing I'd do is I'd look at your T3. For those of you who aren't familiar with thyroid hormones, TSH tells your thyroid to make thyroid hormone. T4 is the precursor. T3 is the active hormone.

If your TSH is normal, that means that your pituitary is receiving the proper messages from your thyroid gland.

But if your T4 is low I would ask; is your T3 normal or high? If your T3 is high, then you're probably just converting it very rapidly. If your T3 is low — then even though your pituitary appears to be receiving the right signals, you're not making enough thyroid hormone.

In fact, it would become unclear whether your pituitary is actually making the right signal because if your T4 and your T3 are low, your TSH should be high because your pituitary should be saying, "wait a second, T4 and T3 are low, so I need to make more of the message, TSH, to tell the thyroid gland to kick into gear."

If T4 and T3 are both on the lowish side and the TSH is normal. I would then look to the pituitary.

In terms of nutritional issues, I think the big things that you're looking at are calories, carbohydrate, and body fat — because the pituitary is overwhelmingly asking the question, do I have enough energy in the short term and the long term to engage in the health-promoting, long-term investments that thyroid hormone governs?

Those are many, like all the biological peacocking, like making nice hair, and making nice skin, and making things look nice. It's also protecting your tissues from damage. Then the big, thing is if you're in the right age bracket, is fertility.

So, if your pituitary is not making as much TSH as it should, then that's basically saying your brain perceives that you don't have enough energy on hand, and that means either your body fat's too low, your calories are too low, or your carbs are too low — because those are the big signals that your brain is going to use.

As mentioned int the Nutrition in Neuroscience series that I did all of these releasing hormones that govern the endocrine system require copper, vitamin C, zinc, and glycine.

So bottom line is; look at is body fat, calories, and carbs. But the next layer to peel back would be; vitamin C and copper especially, and zinc and glycine in the background.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here:https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Chris Masterjohn, PhD, is the Founder and Scientific Director of the mitochondria test Mitome.

Best clinical way to monitor COMT function if you have already tested for SNPs | Masterjohn Q&A Files #04 Nov 13, 2019

Show notes

"What do you think is the best clinical way to monitor COMT function if you have already tested for SNPs?" One way you can look at it is through the DUTCH test — which is at dutchtest.com — it's a dried urine hormone testing platform, they have a methylation index that is based on the methylation of estrogen. For example; the main significance of COMT, is related to long-term risk of estrogen-related cancers. Acute symptoms are primarily going to manifest in the brain in the relation between COMT and dopamine. The higher your COMT activity, the more flexible your brain. The lower your COMT activity, the more rigid your brain. If your nutrition is straight and you don't have a psychological disorder, that's just a personality trait. They call this the worrier/warrior, phenotype. High COMT activity; you don't worry as much, like a warrior who picks his battles, wins, and repeats. There is nothing to worry about, the only concern is victory. If you are a low COMT activity; you're not a warrior, you're a worrier. You think about all the possible ways something could go wrong. Instead of moving forward with an image of invincibility, you struggle to move at all, like a deer in the headlights. But that's the extremes. Within most of the population, it's just a personality trait. So, you really look at, how is your mind operating? If your mind is getting stuck on stuff, low COMT. If your mind is racing around to different things, high COMT. If that's just your personality, don't worry about it. But if it's starting to interfere with your life, then that's where it matters. Low COMT, focus on methyl donors: B12, folate, choline, betaine, some of the other assisting B vitamins. High COMT, focus on methyl buffers: Glycine. This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Supplements that may lower anxiety at night and improve heart rate variability during sleep | Masterjohn Q&A Files #02 Nov 11, 2019

Show notes

Supplements that may lower anxiety at night and improve heart rate variability during sleep

I don't know enough about the HRV, the heart rate variability, to comment on improving that specifically. Heart rate variability is largely related to recovery from stress. So, I know the Oura ring tracks heart rate variability during sleep.

The main application that I'm familiar with HRV for is recovery from stress, especially from exercise. So anything that supports recovery — mainly is rest, is going to support that. Getting enough carbohydrates to support your high-intensity exercise is going to be another thing.

In general, nutrient density across the board is going to be supportive of recovery, and enough calories.

Now, lower anxiety at night before or during sleep I think is a whole different story.

You might have anxiety because you have not recovered well from your exercise.

Maybe your cortisol is running high.

But it could be for totally different reasons, and that's a giant can of worms that I don't think really can be unpacked in an umbrella answer. I think that's kind of something that needs to be very individualized because it requires 10, or 15, or 20 follow-up questions.

But some of the first things that I would think about would be what are you doing to psychologically wind down? The fact is that this is not all about nutrition. It's not all about light hygiene. It's also about psychology. So, is your anxiety at night driven by overthinking? If so, what are you overthinking about? You may need to start a psychological wind down routine if this is your issue.

And then, there are so many other potential causes of anxiety that you really have to address it on a case-by-case basis, but those are the top things that I think about.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

What causes low white blood cell count and what can you do about it? | Masterjohn Q&A Files #01 Nov 04, 2019

Show notes

Nutritional causes of low white blood cells and possible solutions?

The absolute first thing that I would always think of when I see low white blood cells is copper.

So, generally copper deficiency at its most sensitive is going to cause neutropenia; which is low neutrophils, but it can cause low white blood cells across the board. I'm not saying there aren't other things, but that's going to be the number one thing that I jump to first when looking for low white blood cells.

Solutions, well, I'm not going to assuming it's copper. What I'm going to say is, do we have copper here? So, the first thing is testing serum copper, or serum ceruloplasmin. Which are the two most important markers of copper status.

Is the individual eating copper-rich foods?

Top Tier: Liver, oysters, shitake mushrooms, spirulina, and cocoa powder.

Second Tier: All other organ meats other than liver, all other mushrooms besides shitake, all other shellfish besides oysters.

Third Tier: Legumes, and potatoes.

First I want to know if they are eating any of the top two tier copper-rich foods. If the answer is no, then I'm not going to wait on the serum copper and serum ceruloplasmin.

I would suggest increasing the copper-rich foods because there is absolutely no harm in modifying the foods you eat to ensure you're getting some in there.

You don't really need the testing to do that. But I would definitely get the testing before I would start doing any bigger interventions than that. For example, I'm not going to start that person on a copper supplement if I don't have good data backing up copper deficiency.

This Q&A can also be found as part of a much longer episode, here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/podcast/2019/02/09/ask-anything-nutrition-feb-1-2019/

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Supplements that may increase deep sleep | Masterjohn Q&A Files #03 Nov 04, 2019

Show notes

So, deep sleep is, primarily what's going on in deep sleep is that all of your biogenic amines, which are most of the neurotransmitters that you make from protein with the possible except — like depending on how you classify it, you could say ultimately you make melatonin from protein, but it's not a biogenic amine. Biogenic amines, which are the catecholamines — all are basically shut off. They're probably not zero, zero, but they're almost zero during sleep. Acetylcholine is also shut down during deep sleep, but it pops up during REM sleep. I really don't think this is a supplement issue. First of all, you definitely don't want to be taking anything that has acetylcholinesterase inhibitors at night. Non-organic foods have pesticides that are acetylcholinesterase inhibitors. I don't know if that's relevant here dose-wise. Things that improve cognitive function are often acetylcholinesterase inhibitors. So, gingko biloba is one. I wouldn't take that at night. There are drugs that treat neurological problems, especially Alzheimer's, that are acetylcholinesterase inhibitors; I wouldn't take those at night. I'm on the fence about whether you should take choline at night. I think it's most likely fine to eat eggs at night. If you're taking something like alpha-GPC; I'm not sure. You might want to avoid that at night if you find, particularly if you find that when you're tracking your sleep with an Oura ring your REM is higher than normal and your deep sleep is lower than normal. But other than that — I would say that methylation support is very important to help lower some of the important biogenic amines. Histamine, for example, is primarily gotten rid of with methylation in the brain and if your histamine levels are high during the day, it might cause anxiety during the night and that could interfere with your deep sleep. Electrolytes are also super important. Calcium, magnesium, salt and potassium. All these things you need to get straight in order for your sleep cycle to be working right. If your cortisol is high at night or other factors of anxiety are high at night you might want a targeted supplement there, like phosphatidylserine — the evidence is conflicting, but has been used to lower the stress response. I don't think it's a blanket answer to that question. I think it's like figuring out what's the cause of the low deep sleep and working from there.

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.

Ask Us Anything About Sports Nutrition with Chad Macias, Danny Lennon, and Alex Leaf, May 25, 2019 | Mastering Nutrition #68 Oct 23, 2019

Show notes

On May 25, members of the CMJ Masterpass joined me, Chad Macias, Danny Lennon, and Alex Leaf in a live Zoom meeting to ask us anything about sports nutrition, and here's the full recording!

We talk about things like:

Is there a risk of depleting histidine with beta-alanine supplementation?
What's the best form of fuel to use during a workout? Candy, or something else?
Nutritional strategies for recovery from soft tissue injuries to muscles, tendons and ligaments from lifting?
Is AMPK the primary regulator of mitochondrial biogenesis in muscle, and does it matter?
Can riboflavin help with exercise performance?
Why the post-workout anabolic window DOES matter, and why you should NOT eat too much protein BEFORE lifting.
Take BCAAs, or just eat protein?
Should athletes cycle caffeine, and does it matter if they are fast or slow oxidizers?
Nitric oxide: does it have important effects by modifying proteins, rather than just affecting blood flow?
Is it delayed-onset muscle soreness if it happens all the time? Or is it a pathology?
Transdermal carnosine (Lactigo) for fibromyalgia, the role of glutamate and neurotoxicity in fibromyalgia and delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS), and my own experience with using high blood glutamate to identify how acidity was wrecking me after workouts.
Maximizing muscle growth and optimizing performance on a low-protein diet.
Best time to take Tru Niagen (nicotinamide riboside) and TMG (trimethylglycine), especially the purpose of increasing exercise tolerance.
How important are refeeds for dieters?
Carbohydrate periodization for endurance athletes?
Is there any value to training low during those times where you depend on glucose to either try to train your body to better tap into limited glycogen stores or to try to create a better aerobic response?
Besides leucine, what could help increase protein synthesis to prevent sarcopenia in older adults who strength-train regularly?
For muscle growth, what generally applies to everyone?

All this and much more!

If you'd like to participate in the next Q&A, consider joining the CMJ Masterpass. Use this link to get a 10% lifetime discount: https://chrismasterjohnphd.com/masterpass/masteringnutrition

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In this episode, you will find all of the following and more:

02:54 Is there a risk of depleting histidine with beta-alanine supplementation?

08:40 What's the best form of fuel to use during a workout. Candy, or something else?

19:17 Nutritional strategies for recovery from soft tissue injuries to muscles, tendons and ligaments from lifting?

22:55 Is AMPK the primary regulator of mitochondrial biogenesis in muscle or are there other important pathways that need to be considered and which can be targeted by nutrition in addition to endurance training?

28:43 Can riboflavin help with exercise performance?

39:30 Why the post-workout anabolic window DOES matter.

44:26 Does the form of HMB matter?

49:07 Why you should NOT eat too much protein BEFORE lifting.

54:34 Take BCAAs, or just eat protein?

59:13 Summarizing the things that help with muscle growth.

1:00:28 How should caffeine be cycled if being used to enhance weightlifting performance and/or weight loss? Is there a difference for fast or slow metabolizers of caffeine?

1:04:25 More on caffeine

1:09:30 Caffeine for weightlifters

1:14:30 Nitric oxide: does it have important effects by modifying proteins, rather than just affecting blood flow?

1:20:42 Is it delayed-onset muscle soreness if it happens all the time? Or is it a pathology?

1:24:34 Transdermal carnosine (Lactigo) for fibromyalgia. My own experience with using high blood glutamate to identify how acidity was wrecking me after workouts.

1:30:04 The role of extracellular glutamate and neurotoxicity driving DOMS and fibromyalgia.

1:31:46 Recommendations for maximizing muscle growth and optimizing performance on a low-protein diet.

1:41:59 Best time to take Tru Niagen (nicotinamide riboside) and TMG (trimethylglycine) especially the purpose of increasing exercise tolerance.

1:52:24 How important are refeeds for dieters?

1:54:42 Carbohydrate periodization for endurance athletes.

1:59:12 Is there any value to training low during those times where you depend on glucose to either try to train your body to better tap into limited glycogen stores or to try to create a better aerobic response?

2:08:27 Besides leucine, what could help increase protein synthesis to prevent sarcopenia in older adults who strength-train regularly?

Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here:

https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/068-ask-us-anything-about-sports

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