Episode 54: Brianna Stubbs talks about ketone esters and their application in sport

Late in 2017, a San Francisco startup company brought one of the commercial ketone esters to market. Today’s episode features an interview with a scientist and world-class athlete who has spent the past year helping develop and rollout HVMN Ketone, an FDA-approved drink that promises increased athletic ability as well as heightened focus and energy.

Dr. Brianna Stubbs earned her PhD in biochemical physiology from Oxford University in 2016 where she researched the effects of ketone drinks on elite athletes. During Brianna’s collegiate athletic career, she won two gold medals while representing Great Britain at the World Rowing Championships. She first made international news when as a 12-year-old she became the youngest person ever to row across the British Channel.

Brianna graduated from Oxford’s Pembroke College with a BA in preclinical sciences with the idea of becoming an MD.  But after spending a year working as a research assistant helping to investigate the effect of exogenous ketones on human performance, she decided instead to pursue her doctorate in biochemical physiology and investigate how ketone compounds might be applied in a sporting and healthcare setting in the future.

While at Oxford, she worked alongside Dr. Kieran Clarke to develop a novel ketone monoester that has been shown to improve exercise performance in endurance athletes. She also was a member of the Great Britain Rowing Team and in 2016 become the World Champion in the lightweight guadruple sculls. Brianna’s time at Oxford gave her a unique opportunity to combine her scientific interest in sports physiology and metabolism while also competing at an international level.

Brianna moved to the United States in June of 2017 to work at HVMN and help bring the company’s ketone ester to market.

Links:

HVMN website: https://hvmn.com/ketone

Mark Mattson STEM-Talk: http://www.ihmc.us/stemtalk/episode007/

Wikipedia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNhuJ4JiK40

Mice and ketones cognition: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5102124/#!po=10.1064

Owen and Cahill: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6061736

Oxford ketone study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27475046

Glycogen re-synthesi and ketones: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28398950

Ketones, glycogen and mTOR: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5440563/

Caryn Zinn: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5506682/

Ketone esters vs ketone salts: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5670148/

Acetoacetate paper:            https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fphys.2017.00806/full

HVMN online fasting community: https://www.facebook.com/groups/136348456816447/

Show notes:

3:52: Ken and Dawn welcome Brianna to the show.

4:07: Dawn congratulates Brianna on bringing one of the first ketone esters to the commercial market, and asks Brianna to provide some background that led to the ketone ester launch.

5:31: Ken comments that the HBMN ester has been approved by the FDA as “generally recognized as safe,” or GRAS. He then asks her to expand on what this means in terms of human use and to expand on the value of the GRAS status.

6:31: Dawn asks Brianna what sparked her interest in science.

7:18: Ken comments that he heard Brianna was seven years old when she ran her first race, and that she ran so hard, she made herself sick. He asks if this is true.

8:16: Ken says that Brianna’s father was the one who got her interested in rowing, and when she was six years old, he signed her up for the first rowing race across the Atlantic Ocean. Ken asks if it’s true that he had never rowed before.

10:21: Dawn comments that Brianna used to run and row with her father as he trained for these races, and then when she was 12 years old she rowed across the English Channel, becoming the youngest person to ever do so. Dawn asks how this came about.

11:59: Dawn asks what Brianna’s mother was doing while she and he...