For nearly 20 years, I have strongly suspected that I have a genetic disorder in synthesizing or recycling something that is absent or poorly available from plant foods, is very rich in organ meats, and is not present in any of the supplements I was taking when I was a vegan. After six months of research, testing, and self-experimenting, I now believe what I have been looking for is a mix of moderate genetic defects in biotin recycling, possibly combined with poor cellular uptake of biotin, and definitely combined with a defect in burning long-chain fatty acids for energy. The treatments for this, which I will be testing one at a time, will be high-dose biotin, high-dose riboflavin, possibly high-dose L-carnitine and glycine, and, if needed, an otherwise low-fat diet supplemented with C8-specific MCT oil. This episode covers the content of the first of two articles I have written up on Substack. First, I have a free gift for you: my MTHFR Protocol. This 7-page quick guide to optimizing your MTHFR status using foods and supplements is freely available to all subscribers to my Substack. Subscribe now and you will immediately get it emailed to you in the welcome email. You can subscribe here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/mthfr-protocol The content of this episode can be found in the written version, with live links, here:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/getting-to-the-bottom-of-my-health    The second article that will be covered in the next episode is about my self-experiments between September 2022 and June 2023 in the "biochemically unoptimized state" and can be found here:    https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/self-experiments-in-the-biochemically   

Getting to the Bottom of My Health: Biotin and (V)LCAD

Hi, I'm Chris Masterjohn and I have a PhD in Nutritional Sciences. I am an entrepreneur in all things fitness, health, and nutrition. In this show I combine my scientific expertise with my out-of-the-box thinking to translate complex science into new, practical ideas that you can use to help yourself on your journey to vibrant health. This show will allow you to master the science of nutrition and apply it to your own life like a pro.

Alternative Health

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Nutrition

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Question: Is whole food vitamin C superior to natural because it is part of a tyrosinase complex? Short Answer: Vitamin C is nearly ubiquitously distributed in plant tissues, and is never bound to any enzyme as a structural complex. Vitamin C promotes absorption of iron from plant foods, inhibits copper absorption, and de-loads copper from ceruloplasmin, which may play a role in distributing copper to tissues. Vitamin C is not capable of destroying ceruloplasmin. These functions follow directly from vitamin C as an electron donor and there is no evidence whatsoever that whole food vitamin C behaves differently in these respects than synthetic vitamin C. However, daily needs in most contexts are 2-400 milligrams of vitamin C per day, which is below the dose shown to potentially cause problems with copper. Getting this from whole foods or whole food supplements is better than using synthetic vitamin C because it avoids GMO corn and Chinese synthetics and provides a host of other beneficial constituents alongside the vitamin C. This is a clip from a live Q&A; session open to CMJ Masterpass members. In addition to this episode, you can access two other free samples using this link: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/questions-on-hair-trace-mineral-analysis In that batch of free episodes you will also find the answer to this question:   Is Hair Mineral Testing Useful?    What's the Deal With Seed Oils?   If you want to become a Masterpass member so you can participate in the next live Q&A;, or so you can have access to the complete recording and transcript of each Q&A; session, you can save 10% off the subscription price for as long as you remain a member by using this link to sign up: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/qanda Learn more about the Masterpass here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/about This snippet is from the June 16, 2023 AMA. The full recording and transcript is reserved for Masterpass members. Here is a preview of what’s included:   Butyrate for Hashimoto’s? What else?   What in the comprehensive nutritional screening is helping to interpret lactate/pyruvate and ketone ratios?   Is the solution to a respiratory chain disorder to take Niagen?   If I have high manganese on an HTMA, do I need to detox?   Should CFS patients target reducing their serum BH4?   What to do about low alkaline phosphatase?   If my glucose spikes above 140, should I eat fiber and take ACV before the meal, eat cinnamon with the meal, chew slowly, and move for ten minutes after my meals?   Difficulty getting Quest to do the lactate/pyruvate ratio correctly.   Is 38 milligrams of niacinamide enough to rule out niacin deficiency as a cause of low NAD+?   How does optimizing body composition help optimize energy metabolism? Can impaired energy metabolism make someone fatter?   Is monounsaturated fat the best fat?   Manganese followup.   Do you need to stop taking biotin before a biotin test?   What in "a bunch of supplements" flip the lactate/pyruvate ratio from high to low?   NAD infusions, yay or nay?   Why do I feel better after a warm shower, even better than after sunshine?   Should I cut back on vitamin A if I have toxicity symptoms but cutting back makes me get sick?   Do home blood drop tests have to be pricked at the finger?   Is it true that my boyfriend was just born a night owl?   How much eating out is too much?   When measuring ketones, lactate, and glucose at home to optimize energy metabolism, what time of day should we take the measurements?   Here’s a link to the full AMA:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/recording-and-transcript-of-the-june-a55 Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.  

Is Whole Food Vitamin C Really Different? | Masterjohn Q&A Files #330

Question: What Is the Real Issue With Seed Oils?  Short Answer: The main issue with seed oils is that they present an oxidative liability. They do not acutely cause oxidative stress, but their polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) are more vulnerable than any other macronutrient to oxidative damage. Oxidative stress can increase because of nutrient deficiencies, toxins, infections, other sources of inflammation, alcohol, or smoking, and it will inevitably increase as a function of aging. As oxidative stress increases, more PUFAs in the tissues mean more damage. At least 0.6 milligrams of vitamin E should be gotten per gram of PUFA in the diet, but vitamin E cannot fully protect against PUFA, so their intake should be moderated to the very low levels needed, as obtained by eating fatty fish once or twice a week, eating eggs daily, and eating 4-8 ounces of liver per week. Additional secondary problems with them include residual solvents and heat damage prior to intake, but the main issue is that we do not want to increase our tissue PUFA content more than needed. This is a clip from a live Q&A; session open to CMJ Masterpass members. In addition to this episode, you can access two other free samples using this link:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/questions-on-hair-trace-mineral-analysis In that batch of free episodes you will also find the answer to this question:   Is Hair Mineral Testing Useful?   Is Whole Food Vitamin C Really Different?   If you want to become a Masterpass member so you can participate in the next live Q&A;, or so you can have access to the complete recording and transcript of each Q&A; session, you can save 10% off the subscription price for as long as you remain a member by using this link to sign up: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/qanda Learn more about the Masterpass here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/about This snippet is from the June 16, 2023 AMA. The full recording and transcript is reserved for Masterpass members. Here is a preview of what’s included:   Butyrate for Hashimoto’s? What else?   What in the comprehensive nutritional screening is helping to interpret lactate/pyruvate and ketone ratios?   Is the solution to a respiratory chain disorder to take Niagen?   If I have high manganese on an HTMA, do I need to detox?   Should CFS patients target reducing their serum BH4?   What to do about low alkaline phosphatase?   If my glucose spikes above 140, should I eat fiber and take ACV before the meal, eat cinnamon with the meal, chew slowly, and move for ten minutes after my meals?   Difficulty getting Quest to do the lactate/pyruvate ratio correctly.   Is 38 milligrams of niacinamide enough to rule out niacin deficiency as a cause of low NAD+?   How does optimizing body composition help optimize energy metabolism? Can impaired energy metabolism make someone fatter?   Is monounsaturated fat the best fat?   Manganese followup.   Do you need to stop taking biotin before a biotin test?   What in "a bunch of supplements" flip the lactate/pyruvate ratio from high to low?   NAD infusions, yay or nay?   Why do I feel better after a warm shower, even better than after sunshine?   Should I cut back on vitamin A if I have toxicity symptoms but cutting back makes me get sick?   Do home blood drop tests have to be pricked at the finger?   Is it true that my boyfriend was just born a night owl?   How much eating out is too much?   When measuring ketones, lactate, and glucose at home to optimize energy metabolism, what time of day should we take the measurements?   Here’s a link to the full AMA:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/recording-and-transcript-of-the-june-a55 Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.  

What's the Deal With Seed Oils? | Masterjohn Q&A Files #329

Debunking the myth that vitamin C in plants is found in a special "tyrosinase complex." For the written article with references, see here:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/vitamin-c-whole-food-vs-synthetic For issues of vitamin C dosing and balancing with other nutrients, see these two links:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/the-powerful-duo-how-glutathione  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/balancing-vitamin-c-and-glutathione-d6f  

Vitamin C, Whole Food Vs. Synthetic: Does It Matter?

Question: How to Find the Root Cause of Autoimmunity?  Short Answer: Autoimmune conditions are likely driven by deficiencies of vitamins A and D, which contribute to post-infectious autoimmunity by compromising the rhythmic rise and fall of myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs), and to autoimmunity regardless of infections through impaired suppression of Th17 helper T cells. More broadly, infections and tissue damage are the most likely drivers of autoimmunity onset. However, energy metabolism governs everything through the second law of thermodynamics, which holds that energy must be used to prevent everything from randomly mixing, and this includes randomly mixing the immune defense against pathogens with immune attacks on the host. In this example, we discuss how a respiratory chain disorder would compromise absorption and distribution of zinc and compromise the oxidation of NADH to NAD+, and how both of these would interact with a genetic impairment in acetaldehyde dehydrogenase to prevent the activation of vitamin A to retinoic acid. Autoimmunity thus results as one of many symptoms of vitamin A deficiency driven not by lack of vitamin A, but rather by impaired activation of vitamin A, secondary to impaired energy metabolism.  This is a clip from a live Q&A; session open to CMJ Masterpass members. In addition to this episode, you can access two other free samples using this link:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/questions-on-nac-biofilms-vitamin In that batch of free episodes you will also find the answer to this question:   Can NAC hurt your gut health?   Why Would Vitamin C Cause Joint Pain, Muscle Pain, and Brain Fog?   If you want to become a Masterpass member so you can participate in the next live Q&A;, or so you can have access to the complete recording and transcript of each Q&A; session, you can save 10% off the subscription price for as long as you remain a member by using this link to sign up: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/qanda Learn more about the Masterpass here: https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/about This snippet is from the May 13, 2023 AMA. The full recording and transcript is reserved for Masterpass members. Here is a preview of what’s included:   GLA to lower hydroxyhaemopyrrolin-2-one?   When would I use the StrateGene and Genova Methylation Panel for nutritional testing?   Energy metabolism as a root cause of gut issues?   Nutrition for skin healing?   Nutrition for hypnic jerks?   Suggestions for snoring or sleep apnea?   Nutrition to protect against restaurant meals?   What is the cause of crusty eyes in the morning?   What causes brain fog?   How much oxalate should one eat each day?   Should I be concerned about low alkaline phosphatase?   What nutrients give tall children to short parents?   Energy metabolism impairment mimicking Wilson's disease.   Can taking digestive enzymes reduce our own production?   Rapid-fire response to non-winners from the question contest.   Here’s a link to the full AMA:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/recording-and-transcript-of-the-may  Access the show notes, transcript, and comments here.  

How to Find the Root Cause of Autoimmunity? | Masterjohn Q&A Files #327

Is high-dose vitamin C good for you? High-dose intravenous vitamin C can selectively kill cancer cells in live patients and can save sepsis patients from dying, but it acts as a pro-oxidant in cancer and an antioxidant in sepsis. So what does it do in the rest of us? Oral doses of 2000 milligrams raise oxalate levels in most people, and as little as 400 milligrams raises oxalate in some people. This seems to be the most sensitive indicator of a delicate imbalance with glutathione and other factors needed to recycle vitamin C. Such a balance actually needs to be avoided when killing cancer yet is critical to maintaining health in every other context. Given that vitamin C is important to immunity and general health, how do we take advantage of these benefits without upsetting the delicate balance with glutathione and the propensity to generate oxalate? That is the topic of this video. This video is free for only 48 hours. Get evergreen access to the video and podcast, as well as the written article with references, here:  https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/balancing-vitamin-c-and-glutathione-d6f

Getting to the Bottom of My Health: Biotin and (V)LCAD

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