Mind & Matter

By Nick JikomesSociety & Culture Science Education

Mind & Matter episodes

November 18, 2024Your Skin Makes Its Own Melatonin to Protect Itself | Andrzej Slominski | Episode 189
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Andrzej Slominski, MD, PhD is a dermapathologist and skin biologist who has spent decades studying skin biology, especially regarding endocrinology (hormones), stress response, photobiology, and more.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Slominski discuss: hormone production in the skin; vitamin D photobiology; risks and benefits of UVB light; skin cancer & sunscreen; protective effects of melatonin production in the skin; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M #104: Benefits & Risks of UV Radiation & Sunlight, Skin Health, Vitamin D, Nitric Oxide, Evolution of Skin Color | Richard Weller
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 3 min
November 13, 2024Psilocybin Knocks Brain Cells Out of Sync With Their Neighbors | Joshua Siegel | Episode 188
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Joshua Siegel, MD, PhD is a psychiatrist & systems neuroscience at New York University. He uses functional imaging to study the effects of psychedelics and other drugs on the human brain.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Siegel discuss: fMRI and how it works; relationship between neural activity and blood flow; functional connectivity & the default mode network of the human brain; the functional effects of psilocybin on the brain; the role that subjective & expectancy effects in psychedelics medicine; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M #173: Psychedelics, Consciousness, Psychiatry, Psychology, Mental Health & the Entropic Brain Hypothesis
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 12 min
November 10, 2024Heavy Screen Use Can Cause Autism-Like Symptoms That Fade Offline | Richard Cytowic | Episode 187
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Richard Cytowic is a neurologist, poplar science writer and professor at the George Washington University.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Cytowic discuss: the effects of smart phones and social media on the developing and adult brain; artificial blue light vs. broad spectrum natural light; attention & addiction to technology; sensory overstimulation & “virtual autism”; synesthesia and multimodal sensory perception; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M 78: Nature vs. Nurture, Neurogenetics, Personality, Autism, Schizophrenia, Synesthesia, Perception, Agency & Free Will | Kevin Mitchell
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 9 min
November 06, 2024High Protein Doesn't Hurt Healthy Kidneys. That's a Myth | Thomas Weimbs | Episode 186
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Thomas Weimbs, PhD is a biologist at UC-Santa Barbara whose lab studies kidney function in health and disease.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Weimbs discuss: basic kidney biology; kidney stones and their causes, including dietary oxalates and fructose; the kidney damaging effects of common pharmaceuticals like Ibuprofen; the beneficial effects of BHB and ketosis for kidney health; the myth that high protein intake is bad for the kidney; kidney diseases and their causes; and more.

Full version available on Substack and YouTube.
Related episodes:
M&M 158: Ketosis & Ketogenic Diet: Brain & Mental Health, Metabolism, Diet & Exercise, Cancer, Diabetes | Dominic D'Agostino
M&M #139: Metabolic Switching, Fasting, Ketosis, Neuroplasticity, Diet & Neurodegenerative Disease | Mark Mattson
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 9 min
October 31, 2024Oreos Lowered His LDL Twice as Much as a Statin. What It Means | Nick Norwitz | Episode 195
Send us Fan Mail
Full version available on Substack and YouTube.

About the guest: Nick Norwitz, PhD received his PhD in Physiology at Oxford University and is finishing his MD degree at Harvard Medical School. He is also an independent content creator focused on making metabolic health mainstream.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Norwitz discuss: blood lipids & cholesterol; high cholesterol levels and what they can mean for different people; the “lean mass hyper-responder” phenotype to carb restriction; ketogenic & carnivore diets; public trust in medical & science institutions; n=1 (“n of one”) science experiments; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M 158: Ketosis & Ketogenic Diet: Brain & Mental Health, Metabolism, Diet & Exercise, Cancer, Diabetes | Dominic D'Agostino
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
44 min
October 30, 2024Sugar Can Drive Withdrawal. That Doesn't Mean Everyone Gets Hooked | Nicole Avena | Episode 185
Send us Fan Mail
Full version available on Substack and YouTube.

About the guest: Nicole Avena, PhD is a neuroscientist at Mount Sinai. She studies the effects of sugar and diet on animal behavior and the brain. She is also the author of, “Sugarless.”
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Avena discuss: drug addiction vs. food addiction; glucose, fructose & artificial sweeteners; the extent to which sugar consumption can drive dependency & withdrawal; fructose metabolism & live health; sweetness & palatability; ultra-processed foods; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M 140: Obesogens, Oxidative Stress, Dietary Sugars & Fats, Statins, Diabetes & the True Causes of Metabolic Dysfunction & Chronic Disease | Robert Lustig
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 5 min
October 27, 2024BPA Doesn't Just Spike Insulin. It Retrains the Pancreas | Angel Nadal | Episode 184
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Angel Nadal, PhD is a biologist in Spain whose lab studies endocrine disruptors (e.g. microplastics), hormones (estrogen, insulin), and the endocrine functions of the pancreas in health & disease.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Nadal discuss: endocrine biology of the pancreas; insulin and estrogen signaling in the pancreas; BPA, microplastics, and other xenoestrogens; pregnancy & fetal development; effects of hormone disruptors in males vs. females; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M 145: Epigenetics, Hormones, Endocrine Disruptors, Microplastics, Xenoestrogens, Obesogens & Obesity, Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics | Bruce Blumberg
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice.

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 8 min
October 23, 2024The Mice That Lost the Most Weight on Diets Lived Shorter Lives | Gary Churchill | Episode 183
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Gary Churchill, PhD is a statistician & geneticist at the Jackson Research laboratory in Maine. His lab uses a systems approach to investigate the genetics of complex biological traits in health & disease.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Churchill discuss: his recent papers looking at the effects of caloric restriction & intermittent fasting on nearly 1,000 genetically diverse mice; how dietary restrictions affect longevity, metabolic health, immunity, and hundreds of biomarkers; the role of genetics vs. diet in aging; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M #139: Metabolic Switching, Fasting, Ketosis, Neuroplasticity, Diet & Neurodegenerative Disease
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice.
*Full episode available free on Substack & YouTube.

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
59 min
October 19, 2024Your Brain Does Its Thinking Outside the Language Network | Ev Fedorenko | Episode 182
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Ev Fedorenko is a neuroscientist at MIT. Her lab studies the neural basis of language, speech, and thought in the human brain.
*Full episode available free on Substack & YouTube.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Fedorenko discuss: the relationship between language and thought; the extent to which language is for thinking vs. communication; Noam Chomsky’s Universal Grammar theory; Sapir-Whorf hypothesis; language acquisition & language learning; language networks in the brain; neuroanatomy & brain lateralization; large language models (LLMs) & machine intelligence; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M #141: Evolution, Language, Domestication, Symbolic Cognition, AI & Large Language Models
M&M #20: Language, Symbolic Cognition, Evolution, Origins of the Human Mind | Terrence Deacon
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice.

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 13 min
October 15, 2024Focused Ultrasound Briefly Opens the Blood-Brain Barrier, No Surgery | Nir Lipsman | Episode 181
Send us Fan Mail
About the guest: Nir Lipsman, MD, PhD is a neurosurgeon and neuroscientist at the University of Toronto.
Episode summary: Nick and Dr. Lipsman discuss: neurosurgery; the blood-brain barrier and how it works; using focused ultrasound technology to non-invasively treat patients; regulatory impediments to clinical research; costs, constraints, and future applications of ultrasound tech for treating psychiatric conditions; and more.
Related episodes:
M&M #168: Sleep: Neural Circuits, Orexin/Hypocretin, Hypothalamus, Neuromodulators, Stress & Cortisol, Sleep Drugs & Ultrasound Technology | Luis de Lecea
*This content is never meant to serve as medical advice.

Support the show
Support my work:
Good Chemistry: Personalized, science-based health consulting. Work with Dr. Nick Jikomes directly.
Affiliate Partners: Visit this link to see my affiliate partners and get discounts codes for products & services to support health.
For all the ways you can support my efforts.
1 hr 5 min

About Mind & Matter

From the publisher's feed

Whether food, drugs or ideas, what you consume influences who you become. Learn directly from the best scientists & thinkers alive today about how your mind-body reacts to what you feed…