C15: The Newly Discovered Key to Longevity

Hi, everybody.

I'm Dr. Sandhya Moldovan, periodontist and nutritionist. Welcome to the Holistic Dentistry Podcast, the show that gives you the tips and tools to detoxify your mouth for a healthier body. As we explore together the root cause of disease. Remember, you're not healthy until your mouth is healthy, so take care of it in the most natural way. Welcome to today's show and I'm so excited to have here Dr. Stephanie Van Watson, who is the CEO of Seraphina Therapeutics. Stephanie, thank you so much for joining us.

Hi, Dr. Sand, it's great to be here.

I'm so excited to talk to you about the one essential fatty acid that has been discovered in the last 90 years. We haven't had any new discoveries. And you know, when I heard you lecture at a conference about C15, I'm like, wow, I can't believe we're still discovering things that are linked to longevity. So let's tell me a little bit about you. How did you get started in research in general?

Sure. So I am a veterinary epidemiologist. A lot of people now know what an epidemiologist is.

Yeah, what is an epidemiologist?

Actually, so on the veterinary side, I'm a veterinarian, and on the epidemiology side, it's somebody who studies patterns of diseases. So to try to figure out not only what diseases are occurring, but most importantly, how to fix them. So that is my job. I used to work for the World Health Organization and Centers for Disease Control and help to set up infectious disease surveillance systems all over the world. And, and then wonderfully, about 20 years ago, I was invited by the US Navy, Dr. Sanda, to help improve the long term health of Navy dolphins.

I didn't even know we had Navy dolphins. What do the Navy dolphins even do?

Yeah, they're, you know, it's, they're really good at what they do. Navy's been leveraging basically dolphins natural skills, which are to find things. So they're really good at finding things like enemy swimmers and lost objects in the sea. They, they've been doing this for over 60 years. They live out in the open ocean right out our back door here in San Diego Bay. They go out into the open ocean every day and every day they choose to come back. It's really an amazing wow.

You know, I actually love diving. And I remember when I was diving and we see the, you know, school of dolphins and, and, you know, they're so curious and playful and they love to interact with humans. Is that why? You see?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's. Dolphins have always had this connection to humans, right. Even if you go back into Greek days and paintings on the walls and that, there have just been a close connection. And I don't think you've probably nobody's ever met anyone who like, doesn't like dolphins, right? And I was like, ugh, I hate dolphins.

I know.

We all, we all love dolphins. So there is a special connection, it has a lot to what you spoke to. They're social, they have large brains, they're intelligent, they live a long. And so all of those wonderful aspects that, you know, have us have this bond with dolphins goes even further, which is what we found that, you know, at the Navy, dolphins get a lot older and the wild dolphins live on average to about 20 years old. @ the Navy they get, take such good care of them. They live into their 40s and even 50s. So.

Wow.

Yeah. So the Navy had this growing population of geriatric dolphins. And as the epidemiologist, my job was to come in and help understand aging associated diseases in dolphins, to help keep them as healthy as possible for as long as possible. And then wonderfully during that time while we found that dolphins age a lot like us. They can get high cholesterol, they can get dental disease, they can get, you know, changes in the brain consistent with Alzheimer's, fatty liver disease. They can get a lot of these same chronic conditions that we get. But interestingly with the dolphins, despite the fact that they all get the same health care, grow up in the same environment. Some dolphins develop these aging associated diseases while others do not. So that opened up this question of can we find out what predicts a healthy aging dolphin to be able to help them? And little did we know at the time that we'd be able to make some discoveries that could help us too.

That's very interesting, Stephanie. So let's go back to the dental disease because I have to ask the question, do you check the dolphins teeth or detect their oral condition?

It's pretty amazing. The care that the dolphins get is extraordinary. My husband, COO of Seraphina Therapeutics, he's a Navy physician and so he knows the care that, you know, our human soldiers, military people get. And he's just like, man, the dolphins get, get such good care. So which includes, they get routine checkups, routine blood tests, they. And part of those routine checkups, which is even on a daily basis is looking at their teeth. So they'll, they'll just stick their heads out of the water in the Bay open their mouths and they even get their teeth brushed by their, their handlers, which is pretty cool.

I love it. That's pretty amazing. And you probably don't see cavities in dolphins or do you?

Yeah, no, no cavities. Is that probably that all fish diet? Yeah, that's right. And that cone shaped teeth, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What about gum issues? Do you ever see bleeding gums and dolphins?

Yeah, so they can get definitely gingivitis and periodontal disease. And it's associated similar with dogs and in other animals with age as they get older, more susceptible to dental disease.

Yes. So let's jump into the C15 discovery here. How did this all happen?

Yeah, so as we were, you know, looking at the dolphins we were gifted with, the Navy had the foresight of over the past 60 years of saving. Not only did they routinely take dolphins blood samples to assess their health, they also archived the serum that matched with those, those routine blood checkups. And so by doing so we were able to go back and use this advanced technology called metabolomics, which studies thousands of small molecules in dolphins blood that are also present in our blood. We were able to do a pretty simple study which is to look at which small molecules in the blood predicted the healthiest aging dolphins. We discovered about 100 molecules and right there near the top was C15, otherwise known as pentadecanoic acid. Higher levels predicted healthier aging dolphins.

And this was naturally circulating in the blood. Is that what in the serum?

That's right, exactly. Naturally circulate circulating in the blood. And one reason why it caught our attention was that based upon the literature really in humans, most likely dolphins were getting their C15 from their diet.

What part of their diet Obviously is it C15 normally present in fish?

It is. So it's, you know, for us, our primary source to C15 is from whole dairy fat. In fact, it's so reliable that C15 has been used as a measurement of how much dairy fat we have in our diet for dolphins. Obviously they don't eat cheese or, or milk except when they're young. But they exactly like what you said, Dr. Sanda, which is the dolphins were getting their C15 from specific types of fish. And so we discovered that not all fish have C and that some dolphins were getting a C15 rich diet while others were not. So it resulted in being able to really influence that. Dolphins with low C15, we could raise it pretty easily by just giving them the right fish.

Can dolphins be picky with their fish? Like, you know, some Animals don't want to eat like my cats. I have two kittens and they're so picky with their food. Like one loves mackerel, the other one doesn't. So. So Adolph is the same way.

Yeah, absolutely. Yes, they'll be. And they'll have, you know, they live in the open ocean. So even though they are provided a diet which is amazing how much they have, most of their diet comes from what the fish that is provided to them. But they do live out and swim in the open ocean. So some of them will have their favorite treats that they snack out there which is, which is a lot of fun to see. And different dolphins like different snacks.

So. So you were feeding them C15 rich fish. Did you see the level of C15 going up immediately or it does take some, some time to build up in. In.

Yeah, it's a great question. So we, what we found was that easily within one month, which was. So we did modified diet study where we gave dolphins a C15 rich diet which was pinfish and mulnut. And by giving them that by increasing their C15 three fold in the fish, we effectively increased their blood levels of C15 by threefold as well. So just like we see in humans that C15 is truly reflective of how much our levels in our blood truly reflective of how much we eat which is one criterium of an essential fatty acid.

So how does C15 affect longevity? How does it act in the body?

Absolutely. So we just published a paper on Monday, it came out in nutrients peer reviewed journal and you know, we had initially when we first discovered C15 as meeting the criteria of an essential fatty acid which means our bodies need it from the diet in order to maintain our baseline health. We had tested C15 against pure omega 3 EPA and showed that C15 had three times more cellular benefits than EPA. So we published that in PLOS One last year and then so we basically took that same test and said let's raise the bar. Since we pub our initial work there have been, you know, now over 50 papers from research groups throughout the world all showing and supporting all these great long term health benefits of C15. So with all of that we decided to raise the bar and say let's test C15 against the three leading longevity compounds, rapamycin, metformin and acarbose. And what we showed was that C15 had the most cellular benefits while maintaining safety and being remarkably close to the top leading longevity molecule, which is rapamycin. So it was quite shocking to have those find those results that's pretty amazing.

Like what is the top like cellular benefit that, that you see with C15? I mean basically I want to give our listeners like why should we care about C15?

Absolutely. So C15 really does. It truly is an essential fatty acid at the cellular level. So it keeps, by keeping our cells healthy, that ladders upright romative at 37 trillion cells keep those cells healthy. We keep our whole body healthy. So at the cellular level, C15 does three primary things. The first is it helps physically strengthen the resilience of our cell membranes. So it keeps our cell memory strong. As we get older in the face of chronic diseases, our cell membranes get weaker and they tend to fall apart. And that results in age related breakdown. So C15 physically keeps our cell membrane stronger. It actually helps exp explain how long lived mammals live longer in the first place. So that's a big important thing. And then the second is that it helps repair mitochondria. So if we remember from our third grade classes at Mitochondria, the powerhouses of our cells, C15 helps repair mitochondrial function to help keep cellular energy, the batteries of our cells working. And the third thing that C15 does is it actually helps activate and reconnect cells signals between cells. So if our cells can't talk to each other, well that's where we see imbalances. So imbalanced immunity, metabolism, that whole homeostasis world that we want to keep. C15 helps do things like activate PPAR alpha delta receptors, amp K, the heart of the longevity pathway. So by doing all of these things, nature's really created a very simple nutrient that has very broad benefits that have long term health most relevant for cells to our metabolic heart, immune and liver health.

Yeah, that's great. No, I also talk a lot about keeping this membrane fluidity, even when it comes to oral health and you know, periodontitis and gum health, and especially also TMJ and joint health. We need that fluidity on the joint and the cellular membrane. Do humans have C15 or have we become deficient?

We do. So we have C15. Everybody has some level of C15. But because our primary source of C15 is whole fat cow's milk, our intake of whole fat dairy has been dramatically decreasing for the past 40 years. As a result of that, our C15 levels population might have been declining. And so the hypothesis has been that we have accidentally induced nutritional C15 deficiencies. And those deficiencies then may be leading to the rise in chronic aging related diseases that we're seeing, including type 2 diabetes, heart disease, even Cancer and definitely fatty liver disease, especially among younger and younger people. Yeah.

Are there C15 studies done in humans or that's something to come?

There are a lot of C15 studies in humans. Most of them are epidemiological studies. So these are large prospective cohort studies showing that people of higher C15 have a lower risk of developing no big surprise, or type 2 diabetes, heart disease, fatty liver disease and cancer. So it was really then about moving from association to causation. And now that we understand how C15 works, that now helps us understand how C15 works to help protect against the onset of these conditions.

Yeah, and it makes sense, you know, with the. Unfortunately, we, a lot of people in United States got on the low fat bandwagon and that probably contributed a lot to a decrease in C15. You know, we're seeing more like butter being introduced again and eating whole fats, which hopefully is going to help us raise this C15 level.

Yeah, it all comes full circle. Right. It's all about just a balance, making sure you have a balance, not removing everything of anything, not eating too much of anything. So it's just making sure we, we don't mess with the balance of the diets that we're supposed to have.

Are there C15 supplements that we can supplement for those. There's a lot of people who are vegan out there and they don't eat dairy because they're allergic or intolerant. So what can we do?

Yeah. As we move forward with the science and we advanced it, moving from the Dolphins to moving C15 into the lab to understand over the past 10 years, how does it work, what doses do we need and what's the most effective way to deliver it? That's how we landed on a pure free fatty acid C15 ingredient that we provide in a supplement called fatty 15. Absolutely. Getting helping to fix nutritional C15 deficiencies will likely come from conversations with nutritionists to help bring whole fat milk and those sources back, especially to our children for the long term. There are studies that show that, you know, with dairy fat, it has changed over the past 50 years. There's less C15 there than there used to be. So if you feed a cow corn, it has less C15 in its milk than what if it eats grass? So we're seeing, you know, it's. How do we get ahead of Those changes? The C15 present in milk is not as bioavailable as it could be. And in addition, whole fat milk still has really high levels of these pro inflammatory fatty saturated fats like C16 and C18. So there was a recent study that showed they gave mice C15, C17, which is a sister chain fatty acid and whole fat, whole dairy fat. And these were models for type 2 diabetes and fatty liver disease. What they showed was that with only the mice that were provided, C15 saw the benefits and that those that were fed whole fat dairy actually had worse liver disease. Our goal with the supplement is how do we provide just the good fat at just the right dose to help able to target and really allow C15 to go to work in a really bioavailable way. Very nice.

So how do you extract what is the C15 supplement from Seraphina from?

The purity was the absolute number one priority. So all of the research that you see that and all of the studies on C15 are available at discoverc15.com that's where all the peer reviewed science is. So all the experimental studies you see on that are done with pure free fatty acid, C15. So it was really important for us knowing that it was bioavailable to provide that ingredient. And so the best and purest way we could make it and be vegan friendly Is to take C14, which is very common in plants, especially things like nutmeg and coconut, and to be able to take that pure C14 and add a carbon onto it. And in that way It's a bioidentical 100% pure C15 ingredient.

Wow, that's pretty amazing that you are able to build this from a plant source. So it's vegan friendly.

We'd love to say it was super fancy, but, but it was, but it was actually, you know, it's, it's such a simple molecule. It's just 15 straight carbons, no double bonds. I mean, go nature. It just created this beautiful simple molecule. So it's, it made it easy for us to be able to do like nature plus through because a lot of.

People who are vegan cannot take the fish oil anyway, which is, would be kind of similar except C15 seems to be better. But so now this is a great way for them to get the cellular benefits of a fatty acid that's plant based.

Yeah, that's right. That's right. And so we're thrilled. I mean it's, it took a long time, we're glad to, to finally have it, have it out. We launched it back in January 2021.

So I actually got some at the conference where I met you. And you know what I like about it is that it's a small capsule. It's easier to swallow. It's nothing that's difficult for me, actually. The omega 3 fish oil gives me nausea. And I tried many different crimes on this burping. But the C15 comes in a powder, actually, and in a capsule. And it's just so easy to take.

It's. It's nice. It takes extra work to go and make a pure C15. We're also fortunate that C15 is uses odd chain saturated fatty acid. So it is a powder and solid at room temperature versus Dr. Saunda, like you mentioned, as far as omega 3s and other essential fatty acids being oils. So those oils are really susceptible to lipid peroxidation and rancidity. They go bad fast. And so this molecule, again, its job is to do the opposite of that. It's just to be super stable, not just in the bottle, but to help our cells be stable too. And what's wonderful is that our body's ready for it at really low doses. We don't have to take giant pills.

Well, that's amazing. Can you actually open the capsule and just put it on food or it's not going to not have the same absorption.

You can, and I do. Every morning. I actually open my capsule and I melt it in my coffee in my mornings.

Oh, I have to try that. Okay, perfect. Usually put a little collagen powder in my coffee. Now I'm going to be adding some C15 collagen coffee.

There you go. You should trademark it. You got a product. Right? There you go.

Seriously, that's amazing. You know, have there been any studies on C15 with oral health at all that you're aware of?

There are a couple that there hasn't been a ton of focus on oral health. But what's fun is that as soon as somebody comes in and asks a question about, well, gosh, Route C15 and X, right? And we go and look it up, and there's so many people working and interested in C15. It's now popping up for a lot of different things, so, including oral health. So there are a couple studies, one from 2022 and 2023. So very recently, the first study from 2022 talked about the antimicrobial properties of C15 specific to pathogens that are found in the mouth and associated with gingivitis and periodontal disease. And it showed that as an active ingredient, that it can decrease the growth of these pathogenic bacteria. So that was interesting. And we already knew other groups had already shown that C15 has direct antibacterial activities we added on that it has anti inflammatory as well. So that combination makes a lot of sense for oral health. The second study that came out in May was really interesting because they took people who had periodontal disease and they treated them using the typical treatment, just that or the typical treatment with fish oil. And so. And they showed that the ones that were treated with fish oil did better. So they had greater decrease in pathogenic bacteria and less inflammation. When they went in and looked at the human and looked at the patient's blood profile, they actually showed that what increased the most among people who are on the fish oil was C15. So even though the study said Omega 3 fish oils help with periodontal disease, when you actually dive in and look at the tables, it's C15 increased for them with this particular fish oil increased by 300%. Oh, wow. Yeah. Versus the omega 3 levels only increased by 60%. And so, you know, have to play with their numbers. But it obviously would be interesting to go in and say, gosh, well, what part of that fish oil was really providing the benefit? Maybe it wasn't Omega 3s. It would make a lot of sense that C15 played a role.

I'm glad that they looked really deep into this. You know, what's in the blood. Exactly. What. What are the molecules that are higher? Yeah. And because right now, testing for C15, you know, I know we have tests to measure the OMEG 3 for patients, but me as a nutritionist as well, I never even thought about measuring people's C15. Is there an easy way for us to start to do that? Let's say in my periodontal patients to see their level of C15.

It's just starting to be available. So a very common question, Dr. Mark Hyman, his clinics use a test from Genova Diagnostics.

Yeah.

And they include C15 in their panel and we've heard of a couple others. So it's, I think, as you know, more and more information comes out about C15, the demand for the panels. But what's nice is they are available today. And there is a clinical trial that just finished with Dr. Jeff Schwemmer at Rady Children's Hospital looking at pure C15 supplementation, its effects on positive physiological effects on things indicative of liver disease and metabolic disease. In addition to the outcome of that being published next year. Stay tuned. It also helps provide guidance with regard to how the threshold. So what is a C15 deficiency? How do we define it? What we have seen to date is that having a level of about 5 micrograms per milliliter, which is measured in these tests is that threshold or it's like you really want patients to get above that level to be able to see the benefits. So now that we have a test and we have targeted levels and we have a way to increase it, that gets us a lot further along and being able to make a difference.

Yeah, I would love, I'm a researcher at heart. I did my master's at UCLA in oral biology. So I would love to run some studies actually to see the correlation with periodontitis and C15. And if we can ever create, I think a blood spot test would be so much easier and I'm sure probably it's just a matter of time before or there.

Yeah, I mean we hope so. Right. Because the increasingly the mounting data continue to support that C15 really is critical, you know, just as critical if not more than measuring our omega 3 levels. So as the more people can, you know, be able to use these tests, the easier they are, the better we can guide how much C15 should we be taking, where level's at so that it can really. And while C15 levels are important for us, it's really put C15 to the test and it's that if you're taking a C15 supplement, if you're taking fatty 15, go to your doctors ahead of time, get your labs run, not just C15 levels, but your CBC, income, liver enzyme levels, inflammation, and then go back in six to 12 months to get retested. And we would expect for you to see a benefit. And if you don't, it may not be right for you. So it's just like we're really encourage people that say give it a try, but put it to the test because its job is to deliver and provide tangible results, not to kind of cross your fingers and hope and pray it's having a benefit that you don't see or feel.

Oh, I love that. So you recommend three months checkup again?

Yeah, three. Probably the best is six months. But in studies as well as in models as well as in people, that many people see those benefits within three. If they aren't haven't kicked in by six months, then I think that's where the C15 level test becomes really important to say, gosh, did we get you to those levels that you needed?

So what are you currently studying or what are you currently working on?

Right. So we are boy so much. We just got this longevity paper out which is great to be able to support C15 to support our long term, truly Our long term health. We are, like we said, this clinical trial has been completed. Data will be coming out next year. Really focusing on the hypothesis that we've been pursuing for 10 years. Along with Dr. Jeff Schwimmer are nutritional C15 deficiencies the cause of the rise in fatty liver disease now present in one in three people and one in 10 children globally. So we are, it's an urgent issue that we are eager to be able to help. So that's the next step and then the last is, you know, awareness. We have awareness of C15. This is what we're on right now. Thank you Dr. Sanda for helping with awareness friends. Once we've gotten the credibility, which is that, you know, that kind of check that box and now awareness, the next step is accessibility. So how can we have C15 ingredient to fortify foods so that it can really be accessible to the world to improve global health?

Yeah, I mean you're on a big mission. I love it and definitely anything that I can do to support this mission. Dr. Stephanie. And we're gonna definitely put the links to especially the article that nutrients that you just published and the link to discoverc15.com that's gonna be in our show notes. And also how can people find this product? How can people purchase it?

You can go to fatty15.com so right now it's all online. So we haven't, you can't go to Target or Amazon yet. We love the community that we've built. We bring our customers. Come in. It's been wonderful. Our retention rates are incredibly high. We have over 95% customer retention rate month over month. And it's because people feel the difference and so. And we also have just an amazing team that can stand by and help help our customers with their journey. So we want to protect that world as long as we can. So yeah, fatty15.com is where to, where to find it.

Right. I would love to carry it at our health lounge in Beverly Hills so people can actually see it. I love actually what you've done even in terms of sustainability. And I know this is very hard for any company. You know that you have this beautiful glass bottle that's refillable and then you know, your refills actually come in paper bags, which I think it's amazing when.

We first started developing the brands because we went right from being scientists, from being veterinarians and physicians helping dolphins to like, oh my gosh, we just discovered an essential fatty acid in. Our advisors, clinical and scientific advisors were like, this is a Giant discovery. You have to bring this to the world. And the best way to do that is through a supplement. So all of a sudden we were in the marketing world. We're just like, okay, I guess we're going largest supplement. And so when we went to the team that helped develop the name Fatty 15, that was a whole big discussion in itself. Then we included with that was really kudos to the developing team who said, listen, if you're going to save dolphins and you're going to save the world, why not save the earth too? So that's where they said, let's come up with, you know, a packaging and environmentally responsible product that speaks to the high level of the science that you're ready to take that on as well. So we're really proud to have that part and that we had just the amazing foresight of our team.

Yeah, yeah. I'm really impressed. And as a woman CEO, I really admire you for that. You're wearing many hats and I wish you amazing success in the future. And definitely I'll be spreading the word about fatty 15. And also I want to do definitely some oral research with the fatty 15. I think it's so important and it's going to be a pivotal point in preventing periodontitis.

That is wonderful. And we're here to stand by, help provide you with whatever you need. And we'll make sure that you also have fatty 15 at your place, Dr. Zondas. So if you can provide it there. Yeah.

Dr. Stephanie Van Watson. Thank you so much.

Great. Thank you. It's great being here.

Yes. I'm looking forward to getting an update on all this, hopefully in about a year or so.

Absolutely. Lots of fun stuff coming.

Yeah. So stay tuned, everyone.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for joining me this week. Please make sure you check out the show notes for any links mentioned in the show. If you like today's show, please invite your friends to listen as well. That would mean a lot to me. Do you have a question you'd like me to answer? Message me on Instagram. DrSanda. This is Dr. Sanda. And remember, your mouth is the gateway to your health, so take care of it in the most natural and best way possible.