Transform Your Health With Nitric Oxide | Dr. Nathan Bryan

My whole goal is to do is to not apply the principles of pharmacology, which is what Western medicine is, is prescribing prescription medications, synthetic compounds that inhibit biochemical reactions. My approach has been completely different. Let's understand the mechanism of disease to the extent that we can restore the normal function. We coined this term restorative physiology. Understand what the body is missing and give the body back what it needs. And that's what we do with our nitric oxide technology. We know how much nitric oxide a healthy person makes. We know how much is deficient in people with erectile dysfunction, high blood pressure, dementia. We give that back. That's what we do with nitric oxide.

Hello, everybody. Welcome Back to the Dr. Joy Kahn podcast. I am here, of course, to bring you the best of the best so that you can improve your own health and live the most vibrant life possible. Today, there's a subject that has gained a lot of attention, which is nitric oxide. And I have the foremost expert in this subject, Dr. Nathan Bryan, who is here to enlighten us and with his brilliance. So, Dr. Nathan, thank you so much for coming back onto my show.

Well, thanks so much. I didn't realize it had been over three years, but always good to see. And thanks for having me on.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I learned so much from you always. You are a wealth of information. There may be some still. You know, some people don't understand nitric oxide very well. I utilize in my stem cell treatment every day because I believe that you can't really get the cells to places unless you have good blood circulation. Right. But on top of that, nitric oxides do more when it comes to stem cells. So we can talk more about that a little bit later. But yeah, I want to introduce you to the audience first. You know, you are a renowned researcher. You've studied under Nobel laureates, and then you have published over 100 papers with dozens of patents. So. And they're all in the area of nitric oxide, correct?

That's right. Yeah. That's all I've spent the past 25 or 30 years on, studying the single molecule nitric oxide.

Yeah. So tell us, what is about this particular molecule that got you so excited that you devoted your whole career to it?

Well, you know, I came out of a. I got a degree in biochemistry from the University of Texas in Austin, and then I went to LSU School of Medicine, where I. Where I completed a PhD in molecular and cellular physiology. And this was in the late 90s, early 2000s, and the Nobel Prize had just been awarded the discovery of micrococci. There was a lot of excitement around that field. You know, it was a. Was really unique, interesting molecule because it's a gas when it's produced inside the body. And once it's produced, it's gone in less than a second. You know, 25 years ago, we realized that it was a vasodilator, meaning that it increased blood flow and circulation throughout the entire body. But we really didn't know how to measure it. We didn't know, really, a clear understanding of how the human body made nitric oxide. And we really didn't understand what led to a loss of nitric oxide production, which then we knew led to things like sexual dysfunction, high blood pressure, advanced acceleration of cardiovascular disease, dementia, Alzheimer's. So really, you know, it kind of piqued my interest. And, you know, there was. We knew a lot at the time, but there were still so many things we didn't know and understand about micrococcides. So for me, we knew it was a very important subject. And if we could understand how to restore and recapitulate nitric oxide production and signaling in the human body, then everybody thought that it would change the world, and it would certainly change the world of medicine and healthcare and this emerging field of wellness and longevity. And I'm proud to say, 25 years later, we've answered all those questions. We understand all the unanswered questions at the time. We know how the human body makes nitric oxide. We know what goes wrong in people that can't make it. And perhaps most importantly, we know how to restore the production of this molecule.

Mm. Yeah. The first time I heard about nitric oxide was because of Viagra. When I was in medical school. That's when they. When they talked about the. The role it played. But that was the time. Was that time that you were just getting into nitric oxide research is around that time?

No, that's right. The. The. The. The PD5 inhibitors like Viagra were approved by the FDA, I believe, in 1998, same year that the Nobel Prize was awarded. And so these drugs, you know, they potentiate nitric oxide signaling, but they're not nitric oxide donors. You know, if you fast forward 25, 26 years later, we know, and you know, as a physician, that men that are prescribed viagra cialis, only 50% of those patients respond with better erectile function or better urinary symptoms of bph. The indications of those drugs, and the reason for that is because in order for those drugs to Work the body and the blood vessels have to be able to generate and produce a little amount, a little nitric oxide. If you can't make nitric oxide, then those drugs can't work. And really, that's the basis for erectile dysfunction. So if we can restore the production of nitric oxide, we can basically take those non responders and make them responders to PD5 inhibition therapy and basically, you know, restore physiology, which is what my whole goal is to do, is to not apply the principles of pharmacology, which is what Western medicine is, is prescribing a prescription medication, synthetic compounds that inhibit biochemical reactions. My approach has been completely different. Let's understand the mechanism of disease to the extent that we can restore the normal function. And we, we coined this term restorative physiology. And so understand what the body is missing and give the body back what it, what it needs. And that's what we do with our nitric oxide technology. We know how much nitric oxide a healthy person makes, we know how much is deficient in people with erectile dysfunction, high blood pressure, dementia, and we, we give that back. And it's kind of like, if you're low in vitamin D, what do you, do you give vitamin D? If you're low in testosterone or estrogen, we give those back to normal physiological levels, and that's what we do with nitric oxide.

So just for the lay people, how does something like Viagra and the nitric oxide gas itself, how do they work together?

So in the lining of the blood vessels, there's an enzyme called nitric oxide synthase, and it's in our endothelial cells. And the endothelial cells are the cells that line all blood vessels throughout the body. So when we become, let's use intimacy and sexual activity, for example. So when we become stimulated, that turns on these nerve endings, the non adrenergic, non cholinergic nerve endings, but it also tells our blood vessels to make nitric oxide so we can dilate the blood vessels. And so nitric oxide, once it's produced, it activates a second messenger system called soluble guanlocyclase. And this cyclic, this, this enzyme leads to an accumulation of a molecule called cyclic gmp. And so this is pretty complex biochemistry, but it's the molecule cyclic GMP that leads to smooth muscle relaxation, calcium mobilization, which leads to blood vessel dilation. So as we all know, in order to get an erection, both in men and women, we need to dilate the blood vessels of the sex organs, where we can get engorgement of blood flow, prevent the outflow. And that's both a clitoral and a penile erection. So the PD5 inhibitors, drugs like Viagra, prevent the breakdown of cyclic GMP. So I like to say nitric oxide turns the switch on through the elevation of cyclic GMP. And the PD5 inhibitors keep it on because they prevent the breakdown of that molecule. And so that's why you're warned against four hour erections. That's why there's in some people an unsafe drop in blood pressure because you've lost the off switch. And so physiology, normal physiology and biochemistry, we turn something on, but then there's regulation and we can turn it off. That the PD5 inhibitors prevent that signal from being turned off. And look, these drugs are very successful. They work great for improving sexual function, at least in 50% of the patients.

So what happened to the other 50%? What was the problem with the other 50%?

Well, the other 50% don't produce any nitric oxide to lead to an accumulation of cyclic gmp. So the drugs cannot and do not work. So that told us 25 years ago that the mechanism of action of erectile dysfunction is a loss of nitric oxide production. That's the fundamental basis of sexual dysfunction. If you lose the ability to make nitric oxide, you cannot get an erection because you can't dilate the blood vessels and get engorgement into the sex organs. But if you look at the clinical indications now in clinical data on the PD5 inhibitors, they're improving pulmonary hypertension. They can dilate the pulmonary arteries and reduce pulmonary pressures. There's data now showing that people who have been on PD5 inhibition therapy, low dose for three to five years, have less incidence of Alzheimer's and dementia. So what we're finding is any mechanism, any modality that improves blood flow, dilates blood vessels, improves oxygen, nutrient delivery, basically prevents most age related chronic diseases. And that's what nitric oxide does.

Okay, So I wonder if there's any statistics about sexual function 100 years ago versus now, are there more prevalence of sexual dysfunction these days?

There are, and I think there's, there's a couple of reasons for that. And there are data, you know, from the 1970s, you know, I think 45 to 50% of women reported some type of sexual arousal disorder. And today what we call erectile dysfunction. But you know, 50 years ago, this was a taboo subject. You didn't speak about this at the, at the dinner table or, you know, there was, there was shamefulness in it. But now it's recognize that it's what we call the canary in the coal mine. If you have sexual dysfunction, this is a risk factor for advanced acceleration of cardiovascular disease, atherosclerosis, dementia, high blood pressure. So now you have to reveal to your physician and your practitioner that you've got what we call erectile dysfunction, which is also endothelial dysfunction. Because if you can't dilate the blood vessels of the sex organs, that same dysfunction occurs in your coronary artery. So you can't dilate the coronary arteries to increase, you know, the, to meet the increased metabolic demands. If you, you know, exercise, you can't dilate the blood vessels of the, the brain to recall membrane, you get dementia and eventually ozone. Or you can't dilate the blood vessels of the skeletal muscle if you want to exercise or work out. So this erectile dysfunction or an endothelial dysfunction is a topic now of discussion because it's a symptom of, of systemic disease that leads to a rapid acceleration of the number one killer of men and women worldwide, which is cardiovascular disease. So today we know that about 50% of the men over the age of 40 self report erectile dysfunction.

50%.

And that number goes up with each decade. So by the time you're in your 60s and 70s, you know, it's estimated that 80 to 90% of those patients have erectile dysfunction, which translates into endometer dysfunction.

So much so that people are accepting it as it is norm. And that's just, they think they, they should lose it, which is not the case.

No, that's right. And you know, we, we have data and, and others have data showing that we can prevent this age related decline in nitric oxide production. So one, now that we understand how the human body makes nitric oxide and we understand what's leading to a loss of its production, now we can properly inform and instruct patients to stop doing the things that we know disrupt nitric oxide production and start doing the things that we know that clinically improve it so that you don't lose this production of this molecule with age and you can have a, you know, healthy sex life into your 60s, 70s and 80s and, and not have high blood pressure and not have diabetes and not have dementia and Alzheimer's.

Well, let's talk about why the level of nitric oxide in people's bodies have declined, it sounds like, progressively over the past decades. What do you think is a reason?

Well, there's several reasons, because first we have to define how the human body makes nitric oxide, right? So we discussed this pathway of this enzyme in the lining of the blood vessels and really it becomes uncoupled. And so this is the Western diet, Western lifestyle, which leads to oxidative stress, inflammation and immune dysfunction. And all that leads to a loss of nitric oxide, which then further exacerbates those. But the problem is sugar in a carbohydrate rich diet, because sugar and carbohydrates are metabolized into glucose in the body, right? And glucose, as the name implies, is glue, right? It sticks, it sticks to proteins and prevents their conformational changes. And we can measure this in the blood. When glucose sticks to hemoglobin, this is called hemoglobin A1C. Right. And so it's the, it's a long term measure of blood glucose control. But what happens is when sugar sticks to these protein and enzymes, it prevents them from doing their job. So hemoglobin has to undergo a conformational change when it goes from the arteries to the veins to offload oxygen and pick up CO2. If sugar's stuck to this molecule, it can't undergo its conformational change. And we develop hypoxia. And that's the reason people, you know, the problem from 2020 to 2024, during that worldwide pandemic, was people developed hypoxemia because it couldn't pick up oxygen, they couldn't deliver oxygen. And the same thing happens with the nitric oxide synthase enzyme. Sugar sticks to it and it can't produce nitric oxide. And we get oxidative stress, at least to BH4 oxidation, not some coupling. So that's the major problem, eliminating sugar. And then to resolve that, you gotta eliminate sugar. The other pathway we discovered about 20 years ago was through the oral microbiome. You know, the bacteria that live on the dorsal part of the tongue in our mouth are part of our microbiome, these symbiotic bacteria that are doing things that the human body can't do. And we and others published on this, you know, 15 years ago that the bacteria in the mouth are there. Part of the microbiome is to produce nitric oxide gas. So anything that disrupts the microbiome leads to electric oxide deficiency. And what is that? Well, it's antiseptic mouthwash. Two out of three Americans wake up every day and use antiseptic mouthwash. And two out of three Americans have an unsafe elevation in blood pressure, and that's causal. We and others have published, if you use mouthwash, you destroy the microbiome. You shut down nitric oxide production, your blood pressure goes up, you lose the protective benefits of exercise, and eventually you develop erectile dysfunction.

Well, I know people do pound scraping. Would that cause any problems?

In our 2019 paper, we actually revealed that the patients who did tongue scraping actually had the best nitric oxide production and they had the best blood pressure. But the problem was the people who were tongue scraping but then used antiseptic mouthwash were the ones we saw the highest increase in blood pressure.

That's the worst.

That's the worst. Her tongue scraping is good. Tongue scraping with, with antiseptic mouthwash is the absolute worst. Yeah.

Okay.

Then the other thing is fluoride. You know, fluoride is in, in toothpaste because it's an antiseptic. Fluoride's in most municipal water supply. Why is. It kills the bacteria in the water. So the back, the, the, the water that's fluorinated, that you drink, that you bathe in, that you cook in, is eradicating the microbiome in your body, and it's causing enormous damage to the microbiome and shutting down nitric oxide production and causing chronic disease. So you have to get rid of fluoride, fluoride free toothpaste, get a home filtration system and get rid of fluoride. And then the third big contributing factor is our antacids. And these are specifically what we call proton pump inhibitors. The things like Prilosec, Prevacid, Nexium, Omeprazole, Pentoprazole, the prescription medications. So these, these medicines, again, this is based on clinical data. People who have been on PPIs for three to five years have a 40% higher incidence of heart attack, stroke, and Alzheimer's.

Wow.

So that's, that's the observation. Mechanistically we know because it's completely shutting down nitric oxide production. So if you, if you get rid of fluoride, if you stop using mouthwash and start to restore the microbiome and get patients off of antacids, now you've kind of released the brakes on the body's ability to produce nitric oxide.

Yeah. Do we know how empty acids shut down the nitric oxide production?

Well, there's two again. It's shutting down nitric oxide from both pathways. So number one, when you use PPIs, they inhibit an enzyme called DDAH. And this, this enzyme is what breaks down a metabolite called asymmetric dimethyl L argene, or ADMA. So patients on PPIs have an elevation of ADMA, which inhibits nitric oxide production in the lining of the blood vessel. The other pathway is you need stomach acid to. And you need an acidic stomach to. When you swallow your own saliva, we get a burst of nitric oxide in the lumen of the stomach. And without stomach acid, because of antacids, we, we eliminate the nitric oxide that's being produced. Hmm. So the antacids shut down nitric oxide from both pathways that the human body makes, nitric oxide. And the consequences of that are heart attack, stroke and Alzheimer's. I mean, these drugs, I've argued now for 10 years, these drugs should be taken off the market. They're more dangerous than the COX2 inhibitors from the early 2000s that were causing heart attacks and strokes. They were, eventually they were taken off the market. Now they have a black box warning. Hold on. This is the celebrex, the Vioxx. PPIs are more dangerous and causing more death and destruction than the cucks do. Inhibitors.

Wow, that's very. Considering how many people pop them like candy. Yeah.

You don't even have to have a prescription for them. You and I know people through conversations like this, they go, I've been taking these over the counter PPIs for 20 years. They don't, they don't know. If people knew the dangers of these drugs, there's no way they would take them. There was no way. Because it's all about risk, benefit. What's the benefit worth the risk? And the risk far outweighs any benefit provided by these drugs.

There are people who don't do any of those things. Right. Mouthwash and nitric ox. I mean, the PPI or do any other, you know, fluoride, even though they filter their system, but they still have low nitric oxide. Because it's prevalent. Because I've tested a lot of my patients, so. So why are other people low on nitric oxide?

Well, look, it's everything in the environment. You know, the food that we eat and grow in America is really devoid of any real nutrients. We have data showing from the 1940s to the early 2000s, there's a 78% decline in the basic micronutrients in the food grown in America. So we become nutrient deficient. The other thing is the food we eat, whether it's GMO based food or it's. There's food, you know, sprayed with pesticides, herbicides, glyphosate. Glyphosate completely shuts down nitric oxide production and it's rampant. It's. It's in the foods we eat. It's you know, it's. Now we can detect it in breast milk of mothers that are breastfeeding. So it's a huge problem. So that's one. You know, there's certain frequencies, the 5G. If you live in a, an urban, urban environment, you're, you know, bombarded with ems. That frequency of radiation can disrupt nitric oxide production and then physical inactivity. Their diet, you know, anything that leads to oxidative stress and inflammation is going to shut down nitric oxide production. If they've got some type of autoimmunity and a, you know, a viral infection that leads to increased inflammation and oxidative stress, again, it's going to lead them to nitric oxide deficiency.

Yeah. So what are your suggestions when you, you know, come, come upon a person and you're chatting about nitric oxide and they said, what do I do? Do I take arginine or do I eat beets? Like, what, what do I do?

Well, I think you gotta look at. And you were in this whole realm of personalized nutrition and personalized medicine. You have to look and see what is, what's that patient's primary clinical presentations and symptoms and how do we fix it. So first thing I always do is, you know, do a basic micronutrient analysis. Figure out what your body's missing because nitric oxide is foundational. But, you know, if you're missing like magnesium, which 75% of Americans are deficient in, you know, that's a very simple fix. Let's restore and replete your magnesium levels, which, by the way, is an essential CO factor to make nitric oxide. But, you know, I tell people, again, stop doing the things that disrupt nitric oxide. Start doing the things that promote it. Moderate physical exercise. We have to move, we have to exercise. Green leafy vegetables, you know, throw in some more. I'm a, you know, I'm not a big fan of extreme diets. The hardcore carnivore, the hardcore vegan vegetarian. I think we need a, a balanced diet in moderation. Our nutrients from sources. But most important thing is high protein, good fats, and very little or low carbohydrates. But, you know, you mentioned things like arginine. You know, 95% of the nitric oxide supplements on the market are probably geared toward or marketed as an L arginine product. And, you know, those, those products provide absolutely zero benefit because we're never deficient in arginine. So there's no need to supplement. Right. Our body makes it through the urea cycle. We get it from the breakdown of proteins. So if, if you're taking a nitric oxide supplement that has arginine or citrulline in it, just save your money. Those products are providing zero nitric oxide support to the human body. And then we mentioned things like beets. You know, beets really don't provide any nitric oxide. I've tested most of the commercial beets that, that are available at things like GNC and health food stores, and they're dead beats. We use them as placebos in our clinical trial. They're, it's, it's a marketing, it's, it's deception because, you know, there was, there were studies early on in the, in like 2012, 2013, that showed that beets, if they contained a certain amount of inorganic nitrate, if you consume them, then they could lead to an increase in nitric oxide, improve athletic performance, performance. But again, this requires adequate uptake, it requires adequate stomach acid production. It requires the right microbiome. And again, two out of three Americans don't have the right microbiome because they're using mouthwash or fluoride. We think it's probably 88 to 90% of the people don't have the right oral microbiome products. Even if you had everything, even if it had sufficient nitrate, less than 10% of the population would get a nitric oxide benefit from that. So, and you know, there are companies out there selling you beets and in all form factors, right powders and hydrated sugar matrix and things you see on tv, and these products provide zero nitric oxide benefit. And how do we know that? Because we test them. You know, we just got back from the A4M and I take analytical equipment with me to the eating and we test other people's products and. Right.

And they were happy about it.

They complained to the organizers. You know, I've actually been sued by companies because I test their products and reveal to the public that they don't work. I mean, and this is, I'm a scientist at heart. That's what I've done for 30 years. And so I want to reveal the truth and I want to provide the truth to consumers so that they can get a nitric oxide that actually works and provides benefit to them. And the reason for that is it's not to be malicious, but it's really to provide transparency and clarity. Because people tell me all the time, hey, I heard you on a podcast and you said nitric oxide was so important. But, you know, I've been taking this nitric oxide product for the past three or four years, and I haven't noticed any difference. And I go, what are you taking? They tell me. And I go, well, of course that product doesn't produce nitric oxide. Well, the company tells me it does. And I go with the company's like, so that right there could kill the entire nitric oxide field because of a misinterpretation of what they think is. Because they think, well, I take this nitric oxide product, and it doesn't improve my blood pressure, doesn't improve my sexual function. So nitric oxide doesn't work. No, that's the absolute worst interpretation. That company that sold you that product doesn't work, and they've done you and the entire world a disservice by selling you and marketing a product that they say is nitric oxide when it's not. And so what we do with our products is if your body can't make it, then we do it for you, and we fix the reason your body can't make it. And we have test. We have analytical equipment, and we have functional measurements to prove that these products produce nitric oxide and prove that they elicit a biological response, dilate blood vessels, improve oxygenation, improve vascular compliance, improve cognition, executive function, athletic performance, sexual function. And that's what makes us different. Mm.

You do this testing on top of the tongue to look at. I think it's a precursor to nitrate. Nitric oxide. Right. Is it nitrate that you were looking for?

Well, now, the salivary test strips, I developed those back in 2010. I abandoned the patents on those probably in 2012 or 2013, because, you know, it's old chemistry. So now I don't use those test strips anymore. I developed them, abandoned the patents. Now there's several companies out there still selling these salivary test strips that I developed. But here's the problem, and I. I kind of abandoned those because we realized years ago that they're false positives. So if you use that test strip and you. It turns bright pink and you read that, it goes, well, it's optimal. Right. We were making nitric oxide, but then if you look and do kind of a. An assessment of that patient, they have high blood pressure, diabetes, Ed. All the hallmarks of nitric oxide deficiency. And then they do that test, and they go, well, look, I'm optimal. I don't need nitric oxide. So what we're finding is that people who have an active oral infection, whether it's symptomatic or asymptomatic, have false positives, and then the Other thing we're finding is that the salivary levels of nitrite, which is what we're picking up through some old chemistry called the grease reaction, is really not reflective of endothelial function. How? Well, the endothelial layer and the NOS enzyme in the endothelium is producing nico. So there was a disconnect between what we were seeing in this point of care, noninvasive diagnostic versus, you know, systemic function of vascular endothelial function in the patient. So I tell people, you really shouldn't use the test strips. I mean, if you know what you're doing, you can kind of interrogate the pathways and figure out what may be going wrong. Because there's really no false negatives. If you're low, you're low. Right. Then you need nitric oxide.

So if the test shows that you are low, then you are, you are low.

Now the question is, why are you low? Is it because you don't have the right oral microbiome? Is it because you're on antacids? Is it because you're not, you don't have an optimal diet? Is it because you have endothelial dysfunction? So in order to fix the reason for the nitric oxide deficiency, you have to understand why that patient is deficient. And so you always have to follow that up with, you know, functional measurements, you know, and a really in depth analysis and really creating a really clinical picture of that individual patient using the.

Lozenge that you guys produce that helps release nitric oxide directly into your bloodstream. Right. So if you did a test that was negative. Right. It has almost no color in it. So the person is very low on nitrite. That's the precursor to nitric oxide. So after you got more nitric oxide gas in your bloodstream, would that change to that test in any way?

No, of course it would, because we're actually producing both. No. Which has been oxidized back to nitride. So we're picking up, we're, we're delivering what we're measuring.

Right. Okay, so you have release both nitride and nitric oxide.

That's right.

Okay.

What I tell people today is like, look, you can test if you want to. I think testing is important and there are many things we need to test for. But in terms of nitric oxide, there's only two people in the world who need nitric oxide. There's the people who are sick and want to get well. Are there the people who are well and don't want to get sick?

That's Everybody more than one of those.

Two, then you should take nitric oxide. I've been taking my product for 20 years, maybe longer, early prototypes of it. And I don't take it because I need it. I take it because I don't want to need it. Proactive instead of reactive. I don't want to, you know, the older I get, I just turned 51 this year and I've got the vascular age of a 32 year old. And it's not because of probably my diet and lifestyle. As we were talking before we got on here, I'm on an airplane every week. I've traveled millions of miles all around the world. I give 50, 60 lectures a year. I'm in hotels, I'm in airplanes. I don't always eat right, but no matter what, no matter where I am, I take my nitric oxide. But you know, I'm also health conscious and I exercise, I watch what I eat and I try to make healthy decisions. I, I take this nitric oxide again because I don't want to lose this age related decline and get ED or, or hypertension or diabetes or exercise intolerance or, or dementia or Alzheimer's. I mean, and the basic science data and the clinical data reveal that without nitric oxide that you're on a fast path to all of those. And if you can prevent the loss of nitric oxide and you can maintain some nitric oxide production and signaling, you can prevent all of those. And that's, that's my objective. Not just for my own health, my family, but for everybody around the world.

That's true. You take it twice a day or once a day?

Well, you know, typically I take, so I start out, I do an 18 hour fast every day. And so our products don't break a fast. So when I wake up in the morning, you know, my daily routine is I wake up before the sun comes up. I take the beet powder, our no beets when I wake up and that kind of my first nitric oxide boost.

So you just said the beets probably don't work. So what's the reason you have this beet powder?

Well, the beets, we actually manufacture beets that actually work. So we start with the right soil conditions, we ferment these beets to pre convert them so we're not dependent upon the oral microbiome. And then we add electrolytes and mitochondrial ATP to that product. So now we make a concentrated beet powder that we remove the oxalates, the beet pulp, the beet color, the beet Taste. Then we've got white powder that we put in water. And then you mix it up and take it as a shot. That starts my day with increased circulation. Oxygen. I sit in an infrared sauna for 30 minutes at 170 degrees. Uh, well, before that I do a hundred pushups, a hundred squats in less than three minutes. So that gets my blood flowing. I go sit in the sauna, do a cold plunge 37 degrees for three minutes. And then I watch the sun come up and resets my circadian rhythm. And then I take my supplements. So to answer your question, I take the beets in the morning, then in the afternoon I'll take the lozenge. And that's gives me 24 hour nitric oxide coverage.

Mm, I see. Wow, that's 24 hours.

24 hours, yeah. For. To kind of maintain optimal levels, you know, but for people who have maybe metabolic disease, Ed, high blood pressure, which I don't, you may need to take one every four to six hours. You know, everybody's individualized and you just gotta titrate in based on your own individual kind of needs or metabolic demands.

Yeah. So are you saying it's pretty hard for people to get adequate nitric oxide without taking a supplement like what you developed?

It is just because the world we live in and the food that we eat is not nutrient dense and there's so many environmental toxins that completely shut down nitric oxide production. So I think it's, it's one of those things that, you know, it's like a daily vitamin C. You know, we need vitamin number one. Humans can't make vitamin C, so we have to supplement with it. Humans can make nitric oxide, but they lose their ability to make it over time. So we have to supplement. It's. Yeah, it's very difficult to, even in the best conditions. And I've tried to adapt my life. I live on 800 acres out in the middle of nowhere. So I'm completely isolated. We raise our own food, we raise our own beef. We don't buy many groceries from the grocery store. And I control the environment. But even that, even when I do soil analysis and grow nutrient dense, herbicide, pesticide free food and raise your own beef with no antibiotics, no hormones, anything like that, it's still. Because I travel so much, it's, it's very difficult to maintain adequate, optimal nitric oxide. And I'm in a very, you know, controlled environment where most people who live in, you know, urban areas, in cities, where they're exposed to, you know, air pollution and 5G and all types of stuff. It's almost impossible. Yeah.

And I know you're a huge researcher. What kind of research have you done or have you seen that's looking at different aspects of what nitric oxide is doing for our body?

Well, you know, it's been an evolution over the past 30, 40 years because when nitric oxide was first discovered, it was thought to be just a simple vasodilator. It just dilated blood vessels and improved blood flow and tissue oxygen. But today we understand that it's the signal that tells our own stem cells to mobilize and differentiate. Right. So the older we get, the less nitric oxide we make, the less we heal and recover from injury or replace and repair dysfunctional cells. I mean, that's your world, right? The regenerative medicine. So how do we allow for regenerative medicine? How do we. Which humans by nature are regenerative. So if you lose the ability to make nitric oxide, we're not running out of stem cells. The older we get, we're running out of the signal that tells our stem cells to mobilize and differentiate. And that's what nitric oxide does.

Number two, we're all running out of stem cells at the same time. So double.

In bone marrow derived, certainly there's less, but most people accumulate more, less than chymost themselves.

Throughout the body, you're just less and less. But yeah, without the signals, it's even way worse.

And then, you know, it's the end. Nitric oxide activates an enzyme called telomerase, which prevents telomere short. Because now we know again, this discovery won a Nobel Prize about a decade ago, or maybe longer. But the telomeres are the ends of the chromosomes that with each cellular replication, if telomeres get shorter, that's associated and correlated with shorter lifespan. Longer telomeres, longer lifespan. So nitric oxide activates telomerase, prevents telomere shortening. Then number three, nitric oxide controls and activates mitochondrial biogenesis and mitochondrial activity.

Wow.

And mitochondria are really the. Well, not. They are the energy producing organelles of the cell. So if we lose the ability to produce nitric oxide, we have lower number of mitochondria per cell, generating less ATP or cellular energy, less efficient. And now if we can restore nitric oxide, we have more mitochondria, we're generating more energy and cells perform better. So every aspect about wellness longevity is dependent upon the body's ability to produce nitric oxide. Mobilizing stem cells, preventing telomere shortening and activating mitochondrial biogenesis and cellular energy production.

Wow, that's profound.

It's foundational for regenerative medicine. Foundational for longevity. Yeah.

And I know you were looking into different disease conditions and can you talk a little bit about what areas did you look into?

Yeah. So, you know, again, we touched on this. I've been in basic science research for 25 years. I'm trained as a drug discovery biochemist. So I developed dietary supplements based on our discoveries about 20 years ago. But really that wasn't. My overall objective is to develop dietary supplements for the wild, wild west. My objective was again to understand the mechanism of disease through basic science to where we could develop rational therapies to address chronic disease. And we discovered that nitric oxide is affecting a number of age related chronic disease. So we have a drug discovery program through my company called Brian Therapeutics. And so we're making nitric oxide drug therapies and the first indication we're going to go after is ischemic heart disease. And so ischemic heart disease, there's 33 million Americans living with ischemic heart disease, about a quarter of a billion worldwide. And these are patients that have an obstruction in the coronary arteries from atherosclerosis. Right. So ischemia, as you know, is reduced blood flow. Is reduced blood flow because there's an obstruction and stenosis of the coronary artery. So the cornerstone therapy for these patients is isosorbide and nitroglycerin. Right. It's an organic nitrate that produces nitric oxide that dilates the coronary artery. And so these drugs have been used for about 180 years, back to the days of Alfred Nobel. But the problem with these drugs is you develop tolerance to them. Patients lose their ability to respond to these drugs. In fact, 50% less response after the first, second drug is given, second dose from the first and then the long term outcome studies are actually worse. So what we want to do is provide a better, safer therapy for these patients. And so our nitric oxide releasing lozenge will dilate the coronary arteries, improve coronary blood flow, alleviate the ischemic pain known as angina. And we, we're actually seeing plaque regression. We're cleaning out the lining of the, the coronary arteries and reversing disease.

Do we know how?

Well, it's mitigating the inflammation, it's preventing platelet aggregation, it's preventing, reducing nitric oxide.

Is also anti inflammatory.

It's anti inflammatory. In fact, a number of my patterns are on the method of reducing inflammation through nitric oxide. We can see about a 35% reduction in C reactive protein after 30 days. But it's preventing the upregulation of the adhesion molecules which are responsible for the extravasation of fatty acids, cholesterol and the plaque deposition. So it's mitigating the inflammation, oxidative stress and immune dysfunction that we see in the advancement of atherosclerosis. So we can actually see a reversal of disease. And we're improving endothelial function. So that's number one. And I restart, hopefully start those drug studies. We've had the pre IND meetings with the FDA and have clear regulatory guidance. So I'm hopeful within a year, two years max, we'll have a drug approved and on the market. But then we're going after Alzheimer's. You know, Alzheimer's is a huge problem. 50 million people. It's expected to triple in the next six years. People are living with Alzheimer's. And nitric oxide addresses everything we know about Alzheimer's because Alzheimer's is reduce blood flow right through PET scans or functional MRIs. There's ischemia and focal ischemia. Certain regions of the brain we get insulin resistance, you can't get glucose into the cells. And then we get misholding of proteins. So what does nitric oxide do? Well, it dilates the cerebral arteries, it improves glucose uptake, improves insulin sensitivity, it prevents protein misfolding. So we don't get the beta amyloid plaque, we don't get the tau tangles simply by restoring nitric oxide. So that's our Alzheimer's drug. This is probably a six to eight year study, but I think it will completely eradicate Alzheimer's disease.

Oh my God. That's quite a statement because billions of dollars have been poured into this and there has been no solution yet.

You know why? Because they're going after the wrong target. You know, these drug companies have, have, have misspent billions of public money on going after the consequence of disease. Making monoclonal antibodies against beta amyloid plaque and tau tangles is the absolute worst idea in the world. And there's a reason these drugs don't work. It's because they're targeting the consequence. Tau tangles and beta amyloid do not cause Alzheimer's. They're markers of Alzheimer's. So let's target the root cause of Alzheimer's. Let's restore blood flow, let's improve insulin sensitivity, let's get glucose into the cell, allow that cell to do its job so you don't get protein misfolding and you can maintain cognition. So there's a reason these drug companies have failed and there's a reason there's been no effective therapy for Alzheimer's. They're chasing the wrong drugs.

What have you seen in people who already have Alzheimer's and when they start taking nitric oxide?

Well, we've seen this clinically. So we, we get baseline PET scans or functional MRIs looking at cerebral blood flow, and then we give them the standard cognitive test. And so we get baseline data, we give them our lozenge for 30 days. We see an improvement in cerebral perfusion and they actually improve on the cognition test. And the improvement in cognition correlates with the improvement in perfusion of the brain. And, and we published in 2009 that nitric oxide is what allows for glucose uptake into the cell. It potentiates insulin signaling. So Alzheimer's is diabetes type 3. It's a metabolic disease, it's a vascular disease. Nitric oxide mitigates the metabolic disease and improves glucose uptake. It improves cerebral blood flow. So we're affecting the vascular portion of Alzheimer's. Nitric oxide addresses the root cause of dementia and Alzheimer's.

What about for people who don't have Alzheimer's and just want better functioning brain and better cognitive function?

Well, you got to maintain adequate blood flow, right? It's like to have adequate sexual function, we got to increase blood flow. To have adequate cognitive function, we got to have adequate blood flow.

Have you done any testing of, you know, so called normal subjects to see if their brain function is enhanced?

Yeah, in fact, just last week at a 4M, there was a, there was a company there called Mind View, I believe. And what they do is they have this virtual reality set and it's based on executive function, response time and things like that. But it's about a three minute test. And so I always like to test this process product and see what new diagnostics or functional measurements are out there that people are using or companies are using for cognition, executive function, things like that. So they go, look, you really can't move the needle. This is kind of a static situation. But if we, if we change you and put you on a regimen for 30, 60, 90 days, you may be able to move the needle a lift a little bit. So I go, let's put it to this. So I did it. I was in Vegas. I was a little bit hungover, I was dehydrated, it was early in the morning and I wasn't. That was still probably 69th percentile. And I go, okay, I'm gonna take a lozenge and I'm gonna come back in 20 minutes and I'm gonna repeat this test. They go, it's probably a waste of time because we don't see anything move that fast. So I go back 20 minutes later and now I'm like 90th percentile.

Oh my goodness.

Executive function improved. My, my response time improved everything. Cognition improved. And they just sit there with an open mouth and they go, oh my God. What? We've never seen anything like this.

Wow.

So now we're actually going to do a controlled study and take some of their patient cohorts that they have baseline data on. Now let's put them on the lozenge. Let's don't change anything else. Let's just, whatever they're doing, keep doing. But let's just put them on the lozenge and let's just measure their response time and their response over time. Let's give it, you know, measure them a week later, measure them up 30 days later and let's, let's see what we're doing.

Wow, that's really exciting. Yeah.

That test, we do it with a CV profiler looking at vascular elasticity, vascular compliance, about a 30% improvement within 20 minutes of taking the lozenge. So the point here is no matter what functional measure we, we do this and get baseline data when patients take our lozenge, it always moves the needle. There's never been a test that nitric oxide, our products that produce nitric oxide, move the needle and we do it with our competitive products, the so called other nitric oxide products out there, flatline, they, in fact sometimes they get worse.

Really? Wow. And what other conditions have you studied looking at effects?

Well, for our drug study, we're looking at topical drugs for diabetic ulcers and non healing wounds. You know this, this was really started by my dad who's a paraplegic from a car accident in 1984. So most of my adult life I've been treating my dad's decubitus ischial ulcers of pressure wounds. And you know, about 10 years ago he had a 4 year old non healing wound, a right issue ulcer that was osteonecrotic, osteomyelitis, septic. And I took him to all the best wound care centers I could and every single wound care doc told me we would never heal this wound on the 65 year old diabetic paraplegic.

So very deep wound, the bones Are are going dead?

Yeah, yeah, I, I could see the bone in his right butt cheek. And so I just refused to accept this. So I started making a nitric oxide releasing gauze. And so every day, twice a day, I would do a wet to dry dressing and change this wound. And within a period of about six months, I was seeing about 40 to 50% wound closure. For the first time in the history of this four year old wound. We were actually seeing it get better. So then with that I started doing stem cells, we did liposuction and injected stromovascular fraction in and around the wound and then within 10 days got about 80% closure.

Wow.

And then I took him to a surgeon and they did a surgical flap and basically healed this four year old non healing wound in a matter of less than a year. So then I started making a topical nitric oxide. Today we sell it as a skincare product, the serum. But you know, we're taking that same technology and developing topical drugs for, because believe there's 65,000Americans every year that die in nursing homes from infected wounds that become septic. And people are dying from this. And it's unacceptable because now with our topical nitric oxide, we can heal that wound, kills the infection inside the wound, it allows for hyperemia and you get tissue granulation and the wound heals. I mean, nitric oxide is the solution for not healing diabetic ulcers, not healing wounds. In fact, we haven't seen a wound that we haven't been able to heal with a nitric oxide.

Hmm. Yeah. Well that's wonderful.

So those are the big ones, you know, heart disease, Alzheimer's, diabetic, diabetic ulcers. But then we'll go things like heart failure. You know, we have really good data in heart failure, specifically heart failure with preservative Jackson fraction or hip cuff pulmonary hypertension. We've done studies in the cath lab doing right heart cast. We can. The lozenge reduces pulmonary pressures, restores right heart function. It's really, I think.

What about for something like copd? Did you see any difference?

Yeah, copd, congestive heart failure, things like that. Because nitric oxide is not just a vasodilator, it's a pulmonary, it's a, it's a bronchodilator. So even in asthma, copd, it dilates the bronchial. So now you can improve oxygenation, tissue uptake, you can meet ventilation to perfusion in the lungs and match this. Because in, as you know, in pulmonary disease, there's always a mismatch in ventilation to perfusion and nitric oxide can match that and allow for better tissue oxidation.

Hmm. Okay. I know you give extensive lectures at a 4am and training programs and you talk about various organ systems and the effect of nitric oxide. So can you speak on a few other organ systems that you've taught physicians about?

Well, mainly it's cardiovascular because every age related chronic disease has a vascular component. So if we can improve blood flow to that end organ, mitigate the inflammation, oxidative stress and immune dysfunction, then that organ gets better. That's what nitric oxide does. So yeah, heart disease, erectile dysfunction, dementia, Alzheimer's, mild cognitive impairment, even just in the healthy population, improving performance, whether it's athletic performance, sexual performance or cognitive performance. But really what we're trying to do is educate and inform people on the importance of nitric oxide so that they can be proactive instead of reactive. And as you know, when you see patients, you see sick patients, so they don't make changes until they have a crisis. They've had a heart attack, they have E.D. now they want to make changes because it's fear based. But I think we have to change the narrative and inform and educate on how to prevent, how to address these issues before they manifest as symptoms. And I think that's what my goal is. And my frustration is even in organizations like A4M, which I'm a huge fan of, they're leading this, you know, anti aging medicine. But they have speakers there that are paid by companies to come in and give a lecture on nitric oxide. And I go to these, number one, these people have no idea what nitric oxide is. They've never published a single paper. And they're educating this audience, they're misinforming them and providing just unbelievable misinformation on Microsoft. So these people are paying thousands of dollars to attend this conference and get quality education, are being miseducated, misinformed by people who have no business being behind a lecture and speaking on a subject that they have absolutely no business. Stigma.

Yeah. Gosh. Another aspect I know you've talked about, which I'm interested in, is the anti microbial aspects of nitric oxide. And that's very interesting because when I go travel on the plane, if I know I'm around all these people, then I'm going to pop an extra nitric oxide. So what are your thoughts on what's. Yeah, what do you think of this?

Well, look, mechanistically we know exactly what, how nitric oxide is working. So in terms of its antiviral, Nitric oxide prevents virus from replicating. It's the flu, it's the coronavirus, whether it's SARS CoV1, SARS CoV2, which was COVID19. Nitric oxide is what prevents the virus from replicating, specifically the respiratory viruses, they bind to the ACE2 receptors. So in patients who are nitric oxide deficient, they get an upregulation of the ACE2 receptor. If we give nitric oxide, and we saw this during our clinical trial during previous four years, that we could downregulate the ACE2 receptor. So there's no target for the spike protein or other viruses or other targets of viruses to bind to. And then if we have a good circulatory system, we can mobilize an immune response. We go to the site of infection or attachment, generate nicrococcide and prevent the virus from replicating and propagating throughout the body. So it's. That's how it works. Antiviral, antibacterial is that when we produce nitric oxide, it binds to the iron sulfur centers of bacteria and completely shuts down their respiration. So we suffocate the virus by producing nitric oxide. So, again, if your body can't make nitric oxide, you're susceptible to viral infection, you're susceptible to bacterial infection. And these infections always occur in people with comorbidities, high blood pressure, diabetes, previous heart attack, the elderly. Those are the people who can't make nitric oxide. But if we can provide the body with a source of nitric oxide, now, we can prevent from getting an illness from a virus or a bacteria, haven't been sick, lost a day at work from a viral infection or any sickness whatsoever in more than 25 years.

Wow.

And it's not that I'm. I live in a. In a sterile world. I'm like you. I'm on an airplane, I'm in crowded places, I travel all over the world. So I'm subjected to this. But I support my microbiome, I don't take antibiotics, I don't use the. The antiseptic hand. The cost they give you on a plane, those are making you actually immunocompromised. So I want to support my microbiome, I don't want to destroy it.

Right. And you know, what you said about the antimicrobial properties is backed up by the research that you've done. Right. You've actually conducted clinical research on people who are very sick and you saw some remarkable results.

Yeah. So we've done this in cultures of, you know, wounds that are chronically infected and non healing. And, you know, we can plate these bacteria, we put our nitric oxide on there and it completely eradicates the infectious bacteria and the pathogens that are found in most groups. Viruses. Again, we had a clinical study during the previous pandemic and we were getting people better, we were improving tissue oxygenation, people weren't getting sick. And that was our goal, to keep people out of the hospital from viral infection. But as we all know, the disease changed and we aborted the trials back several years ago. And what the beauty of that trial is, Dr. Kong, is that we assume through our drug safety, we treated over 600 really sick, highly susceptible, highly medicated patients and not a single safety signal in any of those patients. So the nitric oxide that we're delivering first, do no harm. The nitric oxide we're delivering is extremely safe even in the sickest, most vulnerable population on the earth. And we were making them better. So now as we move forward through our drug studies, we've overcome the biggest hurdle for drugs and that's safe. So now we're off to the races. And you know, I think, I don't think, you know, there's three levels of conviction. There's, I think, I believe, and I know I'm to the. I know, I know, I know these drugs will change the world and change the way that you physicians treat patients for the next hundred years.

Yeah. So grateful that you are developing, you know, putting all the efforts and resources into doing this. What are the potential side effects if any of these nitric oxide supplements you develop?

Well, there's two signs of toxicity for nitric oxide specifically. There's, there's hypotension or drop in blood pressure and unsafe drop in blood pressure. And there's a condition called methemoglobinemia where if you take too much, it'll oxidize the heme iron of hemoglobin and you become cyanotic blue around the lips and you basically compromised the ability of the red blood cell to carry oxygen. And we monitored this all during our drug study in these really sick patients. And there was never an unsafe drop in blood pressure. There was no first dose effect and there was no appreciable accumulation of methemoglobin in these patients. Like I say, if you take 10, 12 of my lozenges at a time, I can't promise you that you're not going to develop syncope and, you know, lose perfusion. Pressure in the brain and perhaps pass out. But when taking these, as instructed and as indicated, they're completely safe. What are the side effects? Well, more energy, better sexual function, better focus, cognition. Those are the top three that we hear from people taking our products.

Wonderful. Last thing I want to talk about, of course, because of my passionate about stem cells, is how did you come upon the interaction between nitric oxide and stem cells and what did you find?

Well, there was a study published in 1992 in Nature Medicine, and this was looking at the at mice that we basically made them deficient in the enzyme that makes nitric oxide. And this group discovered that the number of stem cells present in these mice wasn't declined, it wasn't lower. They just lost the ability to mobilize this. So that was really the first paper showing that nitric oxide is the requisite signal, is the signal that's required for stem cell mobilization and differentiation. We built upon that science and then we took again in clinical data at Texas Heart Institute when I was taught at Texas Medical center and we were analyzing patients with post infarct, post MI patients and getting stem cell injections into the left ventricle and figuring out could you improve ejection fraction, improve contractility in post infarct patients. And what we found was we never published this, but the patients who actually got better from left ventricular stem cell injections were the ones who had the highest level of nitric oxide. If these patients were so devoid of any nitric oxide, then they didn't get better. And actually some patients got worse. Because I think what happens is if you don't provide the signal and create that niche for the stem cells that you're deploying endogenously or deploying, you know, IV or intraventricularly, then they don't know where to go and they don't know what to become. So now we've in anybody who's practicing regenerative medicines where we're trying to mobilize autologous stem cells or deploy autologous or mesenchymal stem cells or exosomes or any type of messenger cells, if we give nitric oxide before to dilate the blood vessels, open up the microcirculation, now, you're going to get better deployment, better delivery of those cells. More importantly, they're going to know where to go and what to become.

Beautiful. So good to hear you say it. Is me trying to convey that you said it much more eloquently and definitely I've been using that in conjunction with stem cell therapy for quite a few years now, so. So I'm grateful for your contribution into my practice.

Yeah. Now, thank you. The basic science. Look, as you know, the basic science means nothing if we can't translate that in the clinical practice and give you practitioners the tools you need to make your patients better. So, again, thank you for all you do and for making your patients better.

Oh, thank you, Dr. Nathan. Yeah. It's been a fabulous conversation and I'm so appreciative of you coming on to my podcast again and sharing all this information. Just, there's just so much knowledge that you. You're bringing to the forefront and of course, your innovation and your wonderful human spirit. So I appreciate you and I look forward to hopefully another conversation in the future.

I'll do it again. I got a new book coming out in February. It's called the Secret of Nitric Bringing Nitric Oxide to Life. And we'll really. It's part autobiographical. It's about my journey through basic science and academia and translation of these discoveries into clinical medicine into product technology. So be on the lookout for that. And in February, I refer people to my YouTube channel. We'll post these interviews and then. Yes, Dr. Nathan S. Bryan. Nitric Oxide. Or my educational website, drnathensbrian. Com.

Yeah. And you have a nice Instagram.

Yeah. And you can find me on social media. Dr. Nathan S. Bryan. On Instagram, I'm on LinkedIn, Twitter @DrNitrick. Yeah. Most social platforms.

Yeah. Wonderful, wonderful. I follow you. I enjoy your content. And again, thank you for your contribution to all of our health.

Well, thank you so much. Hope to see you soon.

Hope so, too. Okay. Bye, Dr. Nathan.

Bye. Bye.