First NAD+ Infusion Center Is Taking Indonesia By Storm.
Jakarta/Bali, Indonesia
Powerful Ways NAD+ Impact Your Nerves, Lifespan, Brain Function & More
Total Reading Time: 12 Minutes
The Big Idea In 40 Seconds
What is NAD+ and Why Is it Important? Why You Need NAD+
Benefits Of NAD+
Makes Cells Resistant To Stress & Protects The Brain Helps You Eat And Sleep At The Right Time
Helps With Autoimmune Diseases
The Big Idea In 40 Seconds
NAD+, or nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide, is a coenzyme: a compound that your body uses to support basic reactions in your cells. It’s kind of a big deal.
It helps you get energy out of the food you eat, protects cells from stress, maintains healthy sleep cycles, and helps your cells repair damaged DNA.
In short, it can:
- Improve mental clarity
- Boost memory.
- Improve mood.
- Facilitate brain regeneration.
- Improve concentration.
- Increase one’s ability to focus.
- Boost neurological function.
- Reduce symptoms of depression.
Indonesia has a new juggernaut in town. From measuring telomere DNA length (which will tell you how long you may live) from advanced cancer-killing peptides to NAD+. DripDok Indonesia is geared for some serious growth over the coming year.
What is NAD+ and Why Is it Important?
NAD+ is essential to the creation of energy in the body and the regulation of pivotal cellular processes. Here’s why it’s so important, how it was discovered, and how you can get more of it.
Short for nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide, NAD+ is a coenzyme: a compound that certain enzymes need to work. It is crucial for the basic reactions in your cells that keep you alive.
NAD+ levels drop as we age and may drop more when cancer or other chronic diseases invade the body. The study found that increasing the levels of NAD+ can help ward off and even reverse neuropathy.
NAD+, or nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide, is a critical coenzyme found in every cell in your body, and it’s involved in hundreds of metabolic processes. But NAD+ levels decline with age. NAD+ has two general sets of reactions in the human body: helping turn nutrients into energy as a key player in metabolism and working as a helper molecule for proteins that regulate other cellular functions.
These processes are incredibly important.
In short, it’s a coenzyme or “helper” molecule, binding to other enzymes to help cause reactions on the molecular level while regulating metabolism.
But the body doesn’t have an endless supply of NAD+. In fact, it actually declines with age.
Since NAD is so fundamental to good health, how is it that we can become deficient in this powerful molecule?
First of all, the vitamins, minerals, complex carbohydrates, proteins and fats come from our diet and provide the building blocks to citric acid cycle energy production. If any one of the nutritional factors is low, energy production is weakened.
Since oxygen is just as important as hydrogen in cellular energetics, lack of exercise and shallow breathing due to stress are common factors that can reduce the amount of oxygen at the cell level. And finally, the enzymes that catalyze the citric acid cycle are often inhibited or destroyed by chemical or physical toxins that create oxidative, or free radical, damage.
Free radical damage comes from cigarette smoke, drugs, radio waves from cell phones and wi-fi, and the myriad chemicals found in all humans at this time on earth, including phthalates, parabens, pesticides, styrene, benzene, toluene, and thousands more. For example, medical scientists now widely believe that Alzheimer’s dementia and Parkinson’s disease share the common feature of nerve cell degeneration due to impairment of the ATP-producing enzymes with the citric acid cycle and mitochondria.
However, there is more than acquired NAD deficiency, due to poor diet, chronic stress, sedentary living, and toxin accumulation so common in our modern world — it may also be genetic for some people.
Genetic NAD deficiency may be present at birth and appear in children as poor sleeping, behavioral problems, hyperactivity, impaired concentration, academic stress, and underachievement.
Some people have been tired and depressed for as long as they can remember. For these people, there is a greater tendency to try drugs and alcohol in order to improve energy and mood, and simply feel better, but the risk for addiction is high. I have treated several people addicted to drugs, alcohol, or medical drugs such as benzodiazepines, like Valium, Librium, and Klonopin, with intravenous NAD, thereby eliminating the addiction and leading to improved energy and moods in the long run.
Genetic disorders in energy production are complex and the research is accumulating to help us understand this important issue. There may be a genetic polymorphism that reduces a gene coding for a mitochondrial protein. Since mitochondrial DNA is all received from the mother through the egg (no mitochondria are found in sperm) we can look to the maternal side for clues to energy production in the family history.
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Why You Need NAD+
Without NAD+, it all stops.
Professor of biochemistry and director of the Obesity Initiative at the University of Iowa Dr. Charles Brenner, Ph.D., explains,
“Conversion of our fuels, protein, fat, and carbohydrate into energy requires NAD. Similarly, maintaining our blood glucose at night and generating ketones requires NADH. It’s actually reoxidized as NADH to NAD+. NADH is also re-oxidized to NAD+ when we make ATP from that fuel that we ate. This is required for all of our muscles to work, and for ideas to be transmitted along our nerves, and for us to hear.”
In a nutshell, we can’t function without it.
All the good food you’re eating won’t do a thing for you if your cells can’t extract energy from it. NAD+ picks up electrons, becomes NADH, and drops them off as part of the cycle that turns your food into energy that you use to move and think.
On a microscopic level, your mitochondria, the battery packs of your cells, use that energy to do the things they need to do to stay alive and to repair themselves when there’s damage or stress.
On the flip side, when scientists created conditions in the lab that inhibited NAD+, cells died because they couldn’t make energy.
NAD+ also makes sure proteins are properly folded into the form they need to have to do their jobs.
For example…
If the insulin receptor protein is the wrong shape, your cells don’t get the signal to accept the delivery of fuel that’s coming from your bloodstream.
Benefits Of NAD+ Supports Healthy Aging
Proteins that regulate biological pathways called sirtuin protect your cells from age-related decline.[4] Your cells use NAD+ to make sirtuin proteins work. Sirtuins play a crucial role in maintaining the length of telomeres, DNA strand end caps that keep our chromosomes from unraveling.[5] Scientists have linked long telomeres with longevity.
In a Bulletproof Radio podcast episode (iTunes), UCSF professor and co-author of New York Times bestseller “The Telomere Effect” Dr. Elissa Epel, PhD, explains, “When we measure telomeres in midlife, they’re a pretty reliable predictor of who gets disease early and, in some studies, who dies early. So, they do matter when we’re older.”
Because you want long telomeres and the longevity that goes along with them, you need plenty of NAD+ to keep them working efficiently.
Side note: We also sell Epitalon which increases your telomere length directly.
Thing is, your NAD+ levels drop as you get older.[6] One reason is that there’s a compound called CD-38 that destroys NAD+, which is a good thing in the right amounts. It keeps your NAD+ from getting too high and messing up your sleep-wake and hunger cycles.
Rodent studies showed that with age came an increase in CD-38, which destroyed more and more NAD+. Eventually, the balance tips and you have too much CD-38, and not enough NAD+.
Makes Cells Resistant To Stress & Protects The Brain
There’s plenty of research that shows that NAD+ protects cells from stress. When researchers measured NAD+ levels, they were able to predict cell survival when stressed. Sirtuins specifically protect against oxidative stress, and NAD+ helps sirtuins work properly.
In one study, researchers stressed rat brain cells by depriving them of oxygen, then they added NAD+ right to the cell culture. They found that cells treated with NAD+ were more resistant to stress and fewer cells died than in the cultures that did not get the extra shot of NAD+.
Translation: healthy levels of NAD+ may help you stay strong and resilient, especially in the face of stress.
Glutamate, a chemical that brain cells use to talk to other cells, causes neurons to get excited, which releases free radicals and stresses them. Being in ketosis increases the NAD+ to NADH ratio, which protects brain cells from damaging free radicals.
NAD+ is involved in the repair of DNA that has been damaged from normal day-to-day exposures and processes. It brings a negative charge to places where DNA is damaged, which facilitates repair.[12] This process snaps up the NAD+ supply, which takes time and nutrients to restore.[13] Studies show that replenishing NAD+ increases lifespan in animal models because it makes DNA repair more efficient.
Helps You Eat And Sleep At The Right Time
Scientists have identified the role of NAD+ in sleep cycles and hunger patterns. Circadian rhythm, your sleep-wake cycle, that depends largely on light and dark, determines when you feel awake when you feel tired when you feel hungry — in general terms, it determines the flow of your day.
A healthy circadian rhythm, sirtuins, and NAD+ are all interconnected. Sirtuins depend on NAD+ to work properly. Circadian rhythm determines when NAD+ is available. If either sirtuins or NAD+ get disrupted, your circadian rhythm goes haywire. Researchers demonstrated this by disrupting the circadian rhythm in mice by suppressing a specific sirtuin, which depends on NAD+ to do its thing.
It goes the other way, too. When mice had too much NAD+, their activity and rest patterns went wonky due to a disruption in circadian rhythm.
Circadian rhythm also regulates the release of hunger hormones. In another rodent study, NAD+ showed an influence in regulating appetite, and, by extension, even body weight.
Helps With Autoimmune Diseases
There are multiple studies regarding the suppression of autoimmune disease by way of the novel and unique therapeutic potential of NAD+ that mediates an impressive allograft survival through a systemic increase of IL-10 cytokine operating through a novel signaling pathway that does not dependent on CD4+ CD25+ Foxp3+ Tregs.
Harvard Medical School posted about a study done by researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a potential treatment may be on the horizon. Researchers found that NAD+, a natural molecule found in living cells, plants, and food, protects against autoimmune diseases by altering the immune response and turning “destructive” cells into “protective” cells. The molecule is also able to reverse disease progression by restoring damaged tissue caused by the autoimmunity process.
“Our study is the first to show that NAD+ can tune the immune response and restore tissue integrity by activating stem cells,” said Abdallah ElKhal, HMS instructor in surgery at Brigham and Women’s Division of Transplant Surgery and Transplantation Surgery Research Laboratory and senior study author. “These findings are very novel and may serve for the development of novel therapeutics.”
The scientists performed preclinical trials using experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis, a preclinical model for human multiple sclerosis. They showed that NAD+ can block acute or chronic inflammation by regulating how immune cells, called CD4+ T cells, differentiate. Mice receiving CD4+ T cells along with NAD+ present had a significantly delayed onset of disease, as well as a less severe form, therefore demonstrating the molecule’s protective properties.
“This is a universal molecule that can potentially treat not only autoimmune diseases but other acute or chronic conditions such as allergy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, sepsis and immunodeficiency,” said Stefan G. Tullius, HMS professor of surgery, Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s chief of Transplant Surgery, director of Transplantation Surgery Research and lead study author.
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Moreover, the researchers demonstrated that NAD+ can restore tissue integrity which may benefit patients that have advanced tissue damage caused by autoimmune diseases. In terms of the next steps, ElKhal notes that the lab is currently testing additional pathways and the clinical potential of NAD+.
NAD+ Helps Dopamine Regulation & Protection From Neurodegenerative Disorders
Interestingly, emerging evidence suggests a gut-to-brain spread of α-synucleinopathy and related loss of dopaminergic neurons and motor and non-motor symptoms. Studies from mice suggest that the neurons initially affected by α-synuclein pathology are those that innervate the gut (enteric neurons) and the pathology then spreads retrogradely via the vagus nerve to the brainstem and hence to the midbrain (Kim et al., 2019, Kishimoto et al., 2019).
In short, it stimulates the production of dopamine, serotonin, and noradrenaline, thereby improving moods.
The brain has a high energy demand, so neurons contain a lot of mitochondria. Mitochondria dysfunction also contributes to many mental health and neurodegenerative diseases.
Treatment with NAD+ improves the cognitive function of Alzheimer’s disease patients.
In a mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease, increasing NAD+ by supplementing with nicotinamide riboside restores cognitive function by increasing PGC-1alpha levels.
NAD+ has been used to treat Parkinson’s as NAD+ may increase the bioavailability of levodopa, the medication for Parkinson’s. As well as protect the brain from dopamine depletion and toxicity.
In rats, NAD+ administration through IV may decrease brain damage from oxygen deprivation (e.g. due to stroke)
This is also why a lot of my clients claim to do better with niacin/nicotinamide in the short term: because it increases NAD+.
Our clients often claim to do better with amphetamine usage as well in the short term. Amphetamines use up energy, ATP and also deplete dopamine in certain parts of the brain (striatum in rats).
When rats were given niacinamide to increase NAD+ levels, the negative changes caused by amphetamines were reduced. So we see that lower levels of NAD+ will decrease brain energy and dopamine, and people will start to need stimulants to keep up.
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Research Noted
Tullius, S., Biefer, H., Li, S. et al. NAD+ protects against EAE by regulating CD4+ T-cell differentiation. Nat Commun 5, 5101 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms6101
NAD+ regulates Treg cell fate and promotes allograft survival via a systemic IL-10 production that is CD4+ CD25+ Foxp3+ T cells independent
Elkhal, A., Rodriguez Cetina Biefer, H., Heinbokel, T. et al. NAD+ regulates Treg cell fate and promotes allograft survival via a systemic IL-10 production that is CD4+ CD25+ Foxp3+ T cells independent. Sci Rep 6, 22325 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/srep22325
NAD+ metabolism and the control of energy homeostasis — a balancing act between mitochondria and the nucleus
Zinc-Induced Cortical Neuronal Death: Contribution of Energy Failure Attributable to Loss of NAD+ and Inhibition of Glycolysis
NAD+ metabolism and the control of energy homeostasis — a balancing act between mitochondria and the nucleus
Sirtuins in aging and disease
SIRT6 is a histone H3 lysine 9 deacetylase that modulates telomeric chromatin
Why NAD+ Declines during Aging: It’s Destroyed
