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How to dramatically improve the metabolic health and performance of your skeletal muscle: Wisdom Wednesdays · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

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  Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays. Now,
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  Speaker 1: you probably heard me talk previously on this podcast about
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  Speaker 1: the benefits of amiga three fatty acids for both your
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  Speaker 1: heart and cardiovascular system and your brain. And from previous studies,
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  Speaker 1: we know they lower triglycerides, they improve hates DL, the
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  Speaker 1: good cholesterol, they reduced platelet aggregation, and their neuroprotective and
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  Speaker 1: they resolve inflammation.
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  Speaker 2: So very good all around for the heart and the brain.
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  Speaker 2: That's pretty well established. But today I want to talk
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  Speaker 2: about something that's only been recently recognized, and that is
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  Speaker 2: that amiga threes actually change your muscle biology. And the
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  Speaker 2: paper I'm discussing today is a twenty twenty four review.
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  Speaker 2: The title of it is Dietary Omega three fatty Acids
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  Speaker 2: and Skeletal Muscle Metabolism. A Review of clinical and pre
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  Speaker 2: clinical studies. So this was a structured review of twenty
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  Speaker 2: seven different research papers, and they prioritize systematic reviews and
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  Speaker 2: also mechanistic studies that examine the role of amega three
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  Speaker 2: fairy acids in physical activity, obesity, sarcopania which is the
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  Speaker 2: loss of bone and muscle, and keckexia, which is a
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  Speaker 2: wasting disease that's usually associated with cancer or heart failure.
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  Speaker 2: But let's dig into the paper first. Let's talk about
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  Speaker 2: some basics. So the precursor a Mega three is something
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  Speaker 2: called alphaalinelaic acid, or ALA, which comes from plants. But
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  Speaker 2: the heavy hitters are APA and deita. Now they're either
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  Speaker 2: made from eating ala from your diet and it's converted
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  Speaker 2: into EPA and dta in the body, but that's an
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  Speaker 2: inefficient process, or we can directly get APA and dha
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  Speaker 2: from marine sources, and that inefficiency of conversion is really
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  Speaker 2: really important. Like a lot of people that vegetarians and
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  Speaker 2: begans talk about eight lots of flax seeds and things
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  Speaker 2: like that, but conversion of ALA to EPA is roughly
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  Speaker 2: eight to twelve percent and conversion to dha is about
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  Speaker 2: one percent. So you need to eat a shitload of
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  Speaker 2: linseeds or or g seeds to get the CM that
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  Speaker 2: you would get from one serving of fish. So if
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  Speaker 2: you're relying purely on plant sources, you're really not generating
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  Speaker 2: much of the metabolically active forms of a media three
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  Speaker 2: fairy assets. Now, this is where it gets interesting. Once
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  Speaker 2: EPA and DHA enter the body, they're absorbed in your
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  Speaker 2: small and testing, and then they're packaged into substances called
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  Speaker 2: kylo microns and VLDL particles that then circulate through the
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  Speaker 2: bloodstream ultimately, and then they deliver them and they're incorporated
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  Speaker 2: into cell membrans, and this includes skeletal muscle membrum cell
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  Speaker 2: membrans as well. And when they enter muscle membrans, things change.
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  Speaker 2: They alter the fatty acid composition of what's called the
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  Speaker 2: phosphol lipid biolayer or bilayer, sorry, and that shifts membrane
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  Speaker 2: fluidity and it actually changes signaling dynamics inside the muscle. Now,
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  Speaker 2: this is a bit of geeky sound speak. What it
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  Speaker 2: means is basically, we're moving here beyond anti inflammatory fats,
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  Speaker 2: which everybody knows what they are, to something called cellular
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  Speaker 2: bio energetic, so affecting the energy processes within the cells,
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  Speaker 2: particularly in the muscle cells. Now, this review highlights that
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  Speaker 2: amiga threes they increase muscle protein synthesis. That's the creation
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  Speaker 2: of new muscle or the protein that builds the muscle,
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  Speaker 2: and it's via activation of a couple of different pathways
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  Speaker 2: M tour and P seventy S six k if you
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  Speaker 2: really want to know. Now, when we have exercise induced
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  Speaker 2: damage of the muscle, they help to restore this signaling.
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  Speaker 2: It's called akt M, tour and fox O three signaling,
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  Speaker 2: and that reduces protein breakdown and enhances rapair so basically
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  Speaker 2: helps your muscles to repair themselves and reduces the damage
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  Speaker 2: as well. Now critically, they also suppress something called NFkB
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  Speaker 2: nuclear factor cap a bravo if you want to really
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  Speaker 2: want to know. That's a major inflammatory what we call
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  Speaker 2: transcription factor. It's basically a trigger of inflammation and it
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  Speaker 2: actually drives protein degradation. So this is getting a bit gikky,
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  Speaker 2: but basically you're getting a dual effect here. When you
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  Speaker 2: take a Mega three's you're getting increased protein anibolism or
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  Speaker 2: build up and reduce protein catabalism. Now that is very powerful,
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  Speaker 2: especially for older adults, because we know that muscle protein
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  Speaker 2: synthesis gets very reduced as you get older, and it
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  Speaker 2: leads to part of the way that it leads to sorcopedia,
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  Speaker 2: that breakdown of muscle or loss of muscle and bone.
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  Speaker 2: But there's also more. Amiga threes also influence mitochondrial biology.
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  Speaker 2: And you know that I love a bit of mitochondrial biology.
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  Speaker 2: It turns out that EPA promotes mitochondrial biogenesis brand spanking
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  Speaker 2: new mitochondria, and deita increases mitochondrial mass. Now what does
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  Speaker 2: that matter? Because these mitochondrial dynamics, they determine metabolic flexibility,
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  Speaker 2: your ability to switch between fat and carbohydrate is fuel. Now,
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  Speaker 2: APA and DTA they also activate a couple of pathways.
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  Speaker 2: AMPK and PPA are alpha. Now they're important in lipid
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  Speaker 2: or fat oxidation or fat burning and reducing the accumulation
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  Speaker 2: of fat inside the muscle. We call it intramuscular fat accumulation.
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  Speaker 2: Why is this important because we know that excess intramuscular
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  Speaker 2: fat is very strongly associated with insulin resistance and diabetes.
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  Speaker 2: And we also know that sedentary people have much more
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  Speaker 2: intramuscular fat than people who are active. So when AMIGA
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  Speaker 2: threes enriched muscle membranes, what we actually see is improved
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  Speaker 2: insulin sensitivity. You get increased glute one and glute four expression.
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  Speaker 2: These are basically ways that of opening up the cell
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  Speaker 2: walls to take in glucose. So therefore you get improved
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  Speaker 2: glucose uptake and you also get reduced fat storage inside
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  Speaker 2: the muscle. Now that helps to control inflammation, but it's
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  Speaker 2: also metabolic reprogramming and in obesity models, as they discussed
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  Speaker 2: in this paper, a mega threes improve insulin sensitivity and
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  Speaker 2: they assist with weight loss maintenance. And if people with sarcopedia,
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  Speaker 2: long term intake of amiga three fatty acids help preserve
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  Speaker 2: muscle map both muscle mass and muscle function. And in
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  Speaker 2: people who have pre a little bit of pre katetic
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  Speaker 2: cancer states, so they're just about to go into that wasting.
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  Speaker 2: Amega three is reduce the breakdown of protein, but they
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  Speaker 2: can't reverse severe energy imbalance. Right. But one other fascinating
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  Speaker 2: aspect that's discussed is this membrane incorporation. So it turns
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  Speaker 2: out amega three fatty acids you may have seen supplements
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  Speaker 2: that say phospholipid or others that say triglyceride forms. It
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  Speaker 2: turns out that the phosphol lipid seems to be more bioavailable,
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  Speaker 2: more available for your body to use, and once it's
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  Speaker 2: embedded in the membranes of your cells, they influence this
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  Speaker 2: biochemistry with what we call ion channels, neurotransmission, and even
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  Speaker 2: more unit recruitment. There's also data suggesting that dita improves
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  Speaker 2: and we're getting so many geeky academic terms here, but
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  Speaker 2: it also improves action potential conduction basically the function of
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  Speaker 2: your nervous system and motor unit recruitment right, which helps
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  Speaker 2: to enhance your muscle strength. So mega threes don't just
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  Speaker 2: come inny your body and sit there. They are signaling molecules,
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  Speaker 2: They modify intracellular messaging systems. They also influence these what
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  Speaker 2: we call enzymatic cascades that regulate fancy sounding but important
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  Speaker 2: processes such as protein synthesis, lipid oxidation, inflammation resolution, and
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  Speaker 2: mitochondrial adaptation. So, in simple terms, omega threes speak the
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  Speaker 2: language of muscle health. Now, the review does point out
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  Speaker 2: that why many studies show improvements in protein synthesis and strength,
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  Speaker 2: not all down demonstrate and actual gain and muscle some
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  Speaker 2: men in our report monistor inconsistent results and a lot
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  Speaker 2: of us to do with different study designs. Maybe different
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  Speaker 2: quality of the Amiga threes are different amounts of the
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  Speaker 2: Amiga threes, but nevertheless, the kind of the signal that
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  Speaker 2: we're getting across different domains, including exercise recovery, obasicly related
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  Speaker 2: insulin resistance, aging, muscle loss. It's remarkably consistent and showing
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  Speaker 2: a benefit. So what are you doing, particularly if your
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  Speaker 2: eyes are rolling back of your head at all? That
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  Speaker 2: scientific terminology, Well, the recommendations in this paper suggest two
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  Speaker 2: hundred and fifty milligrams per day of EPA and two
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  Speaker 2: hundred and fifty milligrams of dh Practically speaking, that equates
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  Speaker 2: to about two servings of oily fish per week with
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  Speaker 2: at sardines, macro herring, salmon, those sorts of things. If
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  Speaker 2: you don't eat fish, then a high quality fish oil
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  Speaker 2: supplement can help you to bridge that gap. But definitely
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  Speaker 2: look for something on IF's website. I take Nordic Naturals.
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  Speaker 2: They're a great brand, but there's plenty any great brands
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  Speaker 2: out there. I'm not associated with Nordic Natcho's just they
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  Speaker 2: are screened for a wholely of things and the good quality,
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  Speaker 2: as are lots of different brands. But the sort of
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  Speaker 2: cheap stuff that you get in your chemist probably not
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  Speaker 2: the best. Right and now, I look for a product
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  Speaker 2: that clearly states that combined EPA and DTA content ideally
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  Speaker 2: about a gram combined per day. If you want to
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  Speaker 2: target these metabolic or muscle benefits, and if you're vegetarian
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  Speaker 2: or vegan, then go for alkaloil. I think that's one
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  Speaker 2: of the most important supplements if you're vegetarian or you're vegan,
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  Speaker 2: because algaloil provides pre formed dita and some formulations actually
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  Speaker 2: include epa as well, So check and have a look
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  Speaker 2: at the content of the box, and that actually bypasses
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  Speaker 2: the poor conversion from LA entirely and gives you direct
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  Speaker 2: access to the biologically active forms of dita and epa. Now,
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  Speaker 2: given what we just to sum up, given what we
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  Speaker 2: no I understand about muscle aging, insulin resistance, mitochondrial decline
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  Speaker 2: and recovery from exercise, ensuring that you get enough amiga
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  Speaker 2: three fatty acids is pretty critical. So we talked before
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  Speaker 2: about heart health benefits, we talked before about brain health benefits,
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  Speaker 2: and now you can add skeletal muscle benefits to that list.
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  Speaker 2: And as always, it's food first if you can, and
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  Speaker 2: then supplementation if required. But the key thing is to
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  Speaker 2: be consistent over time. That's it for this week, folks,
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  Speaker 2: Catch you next time.