Episode 324: Using NAD+ to Support Aging & Longevity with Dr. Gregory Kelly
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Erin welcomes back Dr. Gregory Kelly, the VP of Product Development at Qualia Life Sciences, to discuss all things NAD+ - a super important molecule that is involved in cellular energy, cellular protection, repairing damage, and responding to stress. Erin is asking Dr. Kelly all your questions about NAD+, especially as it pertains to absorption, bioavailability and how best to supplement with it. Learn more about what NAD+ is, how it can support longevity, testing options, and ways to tell if your levels of NAD+ may be declining.
Gregory Kelly is VP of Product Development at Qualia Life Sciences naturopathic physician (N.D.), and author of the book Shape Shift. He was the editor of the journal Alternative Medicine Review and has been an instructor at the University of Bridgeport in the College of Naturopathic Medicine, where he taught classes in Advanced Clinical Nutrition, Counseling Skills, and Doctor-Patient Relationships. Dr. Kelly has published hundreds of articles on natural medicine and nutrition, contributed three chapters to the Textbook of Natural Medicine, and has more than 30 journal articles indexed on Pubmed. His areas of expertise include nootropics, anti-aging and regenerative medicine, weight management, sleep and the chronobiology of performance and health.
In this episode:
What NAD+ is, it’s role in the aging process and how to test your levels [4:13]
The best time of day to take NAD+ [16:05]
Flushing with NAD+ [19:40]
NAD+ pills versus IV drips [24:55]
Signs and symptoms of low or declining NAD+ levels [28:05]
Participants’ experiences from clinical studies [33:46]
Resources mentioned:
Qualia NAD+ Placebo-Controlled Clinical Study Results
Qualia NAD+ (get up to 50% off and an extra 15% off your first purchase with link + code FUNKS)
Organifi supplement powder (save 20% on your order with code FUNK)
LMNT Electrolyte Replenishing powder (Use code FUNK get a free sample pack with any purchase!)
Ned Natural Remedies (get 20% off your order with code FUNK)
Learn more about Immune Support and Metabolic Health
Related episodes:
280: The Science of Aging & Cellular Senescence with Gregory Kelly, ND
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Erin Holt [00:00:02]:
I'm Erin Holt, and this is the Funk'tional Nutrition Podcast, where we lean into intuitive, functional medicine. We look at how diet, our environment, our emotions, and our beliefs all affect our physical health. This podcast is your full bodied, well rounded resource. I've got over a decade of clinical experience, and because of that, I've got a major bone to pick with diet culture and the conventional healthcare model. They're both failing so many of us. But functional medicine isn't the panacea that it's made out to be, either. We've got some work to do, and that's why creating a new model is my life's work. I believe in the ripple effect.
Erin Holt [00:00:39]:
So I founded the Funk'tional Nutrition Academy, a school, and mentorship for practitioners who want to do the same. This show is for you if you're looking for new ways of thinking about your health and you're ready to be an active participant in your own healing. Please keep in mind this podcast is created for educational purposes only and should never be used as a replacement for medical diagnosis or treatment. I would love for you to follow the show, rate, review, and share, because you never know whose life you might change. And, of course, keep coming back for more.
Erin Holt [00:01:13]:
Hello, my friends. Today we're talking all things NAD. I have doctor Gregory Kelly back on the show. He's just a brilliant mind. He is the VP of Product Development at Qualia Life Sciences. He's been on the show before to talk to us about senescence and aging and longevity. He knows so much about it and can definitely speak into it in ways that I certainly cannot. Not my area of expertise, for sure.
Erin Holt [00:01:37]:
Selfishly, I wanted him on the show. This is what I always do to this poor guy. I'm like, I'm taking this product. Here's my experience. Tell me why I'm feeling this way. And so Qualia sent me their NAD product, and it's kind of promoted for optimized aging, which I'm like, eh, I don't really need that. But I decided to give it a whirl because I love the company so much that and they make such great products. I mean, Qualia Mind is something that I take every single day.
Erin Holt [00:02:04]:
You guys have heard me talk about that before, but I just love what they're doing.
Erin Holt [00:02:08]:
So I'm like, all right, I'm willing to try it.
Erin Holt [00:02:10]:
Not really expecting to see any major, you know, difference because I was already feeling pretty good. And wait till you listen to the show, because I've been taking it for about six weeks and have just noticed so much so much energy. That's the biggest one. And you'll understand why as you learn all about NAD. I pulled you guys on Instagram, and a lot of you had questions about absorption and supplementation, and the supplementation of NAD actually work. So I kind of drilled him about that. You'll hear me asking a lot about that, and that's kind of why I wanted you guys to get all of your questions answered. I love Greg.
Erin Holt [00:02:48]:
He's such a nice guy. He's so easy to talk to and just super duper smart. So without much further ado, here is our discussion about NAD. Okay. Hi, Greg. Welcome back.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:03:00]:
Thank you. Thanks for having me today.
Erin Holt [00:03:02]:
It's going to be a good conversation because I'm going to learn a lot. NAD. I've been taking it. I feel good. We can talk. It's only been six weeks, so, you know, not like a yemenite super long time, but I definitely noticed some differences. But I don't really know a ton about NAD. So rather than try to figure it out, I just wanted to bring you onto the show so you could tell us all about it. Sound good?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:03:26]:
That sounds great. So do you want me to jump right in and start right in? Go for it. Yeah. So NAD has been a pretty, I would say, like a fairly hot molecule for the last at least six years. But, like going back in history, NAD has been known about for decades and decades and decades. But the original two roles I learned when I was in my biochemistry class as a naturopathic student was that it was involved in making energy. So energy in cells is ATP, something the mitochondria churn out, and NAD's instrumental in that. So when you think of NAD, one of its main roles is basically taking the energy stored in food and carrying that so that it can be turned into energy and mitochondria, that energy piece, super important.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:04:13]:
And then the NAD molecules, kind of like a hub. I think of it like a major airport somewhere, right? So, I don't know. I live in San Diego, so we're not a major airport, but Dallas would be, or Chicago or something like that. And NAD would be like that hub airport, and a whole bunch of molecules pass through NAD on their way somewhere else, and one of those somewhere else adds a p onto it. So NADP, NADPH, and that direction takes it into antioxidant defenses, making glutathione, building molecules, doing all kinds of things to make cells more resilient. So think of that as instead of energy, it has this other major role in protection. And then what happened in the late nineties, they started to discover that the NAD molecule, which is a big molecule, it's got an N piece, which is the nicotinamide. It's got an A, which stands for adenosine. That's the A in ATP, and D means dinucleotide.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:05:17]:
So it's kind of got two of those nucleotides. But what happens is that there's certain enzymes, and enzymes are the things that do work in our cells that basically eat the NAD molecule, so they cleave off the end part of that to activate those enzymes. And so that, I think, is what really changed and started the interest in NAD that we have arrived at today. Because one of those enzyme systems repairs DNA, another one activates sirtuins. And sirtuins are involved in all kinds of cellular things, including responding to stress, to the environment, things like that. And so when you think of NAD, just think of those things. Cellular energy, cellular protection, and then repairing damage, responding to stress.
Erin Holt [00:06:03]:
When you. As soon as you said NADP, I, like, started to feel dizzy because I went back to my college biochem class and having to memorize all the pathways and stuff, I'm like, oh, God. But I will say what's interesting hearing you talk about this, because the big word you kept saying over, over and over is energy. And that's what I've noticed. That's the primary thing that I've noticed taking NAD as a supplement is I'm like, oh, my gosh, I have, like, a lot of, of energy. Um, and I'm, you know, doing a lot. I'm in, like, a super, super high work zone right now, like, working very long days. Um, I'm working out a lot.
Erin Holt [00:06:41]:
I'm actively putting on muscle. That's my goal. So I've been, like, just, like, trying to crush it in the gym, and I have the, like, the bandwidth, like, the energetic fortitude to actually do all of these things. So, um, it's pretty wild to feel the effects of it on the other side. Um, I know that NAD you guys do a lot with longevity and aging, and I know that NAD plays a role in aging. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:07:08]:
Yeah. So the main role would be like, I guess, stepping back. There's a model called the hallmarks of aging, and what that means is that there's twelve characteristics that aging has in common, whether we're looking at mice, monkeys, humans, or any other organism. And those things are like mitochondria not performing well and signaling between cells being poor and failing to repair DNA sirtuins, which I mentioned, that that's the intracellular signaling, like, sensing their environment and responding. And so it turns out NAD has links to most of those hallmarks and declines as we age in multiple tissues. So not quite a straight line down, but you can just, like. Like, put in your head. Okay, if I'm 20, I probably have the top amounts of NAD of any age group.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:07:59]:
30, a little bit lower by 50 or 60, substantially lower. So even just for listeners, I'm 62. And if I don't do something to boost my NAD, mine, like, on the testing I use, they would usually be in the high twenties, which it would be thought of as suboptimal for someone that was 28 to 30 years old. When I supplement NAD, I get into the optimal range, or NAD boosters, I get to that optimal range. So that that's part of the aging connection, is we just have less available, and it does all these super important things to keep ourselves youthful. And if our cells are youthful, then we perform better, like you said, more energy, better sleep, things like that.
Erin Holt [00:08:44]:
Is there a way to test levels of NAD?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:08:47]:
Yeah. The most common way that we've done at Qualia is we do fingerstick kits, right? So the commercial one is Jinfiniti is who we've used. But there's another one that we've been using in our clinical study that's supposed to come online to be available to the public as well. But they're fairly expensive. Right? So it's not. I don't know what they retail, but somewhere in the 250 per kit type of price. And we've done, like, one of the things we always do at Qualia is we do ourselves right before we would ever turn a product loose on the public. So I did my NAD testing.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:09:35]:
Oh, it was about a year and a half ago, the time I did it for the current Qualia NAD+ product, and mine went up about 150% over the month I took that product. So, again, from that slightly suboptimal to squarely in the middle to high end of the optimal range, and we see something consistent in all of the testing we've done with these test kits that people that do the Qualia NAD product consistently improve their levels substantially.
Erin Holt [00:10:08]:
So you took it for a month and it went up 150%?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:10:11]:
Yeah, actually, I took it for 23 days. So not quite quite a month, but yeah.
Erin Holt [00:10:18]:
And then. So that, objectively, you saw your own levels go up. What was your subjective experience? Did you notice a difference taking it in that period of time?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:10:27]:
So what? So I went off everything that had any NAD precursors in it, including, you know, like, the old types of vitamin B three. So I went off Qualia Mind, you know, a lot of the Qualia products. So for me, I was doing it almost in lieu of things I would normally do. And I felt the same pretty much. I still felt productive. Good energy, you know, straight through the afternoon. The afternoon's always my, like, test spot. Right.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:10:57]:
How am I feeling then, and how am I performing still at, like, 530 or six? Do I still have a bunch of juice in the tank? And so anyways, it did. I felt like that month, or just over three weeks, I didn't miss a beat.
Erin Holt [00:11:11]:
One. I have my Qualia Mind right on my desk. Literally, it's like, 04:00 p.m. i'm like, it's time. It's time to pop some of these.
Erin Holt [00:13:13]:
One thing, hearing you talk, I've noticed about myself, and I'm not. This is not glorifying the hustle or. I'm not suggesting that this is a very sustainable approach for myself. It's not. I can, you know, listeners, please, please hear me on that. But I usually have to kind of power down around four. I like to end my workday at four. I'm writing a ton of copy.
Erin Holt [00:13:34]:
I'm doing a lot of research right now. It's just like, my brain has to be on. And I've been, like, working sometimes up until 10:00 at night, which is just not usually available to me, nor should it be. That's an insane amount of work. But due to, I should say, I think this is my hypothesis, is that because I'm supplementing with your NAD product and also the Qualia Mind, I think my brain is just. It can just handle a lot. Its capacity is very, very high right now. So I think that's pretty wild.
Erin Holt [00:14:05]:
Cause those are the two chief things that I'm doing differently.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:14:08]:
Well, and I think that's the right way. Like, that idea of capacity is the right way to think of it. So, you know, this would be a simple way to think about the brain that the beginning of most days, assuming we got a good night's sleep, we're gonna start with a, like a cognitive reservoir, so to speak, that's pretty restored and ready for us to face the day and all the demands we have. And then that reservoir is going to be drawn down over the course of the day. So if our brain's being asked, like, kind of a normal day, maybe it'll get drawn down the normal pace. If we're asking it to do more or in a more stressful environment or something out of the ordinary, that well is going to be drawn down even faster. And then by the end of the day, we're often running on fumes, so to speak. The wells run more or less dry.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:14:55]:
And one of the ways I think of the Qualia, especially Qualia Mind, is it's just putting a lot more in that reservoir, so that by the end of the day, instead of being running on fumes, we still have a lot left in the tank. And that Qualia NAD would be doing something similar, but much more focused on that NAD, the jobs it does. But as you mentioned, energy is a big one of those. And so, subjectively, things that come up a lot with people doing NAD boosters are what you mentioned, energy recovering better from workouts and then sleep which wouldn't seem like that would be the case for something you take. Typically early in the day is when I take Qualia NAD+. But that's also a way that people feel it, because even when we're sleeping, our brains are using a lot of energy to clean up things, to help us consolidate memories, to deal with any emotional things that happen during the day. So, you know, we think of sleep as a time when our brain's turned off because we're not conscious, but our brain's working really hard when we're sleeping.
Erin Holt [00:16:01]:
That makes a lot of sense. And it's okay. I've been doing it. But I was like, maybe I should ask Greg about this. It's okay to continue to take the Qualia Mind with your NAD product.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:16:12]:
Yeah, I take both. And I. And I take both of those in the morning. And Qualia Mind, obvious, because we have a caffeine free version as well. But the one you held up is the one that has about 90 milligrams of caffeine. If you were to take seven capsules, so much better to take caffeine early in the day. And I would think of myself as somewhat caffeine sensitive. And then Qualia NAD has what I think of as a microdose of caffeine in it.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:16:38]:
And the reason is, I mentioned that idea of airports, and the NAD molecule being the big hub, everything's got to pass through. But molecules like NR, nicotinamide, riboside, or NMN, which listeners may have heard, oh, these are things that can boost NAD. Those are almost like airports that feed into the hub. And what allows them passengers to get from one to the next is an enzyme. And that enzyme in the brain is activated by caffeine. It's the only thing known that upregulates, that basically increases the passengers that can get from NMN to NAD. So we put a microdose in. But because of that, again, my preference is one because of that, to use Qualia NAD and other NAD boosters first thing in the morning.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:17:28]:
And the other reason, there's not a lot of body clock research yet on timing of when to do NAD boosters. But one animal study found out that if you gave NAD boosters at the beginning of my mouse's day, then it improved metabolic health. So those are things like your lipids, cholesterol, triglycerides, blood sugar. But if you gave that same NAD booster at the end of their day. So think more. Our dinner time or early evening, it actually worsened those same things. So because of that, a lot of studies I see on, let's just say, NR or NMN, right? Just a single thing will do it in divided doses. Like, take some at breakfast, take some at dinner.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:18:12]:
Judging on that animal research that's being counterproductive, it's better just to do them all at the beginning of the day, like we recommend with Qualia NAD+.
Erin Holt [00:18:21]:
Oh, that's. That's really good to know. You keep saying NAD boosters. So, is your product in the pill? Is there nad in it? Or is it just giving you the boosters when you take it to enhance your own innate production, is what I'm trying to say.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:18:39]:
It would be that. So NAD would be thought of as a really big molecule. So, as an example, I'll just take some of this big molecule sublingually, but enzymes in your saliva would start breaking it down right away into smaller molecules. And the same happens when we consume NAD. If we were to take a pill that had the whole molecule, then it would be stripped down to its smaller parts in the digestive process. Because of that, you do the smaller pieces like the nicotinamide riboside. Some people do the NMN, the old flushing vitamin B3 can be made into it. Think of it.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:19:19]:
That is coming from its own different airport, where NR and NMN are passing through a similar airport. So, anyways, yeah, that's why you do these precursors, because otherwise, you would just be breaking down the bigger molecule into them anyways, and it would be a more expensive way to do the same thing.
Erin Holt [00:19:40]:
Do you ever get flushing? I'm curious.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:19:44]:
So Qualia NAD. I don't. We have a really low amount of the flushing B3 in it about, I want to say, 16 milligrams per two capsules, which usually people won't flush below 50, but occasionally some will.
Erin Holt [00:20:00]:
Um, I do, but, like, not every day. So if I've taken it maybe, like, you know, I don't know, 45 days, I've probably, like, had flushing, like, 15 of those days. I personally love. I love the feeling of it. I have poor circulation, so, like, it excites me.
Erin Holt [00:20:16]:
I'm like, oh, something really good is.
Erin Holt [00:20:17]:
Happening in my body, and it's quick, you know, it's, like, under 20 minutes. But I have definitely noticed that. So I was curious if other people had.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:20:25]:
We do see it more than I would expect. I would expect it would be to zero, given that amount. But I think. So this is just extrapolating, again from animal studies. Cause they've done the studies there. In animals they can take NR and then turn what's niacinamide, the non flushing form of B3, into the flushing form in the gut microbiome and then absorb that. So my guess would be, since some of their bacteria can do that, some of ours can do that, but you and I would have very different gut microbiomes, and so yours may have more of the organisms that can do that, mine may have less.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:21:07]:
And so I think maybe in the year plus, I've taken Qualia NAD. I probably had tingly things in my face, like, three or four times, but if I wasn't paying attention to it, I wouldn't have noticed. But some people have a much stronger reaction, and it's got to be something in their gut microbiome, I think, because.
Erin Holt [00:21:26]:
Yeah, I've got a mousey microbiome is what I'm hearing from you.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:21:30]:
Well, yeah, like, yours is perfect for you, but, like, I've rarely seen even people, you know, with none of the flushing niacin, but the non flushing still flush, so they're somehow doing something that our cells can't do. So something in the microbiome has to be doing it.
Erin Holt [00:21:51]:
And I just want to throw that out there in case. Because if you. If you don't know what flushing is and you've never experienced it, it's very scary. I remember the first time I was like, what's happening? I didn't realize I had taken, um, B3. I didn't know it was in, like, a protein powder that I had taken. So I'm, like, was driving, and I thought I was, like, dying. I'm like, what is happening? Um, so just in case you do, after today's conversation, decide you want to try this supplement, which would definitely, strongly encourage folks to do, if that reaction happens, just know that it's very short lived. You'll look a little red in the face, and you'll feel some tingly sensations in your feel at my face and my hands, and then it's gone pretty swiftly.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:22:27]:
Yeah, I've had. Not with Qualia NAD+, but doing something with a big dose of flushing niacin. I've had once a really strong and a strong one can feel a lot like you're having an allergic reaction to something. Right. And you will get, you know, that flushing of your skin's really almost pins and needly feeling. A mild one, like I've had a couple of times with a Qualia NAD+ I'd almost have to pay attention to. It's more just like a quick tingly that lasts, you know, for a minute, and then it's gone. But, yeah, it can be very scary for people if they've never had a niacin flesh and all of a sudden have one.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:23:03]:
Unexpectedly.
Erin Holt [00:24:55]:
So we're taking this in pill form. A lot of people are familiar with NAD, like, intravenously. People. You can get it as, like, a drip?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:25:05]:
Yep.
Erin Holt [00:25:06]:
Can you kind of explain the difference of, like, what's happening? Because I know. I know some people have done that. My understanding is that people will do it not just for energy, but also sometimes to support detoxification. And it can take a very long time, and if they rush it, people can feel really unwell. And so sometimes it can take, like, you know, you might be in a chair for four to 6 hours.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:25:27]:
Yeah.
Erin Holt [00:25:28]:
Talk a little bit about what's going on there.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:25:30]:
Yeah. So the IV ones I think, became popularized way back, especially for dealing with addictions. And people would go through a series of these, and like you said, they're long. Like, you sit and have it, you know, drip, usually, you know, minimum four to 6 hours, depending on the amount you're taking. You know, some people will. You don't want it pushed stronger, but, yeah, the faster you do it, the more unpleasant it is and why it works. And so, for those use cases, it absolutely seems to work.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:26:04]:
But when scientists have looked at NAD levels inside cells, in the aftermath, they don't really go up. And again, like, NAD is a big molecule, and it's too big for us to digest or ingest orally and get in our body in one piece. It's the same, like, in our blood cells. It's too big to get in directly, and it would have to be broken down. And we don't really have those enzymes in any amount in our blood. So it's doing something crazy useful for those people. But it's unlikely that it's because it's boosting NAD, if that makes sense.
Erin Holt [00:26:44]:
Okay. All right. That does make sense. And so, again, just to kind of reiterate is when with Qualia's NAD product, it's not NAD itself, because that molecule would be, A, too big to fit into a pill, most likely, and B, our saliva would start to break it down, so we wouldn't really be able to access it where it needs to go.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:27:06]:
Yeah, in a capsule, the saliva wouldn't matter so much. But, like, in our food, there would be some NAD, the whole molecule, in any animal products, because, just like us, they would have NAD in their cells. Right. So when we consume them, plants would not, like, plant based things would have more the vitamin form of it, like, you know, nicotinic acid, the flushing, as an example, and. Yeah, so when we take it in a capsule, just like if we ate it in food, we'll just start to break it down into smaller pieces, and that's what we absorb, and then those pieces get put back together in our body. But the limiting piece is the end piece, the nicotinamide, whether it's nicotinamide, riboside, or the n from the NMN, which is also nicotinamide.
Erin Holt [00:27:50]:
Okay. I'm spending a lot of time here because this is, like, the number one question I posted on Instagram. Like, what questions do you have about NAD? And everybody was asking about absorption, so that's which I was surprised to hear about. So I wanted to spend some time there for our listeners. What are some signs or symptoms, if any, that somebody might be low or have declining NAD levels.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:28:12]:
Well, going way back, vitamin B3 is a vitamin because of the deficiencies that it caused, but it was always thought of as the three ds. So one was dermatitis. So skin, right, skin redness, like skin health. One was dementia. Not in the context that we use that word now, but basically failing cognition, brain. And the third was diarrhea. So, like GI things. So, like a much more mild.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:28:40]:
You start to see it hitting lots of systems like that. Right? You mentioned energy cognitions, like brain would be a big area. Like, you were just feeling that brainy fog would be a symptom that you don't have enough energy. Skin, again, would be a potential area to look, recovery from anything stressful. One of the, I think the most important ways to think about NAD in terms of what it doing on a cell more than anything else, is when cells get stressed, they try to make more NAD. And if they're able to, then they can weather that stress better. And if they can't, then that cell will become damaged and eventually maybe even senescent or go through cellular death.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:29:27]:
So when you think of NAD, just, it's about resiliency. So even if we're not noticing something, we're saying, oh, like, I might need this because, you know, my skin, or, like, I have a classic deficiency symptom. The reason I would take it isn't for any of those reasons. It's because I don't know when my cells are going to get stressed more than usual, and I want them to be ready, and so I want their tanks of NAD to be full so that they can be the most resilient versions of themselves possible.
Erin Holt [00:29:58]:
Oh, my gosh, that's so important, the resiliency piece, because, I mean, we've all been. It's been hammered into our heads. Stress is bad. We know, you know, we get it. Mental stress, emotional stress, physical stress, all of it is not ideal for our bodies long term. And there can create, I've have found with our clients, is that it can create a little bit of, like, hyper vigilance around stress. Like, oh, no, I can't get stressed. And even sometimes feel at my, like, oh, I can't get stressed because then I'll get sick.
Erin Holt [00:30:26]:
It's kind of like my old way of thinking. And really, my big work, I would say, over the past few years, is just stretching my capacity and stretching my resiliency, because at the end of the day, I want to be able to live my life and I want to be able to live a big life, a big, bold life. I want to be able to do stuff, and I want to be able to do stuff for a long time. And so for me, I think of health as resiliency. So I'm so glad that you brought that up, because I want to have that bounce back. I want to be able to do things. And sometimes if I push it too far, okay, I'll learn my lesson, but I will still have the ability to bounce back. So, so fascinating about, about the cell's resiliency and how NAD can kind of help with that.
Erin Holt [00:31:09]:
Question for you. Anything else that you want to say about the ingredients or anything that folks should know? Just why this particular product is so unique?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:31:20]:
Yeah, so I mentioned so a couple of things. One, NAD is the hub. Like, that's where we want things to get to, to make that molecule, but there's different ways to get there. So one of the cool things about Qualia NAD is we have three different precursors that use different ways to get there. So cells tend to, for important jobs, have built in redundancy. So Qualia NAD+ is supporting that redundancy where the other products on the market usually just choose one way sometimes, too. The other thing I mentioned is for molecules to move from wherever they start to NAD and then from NAD to wherever we want them to go. Those are always enzymes that do that work, that are fundamentally like the airplanes moving the passengers along.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:32:06]:
And so that's why you'll see things like the coffee, fruit extract and resveratrol and magnesium. One of the super interesting things about that whole NAD system is that I mentioned NAD has a major job in making ATP, but it turns out we need ATP to make NAD no matter where we start. So if you start from flushing niacin, there's three steps to turn that into NAD, and two of them need ATP. If you start from NR, one of the, you know, the precursor we use in Qualia NAD, that has two steps. Both use ATP. So magnesium whenever, for listeners, whenever you hear ATP, always tag magnesium on, because it's always an ATP magnesium complex in our cells. So without magnesium, ATP can't be activated, and without ATP, enzymes that use it can't be as active. So, um, so that's why you'll see the, the aquamid magnesium.
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:33:09]:
So when you think about Qualia NAD, just in a macro sense, how is it different? It's, you know, we built in redundancy to make the NAD molecule in three different ways, and then we put things in that supports all the work to make that molecule.
Erin Holt [00:33:24]:
That's an interesting little nugget about magnesium. So thank you for sharing that. And it's, you know, what you're saying makes a lot of sense that my experience with taking the supplement has been more clear cognition, brain capacity, and energy. It makes sense because now I get what it's actually doing. I know that you've done some clinical studies with this. What are other experiences that people have had? Are they pretty consistent with what I'm saying?
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:33:53]:
Yeah. The other thing that I've seen the most consistently pop up would be the sense of not needing as much sleep to feel like that anti fatigue or restored peace. Right. So not like, oh, like, I slept better, maybe wouldn't be the most common way. When we ask about, like, you know, how much sleep did you need? That seems like less for many people. And I think the reason may be because their energetics in their brain are just performing more efficiently. And at least a part of the reason that we sleep is to restore that energetic system.
Erin Holt [00:34:33]:
So, you know, what's wild is, I mean, it's not gonna be wild to you because you just said it. But last week, I had a busy Thursday. I was just, like, a lot of interviews lined up, and I did not sleep well the night before, and I woke up super early and at the end of the day, and normally when that happens, it's like I just feel foggy headed, and I just kind of, like, have to, like, push myself through. And at the end of the day, I was going to bed, I'm like, oh, it's so weird. I knew I was underslept, but I didn't have any brain fog. So it's landing. What you're saying is landing with me. Thank you so, so much for coming on the show.
Erin Holt [00:35:07]:
I always love to. I feel like it's always, like, a little bit of a treat for myself because I always ask you questions that I'm curious about because I love your. I love your supplements so, so, so, so much. I'm so grateful to have a partnership with you guys and super appreciate all the work that you're doing and all the information that you're willing to share and the products that you're willing to make. So thank you for coming on the show and sharing all your knowledge with.
Erin Holt [00:35:28]:
Our listeners once again,
Dr. Gregory Kelly [00:35:353]:
My pleasure.
Erin Holt [00:35:41]:
Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Funk'tional Nutrition podcast. If you got something from today's show, don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, share with a friend, and keep coming back for more.
Erin Holt [00:35:47]:
Take care of you.
