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The Stephen McCain Podcast
Insightful interviews, strategies, and advice from people making world-class decisions in human optimization, performance, & longevity with Olympian Stephen McCain.
The Stephen McCain Podcast
Propion: The Game-Changing Gut Health Metabolite for Longevity with Nicholas Tubach & Dr. Dan Winer. EP 014
Discover how tryptophan metabolites, especially indole-propionic acid, are revolutionizing our understanding of gut and brain health. Learn about the innovative products that Nicholas and Dan are developing, which aim to enhance longevity and cognitive function by targeting immune cells, reducing inflammation, and strengthening the gut barrier. Explore the unique benefits of their proprietary blend, which combines pea protein, nitric oxide boosters, and antioxidants to redirect tryptophan metabolism toward beneficial pathways, potentially boosting melatonin and serotonin production.
Finally, join us as we discuss the exciting future plans for Propion. Nicholas and Dan share their vision for expanding product development into skincare, pharmaceuticals, and even pet food. They also delve into their plans to make their products more accessible by developing pill forms. This episode offers a compelling look at how optimizing the gut microbiome could be the key to unlocking a healthier, longer life. Don't miss the pre-sale information for their dark chocolate flavored blend, starting this Friday at propion.com!
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Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of the Stephen McCain podcast, where I bring you people making world-class decisions in the field of human optimization and performance. Today's episode is going to be about the microbiome and the importance of keeping a healthy microbiome. If you've ever had anything like dysbiosis small intestinal bacteria overgrowth you know that you do not want to mess with your gut. It is now considered one of the hallmarks of aging, and keeping this thing in tip top shape actually has a lot more downstream health effects in many different ways, and my guests today are some of the smartest guys in the room, and they're going to talk about a new gut metabolite. That is really something that could be interesting, and so it's my first time to ever have two people on the show. And just to let you know, we might get a little bit into the weeds with some science, but hey, that's what we do here.
Speaker 1:So my first person I want to introduce is Nicholas Tubach. He's a good friend of mine. Actually, we're in a full disclosure. He and I are in a little business together, trying to create a longevity series, and we also have Dan Weiner. So, nicholas, welcome to the show. Thanks, hey, stephen. How are you doing? Good? And Dan, welcome to the show as well. Yeah, thanks for having me. I appreciate you guys coming on. So, nicholas, why don't you tell us a little bit about your bio, who you are, why you're in this industry and what you're doing?
Speaker 2:I was originally born in Berkeley, california, and I also went to UC Berkeley where I studied molecular and cell biology and tech entrepreneurship and one of the things running in the background. I was mostly a humanities person, growing up, studying English literature, history. Those were my main subjects in school. But when I got to college, one of the topics that started to really sit in my mind was human optimization, maximizing your brain's operating power, or slowing ager, aging slower.
Speaker 2:Sorry, I'm somebody who would like to stay as young as I can, as long as possible, and that is what got me into biotech. This is the third company that I've started. Naturally, I've only started them in the last few years and so you wouldn't have heard any big names yet. But I became interested in using chemicals as a way to augment human biology. So that led me down the road of what can we do to protect our brain as we age, optimize synaptic function, just that main topic and that's where my main interest lies is in neurology and neurobiology. But I'll stop there and I'll just link that later to why Propion was founded down the call.
Speaker 1:Fantastic, dan, what about you? Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, hi. I'm an associate professor at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, also affiliated with University of Southern California and the University of Toronto. I started my career off as a medical doctor. I graduated from the University of Ottawa after studying immunology during my undergraduate degree at University of Toronto and then from there I went on to study anatomical pathology and then did a research postdoc at Stanford University, trying to understand how the immune system controls diseases like obesity and diabetes. During that time we made a lot of interesting discoveries, especially in how immune cells called T cells and B cells and we can get into this more later how they control inflammation and throughout the body, especially in tissues like fat tissue and also the intestine, and then from there this intestinal immune system, once we realize it has implications controlling health, healthy aging and disease. It's one of the things we started focusing in on and that's one of my major areas of research right now the immune system in obesity, diabetes and AIDS.
Speaker 1:Interesting Great field if you can make some changes. Obesity is a massive topic. I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on these GLP-1 agonists and GIP-1s, but maybe we'll pin that for later because I want to get in to this company that you guys have started and it sounds really exciting. Nicholas, maybe tell us a little bit about Propion and what it does. What is this company and tell us about it?
Speaker 2:maybe tell us a little bit about Propion and what it does. What is this company? And tell us about it? Yeah, first of all, dan is extraordinarily humble. He's a professor at three different universities, collaborates with NASA and SpaceX on studying how the immune system operates in microgravity environment. The number one thing I'll say is that starting Propion with him is an incredible privilege for me, having just come out of school.
Speaker 2:The purpose of Propion is really simple it's to help you age slower and live longer and potentially even amplify your health when you're older. And it's not just me saying that. Dan here is my scientific co-founder and he and I have begun developing. Actually, we're fully completed with developing one product, but we've begun developing. Actually we're fully completed with developing one product, but we've begun developing the societal interest in this science that could genuinely slow down how you age and the mechanisms behind that are all things that Dan will talk about. But I first approached him to advise me on immunological pathways in Alzheimer's disease. To advise me on immunological pathways in Alzheimer's disease, so how the immune system works in the brain and what inflammatory mechanisms are being over-activated. Potentially that could be targeted to reduce inflammation, reduce cognitive decline for people with Alzheimer's. And as we got to talking about different ways to enhance neuroprotection for example, the brain's resilience to toxins or inflammation, actually down-regulating inflammatory pathways directly by targeting immune cells. Or neuroregeneration, reintroducing cognitive function to the brain Propion came from a branch of research that was really about neuroprotection, and when we talk about the gut microbiome, we're not just talking about the gut itself, a totally closed system.
Speaker 2:We're really talking about whole body health, and a big part of that is the brain and how not just the way the gut functions, but as being part of gut microbiome science, because your gut microbiome is where you absorb those ingredients from. However, when you get a nutritional supplement company, they aren't saying this is all about the gut. So really, when you say we're a gut microbiome science company, I'd say we're really a whole body health company with technology that originates from the gut microbiome. And this technology that I'm referring to are molecules that were originally discussed in literature as being highly neuroprotective. What that means is that they protected neurons' ability to survive and function in the face of toxin. And then it turns out that it's actually the gut that is producing these molecules and that they have additional functions in the epithelial barrier of the gut, so the gut wall, as well as protein receptors in the skin, the liver and that's whole axis.
Speaker 2:Right there really means that it's our company is about enhancing whole body function, and that's why we talk about this as a longevity company as opposed to just a gut microbiome health company. So these metabolites that I'm referring to, these molecules that are neuroprotective, that originate from the gut microbiome and also stimulate regenerative function, that is what this company is all about, and the vision that I have for it is that propion really could be in every household in America, because what all I just described it applies to absolutely everybody. There's not a person in the world to whom brain function, gut dysbiosis, gut function, the gut-body axis isn't relevant to, and I think we're bringing some highly unique technological insight in the form of a consumer product or multiple consumer product to everyone in that way.
Speaker 1:So yeah, if you've ever been around anybody with a compromised gut, you can literally see their brain change, their behaviors change, and you clearly also. If you know what you're looking for, you'll see immune system issues as well. It is disastrous, especially when you think about how non-discretional people are with whatever they eat. You go to a restaurant and you are rolling the dice, so to speak. The food. There's so much stuff that is sprayed on our food. There are so many really like bad things for the gut and the environment.
Speaker 2:I don't think you should necessarily blame it all on the consumer, though, because a lot of it is just the choices that were faced with.
Speaker 1:Oh, no, I'm not a hundred percent. I had what's his name, Dave Pascoe on the podcast and he's ranked in the top five top six of the regeneration Olympics. That guy grows his own food. He's controlling a lot, and so not everyone is up for that kind of thing. Not everyone's goal is to be number one on the longevity board. Like people have busy lives they have to go about and do their thing. So let's get to this. What is Propion? What are we talking about here?
Speaker 3:I can tell you a bit about some of these metabolites and what they do. The first as people get older or people when they start developing chronic diseases like obesity, diabetes, insulin resistance, cardiovascular disease, their gut changes, especially their gut bacteria. Usually what happens is that the gut microbiome, it will shrink in diversity to match these changes in dietary and environmental patterns. These dietary patterns could be eating more things like processed foods, saturated fats, sugar. Environmental patterns could be things like taking a round of antibiotics. All of these things have profound effect on your gut microbiome. So one of the family of metabolites that gets downregulated across such conditions are tryptophan metabolites, and that's what the target that propane is trying to go after right now. So tryptophan just a little bit of background broken down by pathways inside your body and also pathways inside the gut microbiota.
Speaker 3:Inside your body they're broken down by things like in the intestine. They can form molecules like serotonin, where they cause a. By things like in the intestine. They can form molecules like serotonin where they cause a controlled motility in the gut. They can be broken down farther up in the brain where they can form things like melatonin, which is an antioxidant to control sleep-wake cycles. But they can also be metabolized through a whole battery of other metabolites, through these enzymes called TDO and IDO. In addition to these endogenous pathways inside the body, tryptophan can also be metabolized by the gut bacteria into a whole slew of beneficial metabolites. Some of these will be the famous ones of these things like indole-3-aldehyde, and especially this molecule called indole-propionic acid. So these are the ones that we're really interested in, these beneficial metabolites that are produced by gut bacteria, and how do these things work? So basically Do you want that?
Speaker 1:slide. Should we pull up a slide? You want me to pull up a slide for you guys?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you can pull up a slide now, I think, where I can talk about how these things actually function. I'll just go through it briefly though.
Speaker 1:Yeah, bring it up. So for everyone that's listening to this, we're actually pulling up a slide that you'll be able to see if you're watching this on YouTube, but we'll try to talk it out. Is this the right slide?
Speaker 3:tube, but we'll try to talk it out. Is this the right slide? Yeah, yeah. So I'll just just in brief.
Speaker 3:Metabolites, indole propionic acid produced by these bacteria in the gut I'm going to call that IPA for now, and something like indole-3-aldehyde I'll call as I3A. So these metabolites, they bind to receptors in the gut lining and also to the gut immune cells which line the intestine. They also they also bind to, as I mentioned, to targets in the brain Nicholas alluded to liver skin as well. In the gut, as that diagram shows, they induce this cytokine called IL-22. It should be in there, if it's not. That's the main cytokine that it induces. So what it does? It binds to these targets. One of them is called the AHR, the other is called the PXR. These are present in the epithelial lining, these are the cells that line the intestine and also in some of the immune cells themselves, and so when they bind in the immune cells they produce this molecule called IL-22.
Speaker 3:This is a highly reparative cytokine. It induces repair programs in your intestine. It strengthens the gut barrier. It acts on specific cells in the intestine to produce antimicrobial peptides and these kind of prevent dangerous bacteria from entering. These molecules are also very strong antioxidants actually some of the strongest antioxidants known where they can reduce free oxygen and free nitrogen. Radical similar metabolites that are also produced through this tryptophan metabolism pathway can also produce glp-1. I remember at the beginning you were interested in glp-1, so this would be harnessing. This pathway would be like a natural way to boost glp-1 production. There's also also been a whole number of preclinical studies on these molecules, especially IPA. They show that they can reduce fat and cholesterol production, also reduce scarring, also known as fibrosis, especially in things like the liver, and can reduce kind of glucose absorption from the gut. So there's a whole diverse array of mechanisms that play here and this slide nicely summarizes a bunch of them here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so basically, all these benefits that you're referring to are from the Propion-1 molecule.
Speaker 2:Yes, and Propion-1 is what we call Indole-3-Propionic-A.
Speaker 1:Got it, and so your product? Is it straight Propion-1 or is it some sort of prebiotic that's creating Propion-1?
Speaker 2:Our first product is a blend of precursor ingredients that helps your body assemble Propion-1 naturally. Dan can get a little bit more into how it works.
Speaker 1:Got it Okay, yeah, so real quick. So your product is something that helps the body make or the gut make propion-1, and then propion-1 is decreasing a bunch of negative things like these fatty acid synthesis, cholesterol synthesis, lipid peroxidation, and it's increasing all of these other beneficial things that Dan alluded to. And it's increasing all of these other beneficial things that Dan alluded to. Now, what if because it seems like from this slide that all of this has to do with Propion-1 actually targeting or hitting the inner gut lining what if your inner gut lining is compromised? Is that an issue? Is this something that you need a healthy gut in order to benefit from? That's a really good question.
Speaker 3:One of the things that, especially with the propion blend product, one of the advantages that we have here is that we're actually feeding the raw precursors, or the foods that these beneficial bacteria actually like to eat. So we're actually feeding these bacteria that might be reduced with age or obesity or including a number of other conditions where the gut barrier may not be intact. These bacteria are often reduced and by giving them the foods they like to eat, they'll actually expand, and there has been preclinical studies showing you can expand these bacteria giving the right precursor ingredients, and so we expect that a blend product that nourishes these bacteria will help them be more comfortable within the gut as well. So it should be okay, I imagine.
Speaker 1:Okay, got it. Yeah, like the microbiome, for I always think of a good analogy. It's a rainforest and the rainforest has so many different species and they all keep each other in check, but when some of them get the species get eradicated or something happened, the antibiotics come in and maybe just nuke certain bacteria. Now that you don't have everything in check and you start having certain bacteria that become opportunistic right Like they start taking over, Things aren't being held in check there. You don't have massive diversity and your product is what you're saying is that it will actually increase the bacteria that is beneficial to making Propion-1, right, Fantastic. So tell me about the actual product. What are you guys putting in there? What is this prebiotic sort of solution?
Speaker 3:I can describe some of this. So, as I mentioned, we're interested in boosting these beneficial bacterial metabolites and we do this. These bacterial metabolites are derived from this amino acid called tryptophan, and so we've worked with people in Europe and we've developed this technology, which we call like a tryptophan diversion technology. So I'll just be clear so our product there's no wasted ingredients in here.
Speaker 3:Every ingredient here has a purpose and the way this works is that we've got a protein carrier in here and we've got amino acids, like specific amino acids, including tryptophan itself would be in here. This would be like the raw building block that the bacteria need as well. Also, we've got other ingredients which help divert the metabolism of tryptophan towards it funnels, the metabolism towards the bacteria that need it, and of course, we also have superfoods and antioxidants in there that also protect the tryptophan molecule and its products from degrading. There's also B vitamin complexes in there, which helps fuel the bacterial metabolism into producing our desired metabolite. As I mentioned, everything is titrated and it's optimally designed to fuel bacterial production of these beneficial indole molecules, especially IPA, and so that's.
Speaker 2:And I want to just interrupt you, dan, to say that when he says that every ingredient there is formulated to increase levels of this beneficial metabolite, that actually also means in older people as well, who do, just by virtue of having aged, have a compromised gut microbiome. And, stephen, you were asking about whether the product would only work to produce more of these beneficial metabolites in people who have perfect gut microbiomes. The product was tested in people who are, on average, age 68, which I can tell you there are a lot of reports of people just getting increased gastrointestinal problems in their early 60s and having that just increase linearly or exponentially as they age. So these people are reflective of not a perfect gut microbiome. These gut microbiomes have been decreased in quality and composition by the effect of time and the product was shown to be beneficial and actually increase levels of these metabolites in that population.
Speaker 1:Got it? Yeah, and I saw a little bit of a presentation that you guys sent me, so bear with me if I'm not up to full speed on stuff, but it seemed like your product was a blend of a pea protein, a nitric oxide booster and then maybe some antioxidants. Am I correct in that?
Speaker 3:in there, for example, like nitric oxide boosters can jam up one of the enzymes like IDO or TDO.
Speaker 2:They can work in that metabolism to slow it down, to divert metabolism more towards, and I think you'll have to explain why blocking the IDO and TDO pathways is important and relevant. Okay, so Do that. Yeah, toss that out there. And that's nobody. Nobody knows what that means.
Speaker 3:Okay, so IDO and TDO these are, as I mentioned at the beginning. These are like some of the endogenous pathways. These are some of the pathways where tryptophan is metabolized into molecules like tinerine and quinoloolic acid. These are molecules that are used for other purposes in the body. More than the vast majority of your tryptophan metabolism goes through these pathways.
Speaker 3:Very little and I say don't quote me on this exactly, but I think it's around 2% or so goes to the bacterial pathways which produce these beneficial molecules of interest, and so that's why it's important to get you know this won't nothing completely jams it up.
Speaker 3:It'll slow it down a little bit so that more tryptophan is available to go towards the bacteria to produce these beneficial metabolites and so that 98% of it doesn't go specifically to these PDO-IDO pathways that are inside the body. One of the other things that happens as well by shunting some of the metabolism away from this TDO and IDO is you may get increases in things like pathway, like melatonin, for example, may be potentiated from this, as well as possibly serotonin as well in the gut, because these are metabolized through different enzymes that aren't PDO and IDO. But yeah, so that's how it would work, or how it funnels, and so these ingredients are titrated and I think the proprietary thing we have about the blend is the ratio of all these ingredients and the way they act together to specifically funnel tryptophan towards these beneficial bacterias and then to boost metabolism inside these bacteria to generate optimal levels of our anti-aging and anti or pro-health metabolites.
Speaker 1:Got it Okay. So let me, I have a few questions. So, rather than just sucking down a bunch of tryptophan, which what you're saying, is Not done.
Speaker 1:You don't want to do that? Yeah, and look if anybody's, if anybody's messed around with SSRIs or kratom or certain things like that where they've tinkered with their serotonin pathways and they ruin their gut mobility motility, they couldn't you try to get off of some of that stuff and you can't sleep because you're it's messing with that whole tryptophan conversion to serotonin, conversion to melatonin and stuff. But so what you're saying is you're saying, okay, you're going to input some tryptophan, but what your proprietary blend is doing is routing it more effectively towards a pathway, this propion pathway, that is now going to do something with all of these gut lining receptors, that is going to initiate a systemic beneficial net, positive for many things. Am I correct in that?
Speaker 2:That's exactly right.
Speaker 1:Okay, perfect, all right. Is anybody else doing this on the market? Are you guys, the only one that's?
Speaker 2:talking about propion. There's nothing on the market today that specifically targets propion-1. And, just to reiterate, we call indole-3-propionic acid propion-1. And right now there is nothing available on the market which targets this molecular pathway, which really means that people not taking this product are not accessing 100% of what they can be doing to slow down their aging process, given the pathways that Dan described earlier about how the Propion-1 molecule interact with the gut lining and interacts with the different cell types immune cell types, insulin-secreting cells to boost function of all of those things. Really, if you're not taking this product, you're missing out on something key that you could be doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and look, let me ask you this, because I am not protein-starved. I work out almost seven days a week now and I am on it and protein is a huge boon for me. Like I'm creating muscle protein synthesis. Quite often I pay attention to nitric oxide, I test it, so I'm always tinkering with different supplements in that regard and I take some antioxidants, astaxanthin, a couple other things. Let's say I'm going to try propion. I'm going to try it. Do I need to take it in isolation so that I get the appropriate amounts of propion or regeneration, so I don't cloud it out with any of these other sort of things? Would that be a better practice?
Speaker 2:So there's a yes and no answer there. The yes is that we recommend that you take it at night. That's when a lot of these ways work best, as a once daily, preferably before night, thing. But if you're really busy and you don't want to do that and actually I also take it sometimes before night as a way to not be hungry when I go to sleep I know you're not supposed to eat a big meal super late in the day but introducing some protein and some key ingredients and potentially activating GLP-1, I find it a lot easier to go to sleep not feeling hungry but not necessarily being overstuffed. But then going back to if you're somebody really busy who needs to put this into your daily shake of the day or take it when you take your other vitamins or other anti-aging supplements. Dan has this explanation for why that's okay as well.
Speaker 1:Dan.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if you look at most of the anti-aging stuff on the market right now, I think probably the biggest ones would be things like resveratrol, akg, anything from the NAD family NAD so that would be like NR or NMN Senolytics some of those would be like that and also ketone bodies. These are all kind of the you know the breadth of many of the more popular anti-aging things in the market right now. All of these, they work and they target important pathways in the body. None of them are directly harnessing the benefit of the microbiota like we are, and so people ask me should they stop taking their current anti-aging or pro-health regimens if they want to take propion? And I tell them no, because, if anything, there's a potential for synergy for these. So, even so, NAD, for example. There may be potential for synergy because we found one study where one of the molecules produced by propion, which is IPA, can potentially slow down degradation of NADs.
Speaker 3:If you're taking propion, you may get an even benefit even a better benefit from your NAD supplements, for you're taking propion. You may get an even better benefit from your NAD supplements. For example, some of the bacteria that they do that produce propion, like the lactobacilli and some of the clostridium species. These also act to strengthen the intestinal barrier and boost metabolism, for example. And so if you've got something that potentially can improve mitochondrial metabolism and you're taking AKG with that, which is also in the mitochondrial metabolism family, you may get some beneficial additive effects even and so I tell people not to worry about that right now but whether you should start combining them all at once. I think there would be an argument that could be made to spacing them out, especially because our product is designed with specifically titrated ratios of ingredients. And so if we've got the right amount of protein carrier, if you start eating a huge meal with it and that could potentially alter it, but the other thing I would add is that, stephen, you are in the 99.9999, like almost as much repeating You're really in.
Speaker 2:There are other people who do the level that you do, but very small fraction of people are really actively engaged with their health. You've made it essentially your entire life, and one of the things that we want to do with Propion Blend, which is this blend of precursor ingredients that gives your gut what it needs to create the Propion-1 molecule, is we're making this something that is geared towards everyone, whether it's your average person in middle America who doesn't know what NAD, doesn't know what NMN is, still likes to eat hamburgers all the way up to people like you and everybody in between and I'm somebody who's in between, there, where I haven't been an Olympian athlete like you and I definitely don't get regular exosome treatments or think about my diet in such a carefully constructed way. I'm mostly somebody who's really busy and is thinking about what they can do. That's easy to hit a lot of different points through, whether it's to the gut, microbiome or some other axis. But really, what can I do that has the maximum impact for my body? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:As a 32 hours of exercise. What are the 15 minutes of exercise that I can get in? That's going to keep me strong or whatever. And so I think Propion blends. It's really comfortably for that type of customer and in that range of products as well, and, as Dan is saying, there's potentially synergistic effects with other products as well. But if you're already somebody who's doing the absolute 100% of what they need, I can't say that we're going to add 10 years to your life, Stephen, because I think you're already there.
Speaker 1:I still have very good habits and I do prop myself up with a lot of these great things and I take all those things you guys said earlier. Except for resveratrol I've given up on that one for now.
Speaker 1:I don't know if we want to go down that rabbit hole, but but I agree with you and I think that look the I will say this the moment your gut is compromised, you are, you are going down. It is, it's the whole. What is it? Socrates who said it? That? That all the what was the what's, the famous quote about the gut.
Speaker 2:Oh, I don't know. But also, like when you get into Ayurvedic health, the gut is the number one thing that they talk about it's it is.
Speaker 1:I cannot tell you. I have had people very close to me that have had SIBO and dysbiosis and gut issues and man it just. I've had my buddy's, an Olympic gymnast. He still can't get abs because his gut got so compromised and he's built perfectly everywhere else. If I have a client, I have an actor who wants to take his shirt off and for a role, I have to ask him about his digestion. I just literally had one of these actors. That's why I'm talking about this. He was like I just had this pooch.
Speaker 1:I said what's going on with your digestion? He had zero motility and I'm like are you on any? Are you taking Kratom? Are you on some sort of SSRI? Are you doing something? He said no and it turns out he was eating out every single meal. I said you need to start controlling your meal, you need to cook, you need to get very comfortable with cooking. And I told him how to make it real simple and I said you need to do some jump rope, you need to bounce, you need to actually reach literal motility. Yeah, literally. And guess what? He all of a sudden, it all started coming around for him. But if I would have known about your guy's product, I would have said, hey, try this. These come from very reputable people that I highly respect, and so let's talk about your product real quick. So you have a product now. Is it ready to go? Can people buy it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so today is Monday and we are going to be launching pre-sales on Friday through our website which you can visit, and it is probioncom P-R-o-p-i-o-ncom and we're launching pre-sales and the product will ship out around eight to ten weeks from now.
Speaker 1:Okay, and in what are they buying? Are they buying a one month supply of none?
Speaker 2:yeah, 30 day, 30 day supply 30 scoops of propion blend, which you're supposed to mix into water or sugar-free almond milk is the other thing that we recommend. It tastes really good.
Speaker 1:That's what I use. That's my jam right there. Let me ask you this why did you not also include some sort of brown rice with the pea and make it a complete protein? Or does it not matter, because the pea has the amino acids you need?
Speaker 3:The pea protein has most of the major amino acids. I think it's maybe relatively deficient in methionine, might be the one or two that it's reduced in, but we were considering supplementing methionine in there. However, if you look at studies that are coming out now, relative methionine restriction is actually pretty good for longevity. So we were thinking that you could take a near complete protein which has a little bit less methionine in there and get a relative restriction and start boosting your longevity through that regard as well. So we try to put scientific input into all of our decisions on what goes into the blend.
Speaker 1:Fantastic.
Speaker 2:And look, it's not a protein plus shake. It's that the protein in there is an actual functional ingredient.
Speaker 1:Exactly, it's a propion drink, not a muscle building drink. Right Period.
Speaker 3:Although there are preclinical studies out there that preclinical meaning these are done in mice. Whether they hold in humans, who knows right now but at least in mice that if you supplement mice with IPA you can actually boost muscle strength, boost muscle. This is just the metabolite right Boost muscle strength, boost muscle mass and reduce, dampen inflammation in the muscle. And they go through mechanisms up there. So there are studies out in mice which would support healthy muscle building with the metabolites themselves. That's the goal of this thing is a. It's a metabolite, an anti-aging gut metabolite technology. Which is why I was hooked into this, because it's new and different from whatever is out there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, look, dan, you sound like you are one busy guy working with NASA and SpaceX and what you teach at three universities. You this must, you must really believe in this product. If in this product, if you're that busy and you're getting on my podcast to talk about that, I'm honored to have someone like some brains like you guys on the podcast, but you must have pretty high hopes for this molecule.
Speaker 3:Yeah, one of the things that got me really excited about this is that I like a big picture advancement, so things that are new and exciting and are different from what's out there already. Even if you look across my scientific career and some of the major findings I've made in research, some of these would be identifying adaptive immune cells like T cells and B cells, controlling insulin resistance and obesity, showing that the gut immune system actually can control disease throughout the body and not just in the gut. Another thing we've done is look at mechanical forces, how that shapes inflammation, and also, just most recently, our paper on the immune system and microgravity. I consider all of these things really new, big picture ideas. This isn't a sequel or like right now in Hollywood or whatever. All these sequels or part three or part four or something. These are like I like big, original ideas, and that's what I think propion blend is.
Speaker 3:It's not just another resveratrol or any NADNR in a man. It's not another senolytic or a ketone body or AKG. This is a pathway that's not yet mainstream in products that are out there. I consider it something original and that's why I initially wanted to work with propion. I like to work on new things that are amongst the first out there, and so that's what got me really excited, and what I hope to accomplish is, as I mentioned, I started my career off as a medical doctor and then I became a scientist, and at times I was doing practicing medicine and science, and one of the reasons I went into all of this is try to help as many people as possible, and I think, with a product like this, which potentially interfaces with so many important and relevant components to healthy aging, I thought this was my chance to translate some of the research I've done, especially in the gut immune system, and to something that could basically help people live healthier, longer lives.
Speaker 1:Fantastic, fantastic, speaking my language. I love meeting people like you, people that have serious cognitive horsepower and that they want to do something good with it. I'm really impressed. I've heard Nicholas talk about Propion for God how long now I don know Like. I met you, nick, at Radfest.
Speaker 3:Years ago.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I remember when I first saw you, I was standing in line to get a coffee and you were taking out your business card and you were giving an elevator pitch to somebody about Propion. I remember thinking like look at this young kid, this guy, like he's going places, like I really was impressed. And then the next year you came up and you said, you told me, you said everybody at this conference is learning how to not age and you're the only person I see that's actually doing. What are you doing? And we just got on a call and we've been friends ever since and so I have to say I really am impressed with what you guys are doing.
Speaker 1:This sounds like it's something that is really well thought out and it's actually targeting something the microbiome, which I think is such an important and a lot of times under appreciated part of health, because it does really affect so many things. What do you? What's the future for you guys in terms of what's the real sort of vision for this company moving forward? Are you guys going to have more products? Are you going to have version two of certain things?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're taking things one step at a time. So we're launching this product, propion Blend. We're in talks with a couple of different people, companies who are interested in licensing this from us and putting it on their websites that have lots of traffic, affiliate networks, etc. And then we're going to move on to developing a second product, this science, into a pill so that it's potentially more accessible, just say, running out the door or something, or for people who don't like, for people who don't drink products, we're looking at how to apply it in skincare. We're also looking into avenues in defense and pharmaceuticals, and so there's a lot in the pipeline. But again, just taking things one step at a time, exploring partnership opportunities as they come to us and doing our best to stay sane while we do this all as well. Yeah, good luck with that.
Speaker 3:The other thing, nicholas. We've got the current Blend product. We also have a second Blend product that we're also developing at the same time, so we hope to introduce two Blend products. Both of them will have the same tryptophan diversion technology background, but one might be designed for people who want to even a little bit extra boost on their tryptophan metabolites beyond what we can provide in the initial blend. And then, of course, the pill products. But the potential for this is large, because Nicholas was talking to me also about whether we want to go into pet food products, skin care, and so these are the things we're thinking of down the road, but it's definitely one product that I'm focusing on right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, pet food could be massive, honestly, like dog food, and my God that could be, especially if you show that, like what you guys do, you show that this stuff actually works. But, man, guys, this is, this is fascinating stuff. So one more time somebody, let's say somebody's interested uh, pre-sale goes on this friday. They go to propion I'm going to bring that up again dot com, and then the product will arrive. You said 10 weeks from now, approximately Eight to 10 weeks. Yeah, eight to 10 weeks. Okay, fantastic. And then for everyone else listening, I will include everything we discussed in the show notes and that will be at stephenmccaincom backslash Propion and Propion is P-R-O-P-I-O-N. If you just want to buy the product and pre-order it this Friday, p-i-o-n. If you just want to buy the product and pre-order it this Friday, go to propioncom. P-r-o-p-i-o-ncom. Guys, fantastic.
Speaker 2:I really look forward to seeing you. Thank you so much for having us, Stephen. This was a great conversation. Yeah, my pleasure.
Speaker 1:I really wish I could have dived into so much more with you guys, but I don't want to abuse your time. But if someone wants to reach out to you personally, where can they find you? How can they get ahold of you? Nick, how do you start with you?
Speaker 2:I'm easy to find on LinkedIn. You can always. If you have a question for Dan, I can forward it to him. Also, if you want to just get in touch with Stephen, you and I are in contact all the time, and so he can easily reach out to me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, fantastic guys, dan it. Yeah fantastic guys. Damn, are you gonna say anything, or you know? I just wanted to thank you for having us on. I mean, uh, yeah, we want to.
Speaker 3:As I said, I started my career as a as a physician, and this is one of the one of the dreams that we had was to try to develop products that could really help promote healthy aging and across across many people, especially as people get older and become more vulnerable to things, and the chance to develop something that might improve their resilience and healthy aging.
Speaker 3:This is like what we've dreamed about, and also wanted to follow up on what you said about Nicholas and yeah, that was one of the reasons. When he approached me, I agreed this was a genius kid from Berkeley, and when an undergrad comes to you with ideas like that, we were working on some of the stuff tangentially already. But when someone comes up to you with ideas like that, we were working on some of the stuff tangentially already. But when someone comes up to you with a genius idea like this, it doesn't happen that often. I felt the same way as you about Nicholas as well. I just wanted to bring that up. It's been a pleasure also working with such a genius kid from Berkeley as well.
Speaker 2:Thanks, dan, that's. Nice.
Speaker 3:It's thanks, dan, that's nice.
Speaker 2:Dan and I make a good team.
Speaker 1:Dan and I make a really good team you guys seem like you guys got a great thing going, so I'm really happy you guys came on and I'd love to try your guys product and we're happy to send you a bottle, stephen, we really so.
Speaker 2:We're selling right now in one month and three month quantities, so one in three bottles and I recommend taking that. We went through extensive taste testing with the product. We've developed a really good dark chocolate flavored blend. If you mix it in almond milk, for example, like it'll just taste like a chocolate smoothie. So I reckon I recommend getting the three month supply because that's where you'll actually start to see like cellular effect is the longer you take it. That's where those molecules building up will have the chance to work over time on your body. But yeah, I encourage you to just at least try the product and again go to propioncom and check us out. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And when it's delicious, you have compliance and I imagine you need probably three months to change the microbiome. It's not going to happen overnight. Right, and start feeding those things that they take a while to propagate, right? We're talking about man, nick Dan. Fantastic, thank you so much for coming on. Everybody listening, we really appreciate you. Go to stephenmccaincom, backslash Propion, or this Friday, go to propioncom. This podcast will be released right before that. Get your three months delicious dark chocolate supply and mix it with some almond milk. And guys for coming on and look forward to seeing what goes on with your company and maybe having you guys on in the future as you start to expand and sure, yeah. So thanks again everybody for listening to the steven mccain podcast. Thanks, nick dan, and we'll catch you on the next one. Stay healthy, everyone cheers and we'll catch you on the next one. Stay healthy, everyone Cheers. Bye.