Mitochondria Part 2 with Dr. Kurt Woeller, Following Your Gut Podcast #5

In this episode, Dr. Kurt Woeller delves into the intricate world of mitochondria and their crucial role in energy production, explaining complex biochemical pathways in an accessible manner. From glycolysis and beta oxidation to the Krebs cycle and electron transport chain, Dr. Woeller articulates the processes that occur within the mitochondria to convert carbohydrates and fatty acids into ATP, the body’s energy currency. Emphasizing the importance of nutrients such as B vitamins and magnesium, he illustrates how these are essential for the optimal function of enzymes involved in metabolic pathways.

Understanding mitochondrial dysfunction is imperative for addressing various health conditions. In this episode, Dr. Woeller discusses this dysfunction’s manifestations from mild issues like brain fog and fatigue to severe mitochondrial diseases that can be life-threatening. He highlights the importance of holistic approaches, integrating nutrition, lifestyle, and environmental factors into treatment plans. Dr. Woeller also touches on advanced topics like apoptosis, cytochrome C, and the impact of oxidative stress on mitochondrial efficiency. The session concludes with an encouraging call for practitioners to delve deeper into research, embracing a comprehensive approach to health.

Key Takeaways:

•             Mitochondria are integral to energy production, with complex biochemical pathways converting nutrients into ATP.

•             Nutrient deficiencies, environmental toxins, and genetic factors can severely affect mitochondrial function.

•             Mitochondrial dysfunction manifests in a spectrum from chronic fatigue to serious, life-threatening diseases.

•             A holistic approach combining nutrition, lifestyle changes, and an understanding of environmental impacts can improve mitochondrial health.

•             Education and critical thinking are crucial for health practitioners to effectively manage and treat mitochondrial dysfunctions.

“The microbiome of our digestive tract is like the soil of our body." 

Transcript

0:00:00 Roland Pankewich: You said a lot of things there regarding glycolysis, beta oxidation. Kurt, I think we gotta go a little deeper now. I think we gotta go into the mitochondria. If you’re okay, I think we should give people a little bit of a background and in many cases a refresher of how do these things work, These mitochondria, they take the raw materials of the carbohydrates and the fatty acids that come in from our diet, and they turn them into energy. And there’s a very mechanical and I think a rather elegant process there.

0:00:28 Roland Pankewich: Can you briefly describe the process of making ATP energy? Just so we’re. Everyone’s on the same page?

0:00:35 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Yeah. So you think of glucose. Let’s just simplify. Glucose, fat, protein. Okay. So glucose is pretty, pretty straightforward for the most part. So glucose converts into pyruvic acid, right? So you take, let’s say, you know, one molecule of glucose. It essentially gets funneled down to become two molecules of pyruvic acid. Pyruvic acid gets converted to acetyl coenzyme A. And that happens within the cytosolic fluid of the cell.

0:01:03 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Okay, so this is not happening within the mitochondria at this point. In order to convert pyruvic acid to acetyl coenzyme A, it requires an enzyme called pyruvate dehydrogenase. And it’s a very. It’s actually a very complicated enzyme. It’s a series of enzymes. It’s called a complex. But the bottom line is that pyruvate dehydrogenase complex enzyme requires certain nutrients. B1, B2, B, B3, B5. Lipoic acid.

0:01:31 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Throwing a little bit of magnesium. Yep, magnesium too. Right. So you need thiamine, you need riboflavin, you need niacin, you need panathenic acid. We need some lipoic acid. And throw again. Throw in a little bit of magnesium on top of that. So if we make that conversion. Okay, now we’re at an acetyl coenzyme A level. Acetyl coenzyme then enters the Krebs cycle, which is sitting in the innermost aspect of the mitochondria. So a. A basic structure of the mitochondria is you have the outer membrane, you have an inner membrane, so you have two membranes, and then you have spaces that are occurring in between those membranes. So between the outer and the inner membrane is the intermembrane space.

0:02:12 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And then as part of the inner membrane, which is in many folds. If you actually look at an image of the mitochondria to me, it almost looks like the folds of the digestive system. And those folds increase the surface area. Embedded in that fold of the inner mitochondrial membrane is what’s called the electron transport chain complex. And there’s five proteins, there’s one through five. So we have complex 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5.

0:02:41 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And those complexes are essentially passing electrons down a chain reaction that ultimately at complex 4 converts molecular oxygen into water. And through that process of electron flow, we’re getting an outflow of protons or hydrogen ions into that inner membrane space. And those, those hydrogen ions accumulate over the last protein complex of the electron transport chain to help create ATP. So as we funnel down from glucose to pyruvate to acetyl coenzyme, acetyl coenzyme enters the Krebs cycle within the matrix of the mitochondria, which is that innermost part.

0:03:25 Dr. Kurt Woeller: It, as it’s spinning from one step to the next, it’s producing NADH as well as something called fadh. So basically, nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide and flavin adenine dinucleotide.

0:03:38 Roland Pankewich: I know those names. I know those names, though. It sounds like vitamin B3 and vitamin B2, doesn’t it?

0:03:43 Dr. Kurt Woeller: That’s right. That’s right. So the, the NAD is linked to vitamin B3 and the FAD is linked to vitamin B3. Other way around, B2. Right. So it turns out that the Krebs cycle connects to the electron transport chain and it connects to the electron transport chain at complex one and complex two. So NADH connects to the electron transport chain at Complex 1, Fadh connects at Complex 2. And in order to get maximal ATP production, you want to connect or start the engagement of electron flow at complex one and complex two.

0:04:28 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Okay, so that’s essentially when you calculate out ATP production, you know, per unit of glucose. That’s ultimately how it works. If you’re starting the process at complex three or even complex four, you’re just going to be compromised in total ATP production. So it turns out that you get amino acid and fats will also get metabolized down to the acetyl coenzyme A level. There’s some subtle differences in that. There are a few other doorways to the Krebs cycle as well.

0:04:59 Dr. Kurt Woeller: I’m really just kind of talking about the main doorway, which is acetyl coenzyme A. But biochemistry is very complicated, multi layered. So there’s, there are other entry points, but if you just sort of think of it that way. And so as we process fat as we process glucose and protein down, it funnels down to these, these energy production precursors. All of the sequencing that that takes place is dependent on enzyme activity.

0:05:31 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Those enzymes are dependent in many cases on certain nutrients to help them move from one step to the next. But also those different conversion steps are vulnerable to problems because you can have a genetic influence on a certain enzyme. You could have a nutrient deficiency that might compromise a converting enzyme, or you could have a chemical, an environmental chemical, or sometimes endogenous chemicals that get produced that might inhibit some of those enzyme conversions.

0:06:02 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So, for example, if we take it back to the conversion step of pyruvic acid to acetyl coenzyme A and that pyruvate dehydrogenase enzyme, right. We talked about B1, B2, B3, B5, is necessary for that enzyme to function. Well, it turns out that that same complex of pyruvate dehydrogenase, it’s called something else, is also an enzyme that is active within the first half of Krebs cycle activity. And so if we are deficient in B1, B2, B3, B5, for example, we’re not only going to compromise glucose metabolism and acetyl coenzyme A product, but will compromise Krebs cycle activity.

0:06:45 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So now all of a sudden we’re, we’re affecting downstream what’s happening in the Krebs cycle. Well, if we take it one step further, certain amino acids also get converted down to an acetyl coenzyme A level. And there’s another enzyme complex that helps in that sequence. Well, that same enzyme complex is dependent on the same nutrients. So the B vitamins, the lipoic acid, the magnesium ingest, the initial phases of initial amino acid metabolism, glucose metabolism and Krebs cycle activity is dependent on this grouping of these enzymes that are then dependent on those specific nutrients.

0:07:36 Dr. Kurt Woeller: It turns out that within the electron transport chain, that’s another very interesting area. And mitochondrial diseases, what they sometimes called mitochondrial disorders, are really focused on problems at the electron transport chain level. So basically, activity of what’s happening along the inner mitochondrial membrane. So we know that we engage the mitochondria with NADH at complex one, FADH engages the mitochondria at complex two.

0:08:08 Dr. Kurt Woeller: It’s interesting in that complex two. So when you think about mitochondrial genetics, so complex one, three, four and five are mostly made up of proteins that come from nuclear DNA. But certain mitochondrial DNA also produce protein subunits that support those complexes. It’s only Complex 2 that is 100% linked to nuclear DNA. And it turns out that Complex 2 is a vulnerable spot in the mitochondria that almost in some respects physically connects the Krebs cycle to the electron transport chain. And one of the things that we see commonly on the organic acids test is that a chemical called succinic acid becomes elevated when Complex 2 is compromised. It’s actually linked to an enzyme called succinic acid dehydrogenase.

0:09:11 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And that particular complex is very vulnerable to environmental chemicals. But I’ve also seen it elevate and become compromised in many people who have underlying bacterial and fungal problems, too. So I don’t think it’s necessarily 100% just environmental chemicals. Heavy metals can negatively impact it as well. So if we interfere with any of these complexes that are transferring electrons down that electron transport chain, the end result is poor ATP production.

0:09:45 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Complex 1 is the largest complex. It has the most proteins. Essentially, it’s the largest protein structure. Complex three, I think, is the next. I think it’s. I think Complex 3 is the next largest. The bottom line with that is that if we get deficits, whether it’s nutritionally induced because of a complex, you know, a complex one or complex two or complex three, we’re going to get electron leakage. If you can’t transfer electrons from one protein complex to the next, where those electrons go, well, they end up leaking into the matrix of the mitochondria. And sitting in the matrix of the mitochondria is oxygen.

0:10:26 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And that oxygen reacts with those electrons and creates oxygen radicals, particularly superoxide radicals. But you can also get hydroxyl radicals that are formed. And so if we have faulty electron flow down the electron transport chain, we increase oxygen radical formation in the mitochondria, which then further damages the electron transport chain proteins as well as the inner mitochondrial membrane, which is holding those complexes together.

0:10:56 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And kind of taking it back, by the way, interestingly, to the discussion we just had about short chain fatty acids, butyric acid, as you mentioned, right. Gets produced by a number of bacteria in our digestive system. Some of those are Clostridia based. And that’s okay because Clostridia is part of our microbiome. But we have other bacteria as well. Well, it turns out that butyric acid not only helps induce more robust energy production, but it has other influences in the mitochondria in many regards, helping to assist some of the electron transport chain complexes as well as what appears to be sequences within the Krebs cycle.

0:11:42 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Too much propionic acid can actually have an opposite effect. It can actually inhibit some of the beneficial effects of butyric acid. And it turns out that propionic acid can damage some of the complexes, particularly complex three. So we know that complex one and three are the greatest areas of potential electron leakage. One of the things and why I have done so much study, and it’s a continual study on mitochondrial dynamics, is one of the trends that I’ve seen in autism. And I don’t know if this is happening in other health conditions, but my suspicion would be the same in other types of disorders, particularly neurological disorders, is in the autism group.

0:12:28 Dr. Kurt Woeller: The area of greatest deficit from my mitochondrial assessments has been at Complex 3. And that’s critically important because Complex 3 is transferring electrons between Complex 3 and Complex 4. Complex 4 is the last complex that we’re actually at that point converting oxygen to water. And then at that point we’re getting the last outflow of protons into that inner membrane space. But it becomes a deficit point because we were getting electron leakage, which is generating a lot of oxidative stress, and oxidative stress to some level. As, you know, rolling within the mitochondria is necessary, but again, too much is problematic.

0:13:12 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Taking it one step further, if we have faulty function of moving electrons from through the electron transport chain complexes, and we’re getting leakage of electrons into the matrix that is generating oxygen radicals, those radicals again then are further damaging other cellular systems in the cell, including the mitochondria, and specifically the inner mitochondrial membrane. And what’s very interesting about the inner mitochondrial membrane is it houses the electron transport chain complex. And it’s important for people to understand when you’re talking about a high energy system in our body, brain, nervous system, cardiovascular system, for example, let’s just take for example, a heart cell, okay.

0:14:00 Dr. Kurt Woeller: A individual heart cell might contain 5,000 mitochondria per cell. It’s not just one or two, it’s thousands.

0:14:09 Roland Pankewich: Yeah, the books don’t do a good job of depicting that. When we’re right.

0:14:13 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And then in each mitochondria, we’re probably anywhere between 10 to 15,000 electron transport chain complexes. So you have to think of these complexes as an individual unit. They kind of function amongst themselves, but they are connected in their collective ability to make ATP. And what’s interesting about the inner mitochondrial membrane, as I mentioned before, it exists in folds, and that folding increases the surface energy.

0:14:45 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So as you can imagine, in a high metabolically active organ system, in those mitochondria of those cells, there is more folds, which allows for more electron transport chain complexes. Well, sitting between complex 3 and complex 4 is another protein called cytochrome C. And cytochrome C is. It’s. I look at this as sort of the inherent wisdom, right, of. Of, you know, evolution or whatever dynamics you want to, you know, describe it as.

0:15:22 Dr. Kurt Woeller: But it plays a very strategic role. It turns out that cytochrome C sits on the outer leaflet of the inner mitochondrial membrane. And its job is to help transfer electrons, the final electron transfer between complex III to complex IV to help convert oxygen to water. And that’s complex for Ben, then being the final stage where we’re pumping protons from the matrix into the inner membrane space to then accumulate over the last complex to help generate ATP.

0:15:53 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Well, if there is excess oxidative stress or there is dysfunction in the transfer of electrons, or we’ve got damage of the inner mitochondrial membrane for various reasons, whether it’s chemicals, whether it’s nutrient deficiencies, whether it’s. Whether it’s mycotoxins, whether it’s eating too many seed oils that become oxidized, whatever. As the inner mitochondrial membrane becomes damaged, it releases cytochrome C.

0:16:20 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And a release of cytochrome C travels outside the mitochondria into the cytostolic fluid of the cell and activates a series of enzymes called caspases. And the caspase reaction essentially is a apoptotic trigger for that cell to commit suicide. You want that to happen, right? If we have a cancer cell, obviously we want. Or a cell that is transforming into a cancer cell, we want an apoptosis signaling event to occur because we want that cell to be removed.

0:16:54 Dr. Kurt Woeller: If we have a damaged cell, we certainly want that to occur as well. The problem is, is that if we have too many cells that are malfunctioning, too many cells that are dysfunctional, then we get an excess apoptotic signaling event, and we’re now destroying too many cells or taking out too many mitochondria, and that then lies or leads to these different types of mitochondrial disorders and manifestations.

0:17:25 Dr. Kurt Woeller: It could be happening in the brain nervous system. It could be happening in the cardiovascular system, could be happening in your kidney, in your liver, in your gut, your immune system. It can happen all throughout the body in varying degrees. So it’s a very interesting. And this is an area that I have been focused on heavily to try to understand more. Currently, I’m working with a few individuals who have seizure disorders.

0:17:50 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And some of the genetic analysis that I’ve done and some of the mitochondrial analysis I’ve done. There’s an absolute component to their seizure condition linked to underlying mitochondrial problems. I’m not claiming it’s the only thing, but you don’t have to have a serious condition like that in order to appreciate the impact that the mitochondria play. Again, just take it back to what we originally discussed.

0:18:17 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Brain fog, memory issues, sleep problems, or anxiety, or. I just don’t feel, you know, like I. Energy like I used to have, it just can manifest in different ways and sometimes in subtle ways. But when we get back to the fundamentals of health, gut health, diet, nutrition, lifestyle, eventually it, it, it has an influence on mitochondria and vice versa.

0:18:44 Roland Pankewich: That was an incredible. I don’t want to call it a recap of what medical school taught us that we probably tried to forget. But knowing things down to that level of detail, I always look at the fundamental pieces and how they come together. Then I hover over it and I look at the intricate design of everything and, you know, all of that is basically the reason that explains why we eat food and why we breathe air.

0:19:07 Roland Pankewich: I love to ask medical professionals what’s the true role of oxygen in the body. And not many people ever say to be the final electron acceptor in the mitochondrial transport chain. But what you just said there, the, the nature of how the things come together, the separation of the electrons moving down the gradient and the protons being pumped out of the, the matrix, it just shows you that it’s all about the coming together of balance, right? The positive and the negative coming together is actually what generates the ability for the body to make energy.

0:19:38 Roland Pankewich: But a lot of what I think should be focused on more is also we make structured water. There’s even a term, I believe, for the water around the mitochondria that has a bit of a charge separation state. I think it’s called the minos or something of that nature. So cellular water is also a huge component of this because water conducts electricity. And fundamentally, humans, based upon the density of the mitochondria, how much electricity is being discharged in our body, we’re actually more thermally efficient per square centimeter, a square inch, than the sun is, based upon the sum total of all the mitochondrial reactions going on inside of our bodies.

0:20:17 Roland Pankewich: And I think, although that stuff can seem incredibly intimidating for someone who goes, oh my God, I don’t know any of this as a clinician, you’re not going to make better what’s already perfectly designed. You don’t have to go in and re, remodel and renovate a mitochondria to make a better transport chain in order to Heal someone. What I was getting from what you were saying is understanding the co factors and where they operate, understanding the external and internal influences and how they can enhance. Because fundamentally the body does not know disease.

0:20:48 Roland Pankewich: The body knows to self replicate and heal. And what’s important to know, in my opinion about mitochondria is they give birth and divide or they fuse together based upon the dynamics of what’s happening inside the cell. So if you have the inner world of a cell set up to be a healthy internal environment, you prime the system for the birthing of healthy daughter mitochondria. Because a healthy environment is usually underpinned by healthy mitochondria.

0:21:15 Roland Pankewich: If someone is, as you said, filled with environmental toxins, heavy metal compounds, metabolic metabolites from bacterial, fungal, viral infections, then that internal environment is going to be ripe to create disharmony that is going to eventually breed dysfunctional mitochondria giving birth to dysfunctional mitochondria. So as a clinician, your goal is not to make better what already exists perfectly.

0:21:41 Roland Pankewich: It’s to know how to remove the blockages or remove that which inhibits ideal function and to restore what might not be present. That is holding back the ultimate ceiling. Because the one thing I do know about mitochondria is that nature is very intelligent in its design. It gave the woman the responsibility of passing on the genetics of the mitochondria to the kids. They knew the men would screw it up somehow.

0:22:07 Roland Pankewich: So, you know, if you’re listening to this and you’re a clinician, you’re dealing with expected mothers, people who want to plan pregnancies and plan families. The genetic starter kit you give to your child, both from a microbiome and a mitochondrial contribution is from the mom. The healthier, the state of health of the mom, the likelihood they’re going to give birth to a healthier baby who’s more resilient so they can recover after whatever insults their physiology may experience.

0:22:33 Roland Pankewich: So Kurt, thank you for that. That was a wonderful description. I do want to round this one out by asking you. Okay, now that we’ve looked at the high level stuff, we’ve gone deeper into the nuances of mitochondria structure and function. How do people approach mitochondrial diseases clinically? I know you said supplement nutrition, lifestyle. What are some things that could be strategies to give people thought provoking ideas and actions?

0:23:01 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Well, when you get into the level of mitochondrial diseases, obviously you need to know something about those particular diseases because there are certain mitochondrial diseases that many of them manifest in childhood and there are many of them are catastrophic. You know, they, they can, many of them could be lethal early on, or they can just be, you know, highly problematic, not necessarily lethal, but they can severely compromise a child’s growth. Some mitochondrial diseases don’t manifest until later in life. You, they can lead to blindness, for example, and other degenerative conditions.

0:23:37 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So they’re not all the same thing. When we talking about mitochondrial dysfunction, which is a lot about what we work with, rolling in our collective practices with people, you know, again, there’s. It’s a spectrum, right? So these are not necessarily lethal diseases, but these are dysfunctional states that people can work on that, you know, usually can be positively impacted through lifestyle changes.

0:24:07 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So I have been working with more individuals now with documented, you know, mitochondrial disorders, which would be essentially be a disease. I, I approach it, My approach is really in many regards to. Approach, you know, pretty much everybody with the same intent. I want to try to understand some of the fundamentals of their condition, what I feel I can have an impact on and what I feel I can’t. You know, if you, if it’s a disease state linked to genetics, you know, pretty hard to turn that around.

0:24:41 Dr. Kurt Woeller: But you might be able to influence other biochemical aspects that might be affected downstream. So we kind of get back to some of the fundamentals way. And, and going back to your mention of some of the roadblocks. What are some of those roadblocks? Well, an area I always start with is organic acid testing, because the organic acid test can help provide insight into fungal overgrowth in the digestive system, clostridia compounds, oxalate, certain nutritional imbalances.

0:25:10 Dr. Kurt Woeller: I might need to look at a comprehensive digestive stool test to see if there’s a parasitic infection or some other type of imbalance. And then, of course, you have environmental exposures if that is part of the backdrop of somebody’s history. Mycotoxins, environmental chemicals, heavy metals. So we can look at those and try to remove those barriers as much as possible and let the inherent wisdom in that person’s body and at the cellular level kind of take hold and do what it needs to do.

0:25:36 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Some cases in very serious conditions, you have to be aware of what may work for the general population, may not necessarily work for that particular individual. I’ll give you an example. We, we know nowadays there’s a huge movement towards a carnivore diet, right? Carnivore diet, you know, eat more meat, eat more fat, you know, blah, blah, blah. It’s the best way to go. All right? You know, same thing with a ketogenic diet certainly has been helpful for a lot of people, but there’s going to be certain subset of individuals that it may not be the best choice, because if you’ve got some kind of a fatty acid metabolism problem at a genetic level, well, you’re not going to process heavy meats, you know, And I came across a. An individual recently who has a condition, or at least it’s suspected, something called gluteric acidemia type 2.

0:26:28 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Well, you have to really limit the amount of lysine that, and tryptophan that that person’s eating, because in their body they convert it into toxic compounds. So some, you know, you have as a practitioner, you have to be willing to go back to the textbooks to push yourself into areas that maybe you weren’t originally trained or maybe you got a little bit in medical school or, or, you know, other type of health training but aren’t quite comfortable with. But you have to push past and keep digging to look for answers.

0:27:05 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And so my journey continues, you know, in this particular area, fundamentally, for people who might be just be dealing with generalized mitochondrial dysfunction, you know, where we pick up on some markers on an organic acid test, for example, you know, that oftentimes can be helped. Again, just fundamentally going back to nutrition, lifestyle, diet, using foundational nutrients just to fill in those gaps nutritionally.

0:27:35 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So there’s a lot of ways of approaching it. It really comes down to the individual that’s sitting in front of you. Are we dealing with somebody with a documented mitochondrial disease that’s well defined from a genetic standpoint, and then we know what our limitations are, and then we try to optimize potential as best as possible, or are we just dealing with, you know, sort of the person who’s like, hey, I just kind of tired. I don’t feel great.

0:28:02 Dr. Kurt Woeller: You know, got some gut stuff going on. We can help those people, too. So I always look at it this way. The. The person that comes to me, I don’t always know, obviously going in who they are, unless once I go through their clinical paperwork and I get an idea. But I’m going to do everything in my power to try to help them. And if it’s in something I’m not familiar with, then I’ll spend the time researching it as best as possible and try to figure it out.

0:28:30 Dr. Kurt Woeller: One of the things that I have seen, Roland, is that with some of the individuals with mitochondrial problems, when I look at what’s being done for them, and I don’t know, you know, in every case, all of what’s gone on. If they’ve seen other medical professionals along the way and they’ve gone through sophisticated testing, I, I, I’m a firm believer in trying to figure out as best as possible what’s happening.

0:28:55 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Sometimes it’s not possible in all circumstances. But in a lot of the literature that I’ve read, a lot of the interventions, I feel just kind of fall short. You know, most of the mitochondrial literature, when you read about mitochondrial diseases, they talk about the use of carnitine and CoQ10 and creatine and some of the B vitamins to support some of those major pathways that we are, that we know are intrinsic to mitochondrial biochemistry.

0:29:26 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And then, you know, they sort of give lip service to a healthy diet. And then, of course, they get into things which are absolutely necessary in, in severe disease crisises where, you know, people have, you know, massive levels of lactic acidosis or they’re having cardiac problems. You know, those people need emergent medical attention. There’s nothing wrong with that. But I, I often find that the, I guess the diversity of thought from an integrative, functional medicine standpoint gets lost.

0:29:57 Dr. Kurt Woeller: It’s almost like, here’s your mitochondria, you know, cocktail supplement. Good luck. Right. And that’s not good enough for me. You know, recently I came across some information. I read a great book called what your food ate. And it’s taken me down this path of going back and understanding the, the benefit and the power of regenerative farming. And I came away from that book realizing that the soil of the earth is the microbiome of the earth, and our microbiome of our digestive tract is like the soil of our body.

0:30:41 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And we can have, maybe we can come back and have another discussion about, you know, mycorrhiza and, and fungus and the relationship of fungus and all this.

0:30:49 Roland Pankewich: I think we’re gonna have to.

0:30:51 Dr. Kurt Woeller: But the, so I, I, I have a lot of things that come my way that I read. And, and I got to a point about, I was like, four, five, six years ago. I didn’t question if something came to my mind if I heard about a book or an article, I would just go and read it. It’s like I’m, I’m being told to do this. For some reason, I stopped questioning. And so I would go read something. And I saw this was a book I, I actually had bought for my wife as a birthday present. It was on the bookshelf. I kind of walked by one day, like, I need to read that. And I’m glad I did. And I actually picked up a couple articles.

0:31:27 Dr. Kurt Woeller: One of the articles was interesting on longevity vitamins in, in a, in a. This person who was proposing this theory called the triage theory of nutrition. Have you heard about this?

0:31:39 Roland Pankewich: I’ve not, no.

0:31:40 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So his premise is that we have nutrients, vitamins. We think of, you know, vitamin E and vitamin K and vitamin D and B vitamins as the only vitamins that exist. They’ve already been discovered, nutrition’s already solved, so we can kind of move on. Well, what they realized is that what this person’s theory is that you have nutrients that are really geared towards immediate survival, high states of stress, and a lot of them are geared towards, in the animal world from a biological standpoint, survival, meaning we need to reproduce. Because the way to maintain our species to be able to reproduce. So the body sequesters energy and resources, even down to the cellular level, even down to the mitochondrial level for reproduction and immediate survival.

0:32:35 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And then you have longevity nutrients which are there to help preserve life long term. Now if you’re constantly in a state of stress and threat, this fight or flight, the sympathetic drive, right, A lot of the nutrients that we use, and again at the biological level go towards survival, but you compromise longevity. And it’s only until you can get to a longevity state that you actually can start to engage or maybe become dependent or the biology starts to shift towards long health. And obviously we want to have, you know, long term health.

0:33:13 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And so. And then there’s this mixture, right, that there are certain nutrients that have a. Play a role in both sort of things. The article is fascinating because it got into certain nutrients that have been discovered. One of them called pqq. I know this and yeah, and I’m, I’m drawing a blank on it right now about where exactly it comes from. But pqq, certain vitamin companies actually have pqq and I’ve actually used it for mitochondrial purposes because one of the things in research of PQQ is it helps with mitophagy, it helps with mitogenesis. So it’s not only inducing the development of new mitochondria, but it’s inducing a mechanism to get rid of old damaged mitochondria, which is like autophagy, which is really important.

0:34:05 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Ergo, I think it’s called ergotheanine, which is found in mushrooms, which is a reason I’m going back to eating mushrooms, even though I don’t really like mushrooms. But mushrooms are robust in ergotheanine and they’ve discovered that ergotheanine is heavily concentrated within the mitochondria. It plays a supportive role to the various complexes as well as having some antioxidant purposes. And there are some other nutrients out there as well. And so there. This article is discussing the fact that, hey guys, there’s a lot of research and by the way, there’s likely other chemical compounds out there that we could classify as vitamins, vitamins that aren’t being classified in that way, and others to be discovered.

0:34:55 Dr. Kurt Woeller: The other thing about this book and the soil going back to regenerative farming and thinking about the microbiome was how the, the microbiome becomes a transferring mechanism for nutrients in the body and as we mentioned before, other chemical signals that have a cellular signaling, unifying aspect within our body. It’s known to happen within the soil, the communication between plants and trees, for example.

0:35:28 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And so it’s a fascinating discussion. And so they might. So to kind of finalize this rolling because I realize I’ve been kind of going on about this, but when you ask me the question about how I think about these things, there’s the very rudimentary way of thinking about it and then there’s is it enough? Are we doing enough? And is there more that we can do in thinking about the influence the mitochondria has on us and the things that we can do that have an influence on the mitochondria in a collective way?

0:36:03 B: And I’m a firm believer, obviously, in fresh air and oxygen and exercise and getting out of nature, because that also has a major influence on us as human beings as well. So my journey through this whole path of medical education, functional integrative medicine, whatever you want to call it, is a continual journey to try to not only educate myself, but to try to make these, you know, points of connection as best as possible.

0:36:33 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And the more I connect one thing, it leads me to something else to connect. So I don’t ever see that puzzle being completely finished. And I’m okay with that. If I can, you know, eventually, someday depart and having left something to the world, I’ll be extremely happy.

0:36:51 Roland Pankewich: Yeah, I have a friend who uses the. The term done is for the dead. So I don’t think you’re going to be completing that puzzle anytime soon. But I really want to applaud that answer because you’re right, the quick and dirty answer is get the mitochondrial cocktail, throw this in there. But there’s really no greater systems thinking consideration in the physiology than dealing with the mitochondria. As you were saying, things, you know, it’s almost like you see these patterns in life. And I remember one time what hit me was, well, if all humans are of the earth, and the average state of health of the earth is going to be the sum total average health status of every human walking the earth, you’re going to have variances just like you have some areas that are beautiful lush landscapes and some areas that are barren wasteland.

0:37:39 Roland Pankewich: But we’re interlinked, you know, we’re, we’re yoked to the environment that we come from and ultimately our bodies go back to. So the systems thinking requirement and helping someone with mitochondrial dysfunction takes more than just learning all the vitamins and minerals that the biochemistry textbook tells you, because you have to learn the dynamics and the nature of how to influence these things.

0:38:01 Roland Pankewich: What I mean by that is you can use exercise as a mitochondrial stimulatory tool via driving up oxygen consumption and mitochondrial efficiency. You mentioned cytochrome C oxidase. That’s what’s called a chromophore. So exposing yourself to certain light frequencies at certain time of the day can enhance mitochondrial efficiency, melatonin production, mitophagy psychoregulations, heck, even the kind of music you listen to or the electromagnetic fields that oscillate in your environment have influence. There’s very documented research on the disruption of calcium metabolism with high levels of non native emf. So the. There is no short answer to the question that I asked. And I’m so glad that you, you said that because one of the things that I’ve been saying is we need to bring back critical thinking to understand that as a health professional, you’re not limited to the scope of the tools that you’re assumed to have.

0:38:57 Roland Pankewich: In the same way that we don’t have to just know all the vitamins that a book tells us that are in existence. So I think that’s a wonderful idea to put forth, to challenge everyone to be better. Understand that you need to challenge yourself to know how all of these things come together. Because the tools of a good health practitioner are far, far beyond simply a bottle of pills or a fancy biohack that may or may not work.

0:39:24 Roland Pankewich: You’ll find out as you do it. But you know, Kurt, we could keep going. And I always say that, and I’m sure we will. And I can’t believe I get to use this in a statement. I would love to have you come back so we can talk about the fungus among us. We need to dive in to all the things that we were just alluding to in the end. But I want to thank you for your time. I want to thank you for donating your research, your energy, all that you’ve learned.

0:39:47 Roland Pankewich: You have your own education academy, correct?

0:39:50 Dr. Kurt Woeller: I do. It’s called Integrative Medicine Academy. You can go to integrativemedicinacademy.com we’re currently in the process of updating our website and incorporating all of our courses into one website. So at this point I have personally produced probably upwards about 250 hours of course material on organic acid testing to gastrointestinal problems, to, you know, fundamentals of functional medicine, mitochondria and you know, candida, classtridia, many other topics.

0:40:26 Dr. Kurt Woeller: So people go there. Integratedmedicineacademy.com I’m also on substack, so if you go to Dr. Dr. Wohler w o e l l e r.substack.com I try and post an article at least twice a week. Sometimes I might share somebody else’s article or a video. I talk a lot about these concepts on my sub stack. I’ve gone through things on mitochondria and organic acid testing and nutrients and other topics so people can follow me there. It’s free.

0:40:58 Dr. Kurt Woeller: And then I’m also active online so I have a lot of YouTube videos. We’ve got our own YouTube video through integrated Medicine Academy. Honestly, if you just type in my name on YouTube or Vimeo, you know, Dr. Wohler educational videos, you’ll come across a lot of stuff that I produced over the years.

0:41:18 Roland Pankewich: Well, I’m hoping that this stimulated someone to want to learn more. Not only about you and what you’re doing, but to step up the game in terms of knowing and being able to positively affect those with mitochondrial dysfunctions. So Dr. Waller, thank you again for your time. It’s been great having you on. It’s always great to have a deep dive conversation with you and I have a feeling there will be another one in the future.

0:41:40 Dr. Kurt Woeller: Sounds good Roland, thanks so much.

0:41:42 Roland Pankewich: You have a great day. Thank you everyone. Talk to you soon. Bye.