Category: Research

One of the regular supplements in my regimen is the use of 2 tablespoons of Great Lakes Collagen (12 gm of collagen) into my morning coffee along with 2 scoops of Laird Turmeric Creamer.

My initial reason for taking collagen was to help with recovery and soreness after training, however the more I looked into it the more I discovered that it’s actually an amazing supplement.  

First of all…

What IS Collagen Hydrolysate

There are two primary forms of collagen that are available:

Collagen Gelatin – Consists of a longer chain of amino acids and will become thicker and gelatinous when mixed with liquid

Collagen Hydrolysate – Is collagen gelatin that is processed even more to form shorter chains of amino acids that are more easily digested and absorbed.  … Read More

I’m a regular subscriber to Rhonda Patrick’s Found My Fitness Podcast and was particularly impressed with her podcast on broccoli sprouts and sulforaphane.  Since I mainly listen to podcasts when I commute and her material is extremely dense, I wasn’t able to retain much from her 50 minute lecture.  I only walked away with the vague notion that broccoli sprouts are good for you… and a lot of the science-y stuff just went in one ear and out the other.

Since Rhonda also puts out youtube videos of her podcasts with graphics and texts, I made myself sit through the entire lecture, taking notes along the way so I have a better understanding of what all the fuss is with these sprouts.… Read More

This whole series was kicked off after I first read the NY Times article: After ‘The Biggest Loser,’ Their Bodies Fought to Regain Weight, and came away feeling pretty disheartened at the notion that biology is stacked so unfavorably against these Biggest Loser contestants.

That despite their massive weight loss, they would be condemned to an eternity of weight re-gain that would erode all of their substantive weight loss and make leave them more obese than when they started!

The article left me with a few questions which I tried to explore in a followup post, “The Biggest Loser Revisted,” in which I wasn’t quite satisfied with the answers that were provided, so I decided to look at the source material.… Read More

Ben Greenfield tweeted out a link to the the press release for this study, where they state:

Researchers have found that fish oil transforms fat-storage cells into fat-burning cells, which may reduce weight gain in middle age.

Since I’m currently stuck in the middle of the storm of the century here in Northern Virginia (why did I ever leave California), I figure I have the time to hunker down and read through the actual paper itself.

Press releases are notorious for misrepresenting what is actually stated in the paper. … Read More

I honestly didn’t expect to be writing so much about curcumin but when I came across this study I couldn’t help but read through it.  I recently wrote about a study demonstrating how curcumin can help tendon healing, but because the test subjects were rats, my enthusiasm was somewhat tempered.

Once I saw that this study done in humans, my curiosity was piqued.

This was published in the Alternative Medicine Review journal in 2010 and is titled:

Efficacy and Safety of Meriva, a Curcumin-phosphatidylcholine Complex, during Extended Administration in Osteoarthritis Patients

I actually learned a lot more about curcumin, after reading through this paper. … Read More

In my review of VSL#3 Probiotic, I touched on a paper published in the Obesity journal, this October 2015 titled:

Probiotic Supplementation Attenuates Increases in Body Mass and Fat Mass During High-Fat Diet in Healthy Young Adults

They concluded that:

VSL#3 supplementation appears to have provided some protection from body mass gain and fat accumulation in healthy young men consuming a High-fat and high-energy diet.

This of course made me curious.  Some questions that immediately popped into my mind included: How did they run this experiment?  … Read More