Beyond Topicals: The Science of Skin Longevity ft. JUNG+ founder Simon Sakhai

30:07Next, I want to talk about hyaluronic acid, something that's come up before. So hyaluronic acid, a couple of ways that you can increase those levels. One, as we mentioned, keep those fibroblasts healthy, keep them replicating, but two, supplementing. So two things that you can supplement for with hyaluronic acid. One is hyaluronic acid. So you can take hyaluronic acid as a supplement, anywhere from like 50 to 100 to 150 milligrams a day. But then the other supplement that we really like is something called NAG, N-acetylglucosamine. And basically, NAG is a precursor of hyaluronic acid. And what you want to try to do is not only replace hyaluronic acid, but give your body the building blocks that will help it create more hyaluronic acid.

31:01So what you're doing is you're basically combining these building blocks with the improved fibroblast health, which will then make sure that you're optimizing the production of hyaluronic acid. It's a story with collagen. So I'm sure you guys have spoken about collagen at length. You know, obviously I'm not a fan of topical collagen. It just doesn't make sense. collagen is like really, really complex. It's actually the most abundant protein in your body. And because of that, there are many different types of collagen. So people have heard of type one, two, three, it's way more complicated than even that.

31:41And unfortunately, every different type of collagen requires a different lock and key, so to speak. So the collagen in your skin and the collagen in your nerves and the collagen in your eye and the collagen in your joints are completely, completely different. So one, you need to be making sure that you are taking a collagen that is specific to the outcome that you're looking to have. So there's a lot of collagen mixes out there that are just like general collagen and they say they're for skin, but it's really important to make sure that you have one that's been validated and shown to actually improve collagen synthesis in skin because there really is a huge complexity of different types of collagen.

32:33The other thing I'd say when it comes to collagen is that whole collagen just, just gets broken down as, as normal amino acids. It's almost just like taking protein powder. Yeah. I was going to say, like, I I'm like not a fan of that. Like there's so many supplements out there like, yeah, you know, we have collagen. It's like, it's not going to do anything. No, it's that same story of like eating eyeballs to improve eye health. It doesn't work like that. Yeah. The best strategy that we have right now, or what you've probably heard of collagen peptides. Yeah. Peptides are broken pieces of the broken pieces of collagen.

33:10And what happens is when you take that broken down collagen and your body sees pieces of it, it all of a sudden says, oh my God, my collagen is broken. I need to make more. And that's when you're stimulating the production of more collagen. So people might think when they're taking collagen peptides that they're just like replacing the collagen. That's actually not, that's not what's happening. That's not what we're trying to do. What we're trying to do is we're sending the right key to send the right message to those fibroblasts and the rest of your body to create more collagen. So we, we've used a version of a collagen peptide called Verisol.

33:49It's not the only one out there that's been proven for skin. There's like maybe two or three out there that I've seen that has the same level of clinical evidence, but it's our favorite. So we've included that collagen peptide into our formula. And then the last thing I'll talk about is DNA damage. DNA damage is another driver of aging and probably the biggest factor of DNA damage when it comes to your skin is sun. And I'm sure you have all heard about sun and, you know, skincare industry is always telling you, oh, don't forget your sunscreen. Oh, don't forget this product. Now, this is a controversial statement, but I think that it's a little, this is a kind, I need to word myself correctly because people get really angry about this.

34:43I think the skincare industry is looking for new ways to monetize. And, you know, there's only so much foundation or so much moisturizer, so many serums that you can put. So they're always trying to invent new categories. And I think sun cream may be one of them. Yeah. Fear mongering. It's fear mongering. It's a lot of fear mongering. You know, there's a statistic that came out recently where there were more, there were orders of magnitude, more deaths due to cancer that are probably associated or can be associated with a lack of vitamin D. Yeah. Than there were skin cancer. So what's happening is the skincare industry is telling people to walk around every day, put tons of more extra stuff on their face.

35:35Half the times, as we know, these sunscreens have chemicals in them. That's why everyone's like, oh, no, try the mineral or do this. No, I mean, like, we want to minimize the amount of stuff we put on our face. And at the end of the day, what that's also doing in like is blocking the sun. It's blocking, you know, the UV that helps our bodies create the vitamin D that we actually need. Now, I live in New York. I work a lot. So I'm in front of a screen all day. If I'm able to get 30 minutes out in the day of sunlight, I'm going to take every drop that I'm going to get. And, you know, what I hear often people showing off is saying, like, I wear sunscreen every day, no matter what.

36:19and I don't know if that's the best strategy. Now, look, there are caveats here. If you live in Australia, if you live under the hole in the ozone, please wear sunscreen every day. Exactly, yeah. Going on a beach holiday, if you're spending the whole day outdoors hiking, please wear sunscreen because we're not trying to burn. But we do want to allow the sun and the UV to do what our skin has evolved to do, which is to turn, to reset our circadian rhythm, you know, rebalance a lot of hormonal stuff that happens when we get UV rays, but also make that vitamin D. So question is, and the last thing about sunscreen that really annoys me is that like sunscreen is only going to work where you put it.

37:03And like, you know, it's just really on a practical level, annoying to get it to every single part of your body. So all of which is to say, have I got the solution for you? I almost sound like a used car salesman now, but there's a supplement that's unbelievable. And it's like my favorite supplement. It's the queen of supplements, astaxanthin. Astaxanthin does multiple things. And I'm going to start with the story of astaxanthin, which is really cute. So the reason that salmon are orange pink or flamingos are pink are because of astaxanthin. And astaxanthin is a carotenoid. And it starts in krill or algae.

37:44It starts in algae. And then the algae are eaten by the krill. The krill are eaten by either the salmon or the flamingos. And then everyone turns orange or pink. But that's important because what happens is that those carotenoids build up in your skin and they protect against sun damage. so they allow your skin to receive the uv and all of the things from the sun but they help prevent it from actual damage and it also works systemically right like i don't have to spread astaxanthin on my skin i just take it as a supplement it goes into my body and it goes to it gets ferried to where it needs to go and sorry there's one last thing i want to say sorry yeah inside out approaches.

38:32I think it's worth reminding, reminding people a little bit about evolutionary biology. Yeah. And how different organs, different organs evolved to do different things. So my, my ear, for example, evolved to listen. If I wanted to listen to, you know, a song, I wouldn't put my headphone on my toes, because my toes are not designed to take in sound. I think this whole thing about topical products, again, it's like, I think I find it crazy because it's like the skin was not designed to absorb nutrients. Yeah. Like it's literally designed for the opposite. It's designed to keep everything out. The only organ that's been designed to absorb nutrients is our stomachs, is our digestive system.

39:22over hundreds of millions of years, our stomachs have evolved as this place where nutrients arrive. There's then a decision that's made of where should the nutrients go? And then they get ferried there. That's how evolution wanted it to work. And then we've come and we've said, let's take all of these chemicals and fillers and this and that and slap it on our face and hope that it gets in. I mean, it's like a counterintuitive process. And astaxanthin is a great example of this. Like if it was sunscreen, you'd have to apply it. You'd have to worry about all the chemicals that are on it. You'd, you know, we're not even going to get into skin microbiome and like what all these topicals are doing to that.

40:04Microbiome is a factor of aging. It's another one of the hallmarks and why another reason why you should be very judicious with what you put on top of your skin. Whereas you take astaxanthin, you know, it's sort of like sunblock and a supplement and you have that built-in protection that allows, you know, your systemic system and all of your skin to benefit from that process. No, I love that you, I love that you did, you know, like I want to say deep dive, but I know you can go a lot deeper than that, you know, in terms of explaining the science. I love that you talked about this because I've always said this and I've said it many times on other episodes, if anyone remembers, is that I always look at topical products as like kind of like broth you know like when you do cell culture in a lab you put nutrients on top of cells to help them grow but in the case of topical products you're not even doing that you're just providing and I think you had brought this up Simon was this idea of moisture like the skincare industry is obsessed with moisturizing you know and I think that that's pretty much the extent of what you can do with topical ingredients and products because yeah the top layer is dead you know it's a dead layer of cells and at the end of the day it's very much like the comparison of the skin barrier to the blood brain barrier you know you don't want things to get across actually it's not like it's not a problem that we have to solve as humans it's no it's we have to solve the problem less wanting to solve the problem you know because it's meant to protect us like i think you've stressed that you know in various ways that it's really it's an organ but it's made to for protection because it does interact with our environment and all of these stressors out there and it has to make sure that whatever is underneath is protected so that's so important for consumers i think especially now when i look at the skincare space and i see nothing but you know i i say this a lot i say you know there's a lot of packaging out here and it is it's a lot of packaging you know there's not a lot of like depth to these products and really what they do from the health perspective.

42:09So I think for consumers, it's very important to understand these fundamentals that you explained, you know, really, really important. But I want to actually I want to circle back because I know you had brought up NAD. And I really want to talk more about NAD. I think NAD has become a huge buzzword, especially in the longevity space. I mean, you know, for all of our listeners out there, you know, some of you might be familiar with it. For those of you who are not, I would love for you, Simon, to explain to us what is NAD and why is it so essential for skin and also systemic health? So yeah, NAD is a great case study to bring together everything that we've talked about.

42:46First of all, thing to remember with NAD is that it's a factor of aging. So it's one of 12, maybe more things. So just solving NAD won't stop aging. And you, of course, you see a lot of even, you know, companies that call themselves longevity companies or longevity products saying, you know, take this NAD thing. But it's not enough. That's not the portfolio approach. Like when you're thinking about what is longevity as a field trying to solve, what is a longevity doctor trying to solve, it's part of a bigger package. That's the first thing I'd say in NAD. Second thing I'd say about NAD, it's a great case study to look at how we solve for an endpoint and what that means in terms of your body.

43:29So NAD is part of a process of energy production, and that process has many layers. And oftentimes in science, it's not clear whether it's the end product that is the benefit or a mechanism that's happening through the end that gets to the end product that is the benefit. or even if we know that the end product is beneficial, whether just supplementing or replacing for the end product is actually the thing that's going to help. Let me explain what I mean by that. So you've heard of NAD and you've also probably heard of things that are called molecules that are called NMN, NR, niacin, niacinamide.

44:21I've mentioned one of these. It becomes really confusing because NAD is three letters, NMN is three letters, and then people are like, oh, well, they're the same thing. They're not. You have precursors, so molecules that you can take that help the body produce more of something, and then you have the end product, which in this case is NAD. So one of the things I'm seeing a lot right now is NAD products. And, you know, I think it's just weird because like, you know, we know that for various reasons that just supplementing for NAD doesn't really doesn't really work. We need these precursors. So the first issue really is that NAD is a very, very unstable molecule.

45:08You know, as soon as it's produced, it sort of unravels and it's not NAD anymore. It doesn't do its things. So you have this issue where I'm seeing a lot of either NAD supplements or NAD topicals where it's just the end product. And like we know this, the science is clear, like just supplementing for NAD doesn't really work. You know, oftentimes it's an issue of absorption. It doesn't really help increase NAD levels. You really, really need these precursors. So the first thing that I would say is don't just use an NAD product. Focus on a product that's using a precursor strategy. And really the best precursor strategy that we know of based on longevity science are these B3 vitamins, which are either NMN and are niacin or niacinamide.

46:07That's really the four. You know, choose your pick. Now, the other thing that's really interesting is you've probably heard of NAD drips. And if I'm shot tomorrow. Let's hope not. like if my body is found like you know like like falling off the the 15th floor of a balcony like someone in the longevity industry is trying to silence me um basically like like these iv drips these nad iv drips have become huge now everyone has a different perspective take what i say with a grain of salt because it's just a little old me talking but there's sort of two issues with nad drips. The first is the first one I mentioned, the lack of stability of NAD.

46:56In order to make sure that the NAD molecule is still stable, it needs to be in like a perfectly temperature controlled environment from the moment it's produced to the moment it arrives at the place to the moment it ends up going into your body. You know, I'm not an expert on NAD stability and what that process has to look like. But I do know that it's incredibly complex. And I don't know if anyone's necessarily testing the levels of NAD before they hook that IV up and putting it into your body. They just want to collect their 150 bucks. They've got a technician that's making minimum wage oftentimes just to put the needle into your thing.

47:41I think that there's a lot of hype riding on that. The second thing and probably more interesting thing is a study that I saw about what happens where the NAD ends up once it goes into an IV. And, you know, you might say that, oh, Simon, like if you put in an IV and it goes into your bloodstream, it's going directly into your blood. So we got it through the skin. So that's great, right? Well, actually, you know, there was a study that was done. And again, this is just one study. And they saw that while NAD IV drips can increase NAD levels in your blood or in your plasma, something called extracellular outside the cell, what they failed to do or what they didn't see was intracellular inside the cell increase in NAD levels.

48:36And that's really where you need the NAD. Yeah, that's the whole purpose. That's the whole purpose. And that comes back to this idea of why we need to go with the precursor strategy and why we need to follow the body's natural. Sometimes we need to follow the body's natural mechanisms. We need to insert ourselves in a way that gives the right ingredient at the right time in the right place so that it ends up making NAD increases in cells. And right now, what seems to be the best method is to take a precursor, let that land in your stomach, and then let that go through the digestion process. And then the body will actually make sure it goes to the right place, which, you know, in this case is inside the cells.

49:23But this was just based on one study. More research needs to come out. You know, I might be wrong, but, you know, This is my hot take on NAD and IV drips and also top. No, I love it. I really love it. And I think you're so like, I love what you're saying because there's such a thing as redox reactions, you know, and there's the instability of NAD plus for everyone listening, just to add to what Simon said, the plus that you see at the end of the word, the letters, NAD, it just means that there's, it's dealing with electrons, like the exchanging of electrons. So what happens is like NAD will turn to NADH.

50:00And so, you know, what the reason it's so unstable is because it's a very reactive molecule when you have it in that state. And so the likelihood of it doing anything for your body on a cellular level is very slim to none. If you don't have it in a form, what you're saying, Simon, which is like, you know, you need some sort of a precursor to actually form the, you know, form it within a cell. I completely understand that from a scientific perspective because it's simple chemistry, really. So that is something consumers need to be aware of and understand because there's hundreds of supplements out here that are promoting NAD.

50:34I think just the other day I was on TikTok and someone was – many influencers right now are just like pushing out these random companies that are making NAD supplements. And I'm just like banging my head against the wall like, please stop. So it's very, very interesting. but I know you guys have a different approach though Simon I mean you know what what is your approach like what makes it different the way you guys are doing it so I you know I think that like aside from taking the inside out approach you know the other thing that we're really really big on is lifestyle you know what also kills me like literally I cry when I see this you see a supplement company and they're like you know here's this pill and it does you know it'll grow all your hair back It'll make you grow six inches taller and it'll make you lose 100 pounds.

51:23And then in fine print, it'll say, but it's not as effective as a healthy lifestyle. Like that pisses me off because it's like, why would you bother making a product if you're not going to make the best product and you know what's better out there? Like don't make crap products. And, you know, fundamentally, when it comes to longevity, you know, and this new framework, we're thinking about systemic health. We're also thinking about lifestyle and how your health interacts with your lifestyle. is a is is what is one of the factors that we're missing with our let's say old version of health care that was very reactive that wait waited until you're sick you went to a doctor and they never asked how's your sleep what are you eating i mean basic things like like sleep drives every single one of your you know like cognitive or physiological processes they're just not addressing that, right?

52:15So lifestyle plays a huge role. It also plays a huge role in skin. So, you know, as part of our system, we've created this Build-A-Kit program. And what we've basically done is we've taken these molecules that have all the evidence that you could possibly want, but we've divided them into like this program that helps you design a lifestyle strategy. So rather than just taking molecules for no reason, you're really focusing them on the goals or the lifestyle behaviors that you are engaged in. So if you're doing intermittent fasting, well, you should probably take these molecules instead of those.

52:53If you're doing low carb, well, then you should probably do these things instead of those. If you're focusing on your sleep optimization and you're trying to improve that, well, then you should probably focus on these and take these instead of those. And this is like, you know, something that bothers me about like what a lot of companies do, but also sometimes a lot of people do, which is they take a spray and pray approach. They say, I'm going to try everything. And, you know, I'm just going to hope that it works. And you listen to a podcast like this and I tell you a million different things in a million different directions and you want to do it all.

53:27And I'm sorry. And I'm part of the problem, too. too. But you really need to think more carefully. So to make it more specific to skin, I'm going to give a little bit of advice that relates to our products and also how they can help with skin. And when I say products, I really mean like our recommendations on what you should be focusing on for your health. So I already talked about sun. That's a big lifestyle behavior. I've given you my caveats on that. The next two I want to talk about are sugar and sleep. So people intuitively will understand that your diet affects your health. When it comes to sleep, this is especially, sorry, when it comes to skin, this is especially true.

54:13Now, one of the major issues with our modern Western diets is the amount of sugars and carbohydrates. It is insane. It is completely abnormal to the whole of human history and also the rest of the world. Like the crazy thing is like, if you look at human remains, the teeth of human remains, before we started refining sugar, they were perfect. Now you look at human remains, you see someone who died in their old age, they have no teeth. So sugar is killing us. But what's especially it's aside from just skillet killing us. And everyone is like, okay, well, I know that it's bad for my health. A skin aging, a huge factor in skin aging is the acceleration of these, these things called AGEs that cross link with the elastin in your skin and are made by having high blood sugar levels.

55:18So let me break that down. Basically, every time you have a blood glucose spike and you have lots of sugar or you have a bowl of pasta or a pizza and your body is flooded with all of this sugar and this glucose. And by the way, glucose is carbs, but it's also sugars. It's the same thing. It's also the same in fruit. Fruit can be evil. It's all the same thing. And what happens is your body needs to do something about it. And oftentimes, because we're eating a lot more than we need because of our modern diets, the body has these sort of mechanisms of figuring out how to store and get rid of all of this glucose from your bloodstream.

56:00One of those things that it does is it creates AGEs, advanced glycation end products. These are one of the things that happens when you have too much glucose. And these are one of the things that cause wrinkles because they cross-link the elastin. The elastin are these long strips that connect your skin layers and fill out the layer of collagen and hyaluronic acid. and they're what make your skin elastic, basically. So if there's lots of them and they're not tangled, your skin is elastic. If there's few of them and they're all tangled up, your skin is inelastic. That's how wrinkles happen. So number one, cut sugar, try a low carb diet.

56:43And we have a product called a glucose blocker. And this is a specific protocol for people who are trying to go low carb. It's a product that you take with meals when you're having a cheat meal or you have the inevitable pasta or whatever, you basically pick the meal in your day that is going to have the most carbs or sugars. You take this with it and it helps mitigate a part of the effects. So it's sort of a cheat for your cheat meals. And it's got like lots of great longevity ingredients that do other things, but specifically related to this insulin response. The next thing I want to talk about is sleep.

57:19You know, probably something to end with because it's what I began with. You know, sleep is literally nature's longevity miracle, right? Like we talk about longevity and anti-aging as if it's something we're just discovering. Your body does it every night. when you sleep is when your body is literally repairing damage, rejuvenating cells, clearing out, you know, broken proteins. And let me be clear, that is a reversal of factors of aging. That is a literal age reversal that's happening while you sleep. Now, you just said you get bad sleep, you know, this is the perfect example. We've got a leader in the science of skincare space who knows everything about skincare and who's doing the best of the best, right?

58:19Like, I'm sure your listeners would like kill to have the knowledge and ability and access that you do when it comes to sleep. Sorry, when it comes to skincare. And yet here you are. Yeah, not sleeping, not sleeping. Like, that's just crazy. That's crazy. So, you know, focusing on your sleep is really important. And there's a whole strategy behind getting high performance sleep. There is, and I'm not talking about insomnia. I'm not talking about people who have issues falling asleep. I'm not talking about people who have restless leg syndrome. I'm talking about making sure that when you sleep, you are increasing the amount of slow wave phases, or there are different, there's a whole sleep architecture, but basically the times that your sleep is able to get into those repair mechanisms.

59:06And that's, we have a whole sleep protocol for that. And that's a, that is, I'm not going to get into it, but it's an entire product with, that gives your body the building blocks to help that regeneration process and to rebuild things like collagen or tissues. Like really, if you want to think about how can you regenerate, you really need to think about like tissue repair. High level, I would just say at night, Make sure you're taking zinc, magnesium, and B6 because those three together are really important factors that help support like wound repair and healing. Glycine is a really great one you've probably heard and skincare is a supplement, but also really great for sleep specifically for supporting those regenerative processes at night.

59:51This is where we start getting into the question of like what to take when. Yeah. So lots of supplements you can take whenever, but if you want a specific outcome, you're going to want to take them at a certain time. So, you know, take a look at our advanced sleep repair protocol. A lot of those supplements you've probably seen elsewhere, like things like magnesium, zinc, B6, tart cherry, glycine. If you want to improve your sleep and you want to enhance the regenerative mechanisms that can support younger skin, you're going to want to take those before you go to bed. so that they're there when those critical repair processes are happening.

1:00:30Interesting. Now that's really interesting because I think with sleep, we just, I don't know, there's so little information out there about sleep as it ties to just overall health, I think. I mean, I know that we all know you need to sleep to be healthy, but no one really discusses in depth, I feel like, with what it does and how sleep actually repairs your body. I mean, It's very, very interesting that you brought that up. And thank you for listing some ingredients off because I know that there's just not enough education about it. I certainly don't see it from my perspective. Well, all of that's changing, right?

1:01:07I think what's really exciting about this moment of time is that we're going from a top-down healthcare system to a bottom-up. Yeah. And a bottom-up healthcare system is when you have more educated consumers that are demanding more from the companies that are providing their services. I love that. I feel like everyone listening demand more, you know, like genuinely demand more. Yeah, I completely agree, Simon. I think that it's time for change, you know, in that regard. So I really hope it reflects in the next years to come, the next decade to come, you know, that we get more knowledge around these topics.

1:01:48You know, and speaking of sleep, something that really comes to mind, and, you know, I know you had spoken a little bit about the microbiome earlier, is this concept of inflama aging. And I really want to talk about inflammation and immunity and all of those things and their relation to longevity. If you could kind of give us a little understanding there and explain how it impacts our skin overall. Yeah, I mean, chronic inflammation is like oxygen. It's everywhere. And it's one of these things that gets talked about a lot. And like when you see a health company or you see a supplement company, they'll throw that around everywhere, partially because it literally is like oxygen.

1:02:30I would say it's something that people, if they're living a healthy lifestyle, they shouldn't really worry about it. But it is an important part of these processes, and they're all interlinked. So in the example of senescent cells, I know we talked about that a lot. one of the things that ends up happening when you have lots of senescent cells, it causes more inflammation, causes an inflammatory response. And then vice versa, when you have an inflammatory response, your body's not able to react properly to oxidative stress, it's not able to clear those senescent cells. So chronic inflammation is one of these things that cuts through every part of your body in every process.

1:03:15And, you know, the kind of thing I would impress upon all of you is to live a healthy lifestyle. There are supplements that can support, you know, that can help with chronic inflammation. The good news is, is that like what we see with a lot of the supplements we normally talk about, you know, most supplements seem, you know, most supplements that have evidence that they improve their health also have a positive effect on inflammatory levels and the likelihood is because those two are interlinked. It's like no surprise that every time we find a good supplement, it like relates to inflammation levels.

1:03:52So if you're already living a healthy lifestyle and if you're already taking supplements, I wouldn't actually, you know, say that you need to think about it too much. You know, I think a lot of what I'm seeing, especially is we're doing a lot of like biomarker testing with our community and the types of people that we work with, and I'm reviewing their numbers, and I'm seeing C-reactive proteins and what their inflammation levels are like in their body. One of the interesting things I'm seeing is that it's not really the big problem that you might think it is, but it doesn't mean it's not a big problem for everyone.

1:04:32It's probably not a big problem if you're already taking good care of yourself. And this is another thing to think about and something I say a lot. But like, you know, and I say it in terms of weight loss, like there are people that are, you know, 500 pounds and need to get down to 300 pounds. And then there are people with a six pack and they want to get down to an eight pack. And sometimes getting down from a six pack to an eight pack is harder than going from 500 to 300 pounds. Absolutely. Yeah. And I think probably like, you know, inflammation is one of those things that like if you're leading a healthy lifestyle, you know, you're doing all of these things, taking all these supplements.

1:05:12I wouldn't make it like the primary the primary factor. OK, yeah, that's good to know, though, because I feel like it's become another big buzzword is this whole idea of like inflammation and inflammasome and skin inflammasome. And you know what I mean? Like it's just everywhere these days. No, it is. And there are ways that you trigger it, you know, like using loads of topical products. Yeah. But it's the wrong things. Like it's going to trigger it. So it comes down to like what choices are you making? Same with microbiome. You mentioned that. So your body has a microbiome everywhere. Of course, we know about the one in the gut.

1:05:46The one in the skin, we're still learning about it. It's huge. There are more foreign cells in our body than there are human cells. So they play a huge role in how we function. And again, all these things are interconnected, right? When we mess with the skin microbiome, I bet you, I don't have a study in front of me, I could bet you my entire life savings that we compromise the skin microbiome, the signaling responses, the barrier is not working properly, more toxins are getting in. What happens? Inflammation, right? Yeah. So, yeah. Yeah. No, I agree. I completely agree. I think it is kind of like this vicious cycle we're in.

1:06:29We're trying to fix a problem that doesn't really exist. And I just don't understand why there are so many efforts geared at, you know, basically penetrating the skin barrier in order to fix inflammation. It doesn't even make sense when I look at it. And I've seen it many, many times. And, you know, speaking of the microbiome, I've done my own research with the microbiome. And I can tell you guys one thing for everyone listening. It's not going to help if you keep messing with it with all these different products. You know, those microbes, they existed long before skincare existed. and they're going to continue to exist.

1:07:02And the more we mess with them, the more likely we're going to mutate them and actually cause problems. Oh my God. I don't want to go off piste here. Yeah. You know, we know more about the surface of the moon that we know about our microbiome. Yes, exactly. What I'm seeing a lot now is a lot of companies that are making probiotic products and every company is saying, no, we have the perfect strain. And the truth is, is that we don't know what the right ecosystem is, right? Like, if you look at how ecosystems work in nature, I don't know how people are familiar with, like, with the history of Australia and, like, the natural history of Australia, but, like, basically, Australia was, like, not connected to the rest of the world for a very long time.

1:07:46It was very far from the rest of the world, and it developed its own unique ecosystem. What happened was, you know, the Western world started colonizing it, and without realizing it, accidentally introduced what seemed like really inconsequential species. So they introduced things like frogs and rabbits, like certain types of frogs and rabbits. And these small introductions have utterly decimated and completely ruined huge parts of an entire continent's ecosystem because we didn't realize it at the time, but we were completely messing things up. And I think, you know, we're gonna, I think we're gonna look back on, you know, this, this journey we're taking right now with our microbiome, and probably there's going to be some similar things.

1:08:33I don't, I only take probiotic products when I'm taking an antibiotic, if I absolutely have to. Yes, exactly. Yeah. What I like much more, we don't have a microbiome product, but if we did, we would do a prebiotic product. I'm a big fan of prebiotics because what a prebiotic is, is basically food for the microbiome. So what you're saying is rather than introduce new strains, we're going to let, you know, whatever your natural thing is take its course. And and we're going to feed it, you know, and we're going to try to feed that beneficial bacteria. Of course, this doesn't mean that you can't have imbalances and it can't mean that there's something wrong with your microbiome.

1:09:17But, you know, what I'd say on that front is like caveat emptor. Like, I see lots of promising stuff. And I do know that there are some amazing doctors out there that like live this. And they they they've been working with patients just on their guts for like decades and have a lot of firsthand experience that doesn't even exist in, you know, in a research setting because they're they're living it. So not to say that it can't exist, but just caveat emptor, you know, like, yeah, it's something that we're still figuring out. 100 % I couldn't agree with you more I think that that's something that we have to keep in mind as consumers is that you know these things sound very like pro-health and very like you're being very proactive and also even preventative in your efforts but a lot of times it can do more damage than good but I mean coming back though Simon I want to come back to just you know what you've done here because I really love what you've built you know with young longevity I think that the whole concept of creating something that is really a holistic approach to health.

1:10:22I mean, that is really, I think, the future of every type of science. I mean, not to say aging, but really everything. Whenever you look at, whenever I look at science, I always think of like, you know, you have to have different angles that you're approaching one problem from, you know, and I feel like that's what you guys are doing. And I would love for you to offer some practical advice for those who are listening who want to start improving their skin health, They want to see real results. What are, for example, what are three lifestyle changes or any habits that can they can adopt and also reduce the impact of the the 12 drivers of aging, as you discussed?

1:10:58Oh, gosh, there's so many more than three. Let me just I'll try to narrow it down for us. The first thing I'd say is always think about things in terms of a portfolio approach. Aging or skin is a complex process. And I don't want to make your life more complicated. But when you're trying to solve for these things, avoid silver bullet solutions. Listen, I love companies like The Ordinary. I actually think what they've done is amazing. I love this whole idea of democratizing individual ingredients and helping you build your own thing. I think that's great. But in order to do that, it comes with a big responsibility.

1:11:44If you're going to be making your own protocols, you really need to make sure that you're covering all of your bases, which is part of why we've done what we've done is because we've made pre-made protocols. We have these different categories. We have skin. We have sleep. We have fasting. We have glucose. We're launching a strength product. We have a foundational product. look, we've done all of the heavy lifting in creating that portfolio where we've looked at all of the hallmarks, we've looked at all of the mechanisms and we've tried to solve for them. So rather than taking one or two ingredients, you're applying a strategy.

1:12:17That's the first thing I'd say. Second thing I'd say, try to cut the topicals. And of course, me, we have a supplement company. So of course, I'm going to say that. But really, there's a reason that we're a longevity slash anti-aging brand and we don't have a topical product. It's not do as I say, it's do as I do, and we're doing what we believe. So yeah, be really cautious. There are some great topical ingredients out there. You know, things like vitamin C, I'm a big fan of. You know, use a vitamin C serum. You know, vitamin C is a molecule, super tiny. It'll pass through. But again, you're only covering where you touch.

1:13:01Skin is a big organ. So, yeah. Yeah. Next, like, look at your lifestyle. Like, what are you eating? You know, are you eating lots of sugars? Don't do all of this work on your skin. And then, you know. Eat McDonald's. Eat McDonald's or have ice cream every night. You know, like Donald's going to cause systemic inflammation, like a big ice cream is going to cause a glucose spike. And those glucose spikes, though, the damage of the AGEs are irreversible, by the way. So there's a lot of stuff that we've figured out how to reverse, like clearing senescent cells, you know, repairing cell damage. Things like AGEs that we can't remove them.

1:13:36We can slow them down. Like in our products, we've created strategies that help mitigate that. But yeah, the sugar is really a big thing. And I would say, like, really look at your diet specifically around sugar. You know, fasting is another big thing that people can try. I would say fasting is more you need to be really careful, especially for women. I would say fasting does a lot of things to your hormones, depending where you're at with your cycle or, you know, where you're at with your age. You might decide that fasting is right for you or fasting is not right for you. But all of which is to say, if you did want to try fasting, intermittent fasting, or calorie restriction, I mean, these are things that have been like, proven, they're two separate things, calorie restriction, intermittent fasting, to either slow aging on various like aging tests, like calories, it has been shown to like actually slow aging in humans, or things like intermittent fasting, it stimulates something called autophagy, which helps renew and clear out, you know, dead cells and bad cells.

1:14:41and broken proteins and stuff like that. And that's where you're going to get those rejuvenated aspects. So, you know, you could try things like that and sleep, you know, get good sleep and exercise. I guess in a lot of ways, like, you know, when I list these out and I list this to myself, it's not rocket science. You kind of got to pick a lane. You got to say, okay, I am going to actually do something about sleep. I'm actually going to do something about, you know, my blood sugar. And what I also say, probably like, you know, some little lifestyle advice. All of these things are good for you.

1:15:11like yeah all of them are good for you and unfortunately you're not going to be able to do them all properly that's just a fact they're always asking me simon like what's the best thing i can do for my longevity what's the best thing i can do for my skin and like the truth of that answer is the best thing that you can do is not this or that because they're all good they all do different things but they're all good the best thing that you could do is the thing that you actually enjoy doing and you're willing to commit to for the long term. And that's really the key. Like there's a lot of like, you know, self-discovery you need to do when starting one of these routines before you even start them and be like, am I really going to be able to commit to this?

1:15:52You know, do I really love sugar too much or am I too hungry in the mornings or like is my schedule too all over the place to really commit to one of those routines? Well, if it is, try one of the other ones that you care more about. And then I promise you, your results will be exponential, because you're doing something that you love, and it doesn't feel like work. And when we're talking about longevity, this is a long term strategy, you know, and I'm sorry to say that you have to do this for the rest of your life. You don't do this for weeks. And then you're suddenly like, you know, the 20 year old version of you, this is something that you're like, this is now part of my life and something that I'm willing to commit to for, you know, the next several decades.

1:16:33Yeah, I mean, it's a it's a true commitment. I mean, I think that's the that's the hallmark of this is that, you know, if you want it to work, it will work. But you have you have to stick to it. You know, you can't just do it for five days. And then be like, why am I not looking 10 years younger than I was yesterday? Like, it's, it's just not. And I think that's honestly, I mean, I'm glad you said that, because there's a lot of, you know, in medicine, they call it managing expectations of patients and I feel like in the OTC space we just don't see that you know we don't see a lot of brands taking ownership of this idea that you know what I have to be very careful with my marketing because there's a lot of people out here who are looking at longevity science right now and they're thinking oh this is going to actually make me younger you know like this is going to make me like I don't know I don't know what they're thinking but it's not the correct way to approach it is my point.

1:17:26You know, so I think that that's very important that you said that in terms of like knowing what to expect, you know, and sticking to a plan. It's very, very important. I would love for you to offer some advice though, in terms of if anyone wants to dive into the Young Longevity products, where can they start in terms of seeing the optimal results? You know, what is a good starting place? Okay. So the way that we've designed our system is we've got a master formula and this is the master formula. You know, everyone should really be taking it. It drives, it targets all 12 high drivers of aging with the best in class ingredients.

1:18:01It's, it's a, there's actually two formulas in it. One for morning, one for night, where we separated the ingredients based on what's happening in your internal biology, making sure that the right ingredients get, gets administered at the right time with the right dose for it to do the thing that we want to do. And then there's our boosters. And our boosters are where you can carve out like your own longevity path. So if skin is really what you care about, then you should probably take the cellular skin renewal protocol. If sleep is the thing that you really care about, do the sleep one. You can also combine them.

1:18:33Everything has been designed to work together. So if you go on our website, you can sort of see how you can build that kit for yourself and build that lifestyle for yourself. The next tip that I'd give is to say, you don't need to take our products. You can, you know, one of the things that we really care deeply about is this idea of longevity for the billions, not just for the billionaires. Because of that, we've been extremely transparent. I don't think there's any website or consumer product that has more published research and more details about the mechanisms and the science and the studies about each ingredient and how it works and what it does.

1:19:13And the reason we did that was because we didn't just want to sell products. We wanted to sell protocols and advice on what you could be doing yourself. So you can go through your website, go through our website. Our product pages are insanely long. I apologize in advance. But we have a lot of resources there. We talk about how each molecule targets each hallmark of aging and what each mechanism is doing. We go through each ingredient one by one. We talk about the synergies between them. We highlight individual really interesting studies and give a summary of some of the key studies that have come out about individual ingredients or synergies of ingredients.

1:19:52And then at the very end, we have all of our references. So if you read through our entire product page, every time we make a claim, every time we say something does something, there's a little number next to it. And then all the way at the bottom, there's a list of references. Sometimes we have like 150 or 200 references for each product where you can find that number, click on the link, and then go to the study itself and make your own mind up about whether you're happy with it. So you can go and Frankenstein your own protocol and ways of doing things. And really like the way that I see it, like our products are just ways of making them more convenient and cheaper.

1:20:35Because if you were trying to like buy all of these ingredients individually at the level of quality and at the therapeutic dose that you needed to, it would end up costing you like three, four, five times more. And it would just be really annoying. You'd have to like, you know, have like 10 pills sometimes for some of our things or 12 pills taken at different times of day. So really, you know, build your own perspective. You guys are you guys are smarter about your own health and your own needs than I ever will be, or that any brand owner ever will be. The power is in your hands and go on our website and learn what you can.

1:21:11If you ever have any questions, my favorite, favorite thing to do is to answer customer service requests. Oh, yeah. I love that. No, no. Genuinely, I just think it's the most magical thing when I spend all of this time dealing with researchers and manufacturing and this and that, like, you know, but when I get to like talk to an actual customer and like ask them, you know, what are you thinking or what are your concerns? Like, it's the best part of my day. So shoot us an email. You know, I'm more likely than not going to read that email and either I'll get back to you or someone from my team will get back to you.

1:21:48And we're always here. We love it. So where can we find you? Where can we find the brand? so it's forever young j-u-n-g dot co so forever young.co so young is obviously j-u-n-g is a play on words so the german word for young is j-u-n-g young but it's also after carl young so i was wondering i was wondering he said he so carl young's really interesting because he famously had a midlife crisis. And then some of his best work came out of his midlife crisis. And midlife crises are famously moments where we reckon with our mortality. It's the moment we enter into our 30s or 40s and we suddenly realize, oh my God, I'm deteriorating.

1:22:39And this party is not going to last. I'm not as beautiful as I was. I'm not as energetic as I was. And you have this whole crisis. So I whatever you want to do. So he did a lot of studying around this and like what it means. And he came out with this amazing quote and he said, life begins at 40. Up until then, you're just doing research. When you're thinking about what's really happening with longevity science, like, yes, the biology and the science is very interesting. But what we're really talking about is the opportunity to reframe our understanding of our future and of getting older as getting better.

1:23:24Not clinging on, but like, wow, the best is yet to come. And I've planted all of these incredible seeds in the past 30, 40 years, and now I really get to do something about them. And your biology is your tool for that. So yeah, it's called Young, Young Longevity, foreveryoung.co. And, you know, our hope is really to make sure that you guys feel that you have all the tools and resources to be excited about the future and to really think about aging, not as this scary process, but to say, hey, I can be in the driver's seat and I can be doing everything that I can to slow that process down. I love it.

1:24:02And I want to thank you so much for this incredible deep dive into truly the science of skin aging and all of the innovative solutions you're bringing to the table. I know that longevity science right now, like I said in the beginning, it's a very hot field and there's a lot to know and there's a lot of knowledge to gain. And the fact that you guys have such a comprehensive website, you have so many resources available for consumers to really sift through. I really applaud you for that. And just the way you're building this brand and bringing this to the masses. I mean, it's amazing. So thank you for doing what you're doing.

1:24:36I know that this is going to obviously make an impact on all of your consumers and your customers, but also for anyone in the future that wants to go into longevity. You know, it's important for us to I strongly believe that, you know, as scientists, you have to pave the road for whoever comes next. I really see that with, you know, what you're doing with Young Longevity. So thank you so much for your work. Thank you. Coming coming from you, that means so much. No, it's really it's truly from the heart. I really believe in in good science. And, you know, I I can't tell you how many times I've seen science go wrong in this space.

1:25:09You know what I mean? And it's like, I feel like sometimes people don't have that. I don't want to say moral ethical compass in the right place. Without saying it, I'm going to say it because I think that that's important to acknowledge when a brand has put so much thought and true innovation into something. And that's exactly what you've done. So thank you for your work. Thank you, Hector. That means a lot. And thank you so much for having me today on the podcast. What a special opportunity to talk about one of my favorite topics, the intersection of longevity and skincare. here yeah no thank you for your time and for everyone listening definitely definitely check out the brand I highly recommend it if you are not you know familiar with longevity science you don't know where to begin this is the brand for you you have to check out the website look at all the wonderful literature on there read up about things and really dive in guys you know I think that's one of the biggest messages that I would send to you is that science is for everybody we're all scientists and the more information you can gather for yourselves the more informed decisions you're going to make and i really think that there are truly brands out here that are trying to give you those options and this is definitely one of them so check them out let us know what you think definitely tune in for all of our other episodes and if you haven't subscribed already please subscribe to us on spotify apple podcast or wherever it is that you tune in and we will be back next time thank you so much thank you simon thank you hey guys so i hope you love that episode please make sure to hit subscribe if you're tuning in to us on any podcast platform we are available on so many different platforms so wherever it is that you're tuning in just go hit subscribe you will be immediately notified when we publish new episodes this way you're able to tune in to amazing insights from experts brand founders industry leaders authors all the wonderful people that we host and that's very important for me because i love to hear from you guys and really understand what you love and what you want to hear more of.

1:27:07Also make sure to give us a follow on all of our social media outlets. We're available on Instagram, TikTok, X, you name it, we're there. We also have a blog on Medium. So if you're a reader and you love Medium blogs, check us out on Medium. We publish some really great articles on there that do deeper dives than just what's available on the podcast. And it's really a great place for all of you science geeks out there that want to learn a little bit more. We go above and beyond with our research and make sure we're bringing you information that you usually probably won't hear about in other outlets.

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