240 grams
Serving Size: 1 Level Teaspoon (approximately 4.0 grams)
Servings per container: Approximately 60



AUTOPHAGY: SCIENTIFIC CELL CLEANSING

Autophagy (‘self-eating’) is a catabolic (breakdown) process used by cells to degrade and remove some of their internal components deemed to be unnecessary or undesirable. Our cells are little factories of a sort, and as such they function under many of the same dynamic considerations: Things accumulate and byproducts are produced that can’t do anything, etc.

In cells these byproducts are usually some sort of misshapen protein that folded in some manner incomprehensible to the cell and hence not usable. This is not all that uncommon and many common chronic diseases are characterized by the production of proteins that did not fold properly. Much like having a rock in your shoe, having misfolded proteins in the secretory parts of the cell factory (an organelle called the endoplasmic reticulum) results in what is known as the 'unfolded protein response,' a cell-wide stress reaction to these weird proteins. Autophagy is the process by which the cell attempts to rid itself of these misshapen proteins.

In addition to acting as a type of cell cleansing mechanism, autophagy is a very old survival tool. Like a factory deprived of raw materials because of a transit strike, cells deprived of nutrients will scrounge around the workplace looking under tables and behind cabinets for surplus parts. When deprived of nutrients the cell will begin to breakdown parts of itself to keep going. Much of the time, this breakdown is a good thing, and perhaps explains why calorie restriction appears to increase lifespan: under those conditions the cell is munching away at itself, and since it is no fool, a lot of what it munches away at is junk best gotten rid of anyway.


TREHALOSE

Enhancing autophagy looks to be a winning strategy when it comes to neurodegenerative problems and maintaining healthy cognition. Slower aging is also associated with increased autophagy. One interesting agent with well-recognized effects on autophagy is the natural disaccharide sugar trehalose. Trehalose is found in many organisms, including bacteria, yeast, fungi, insects, invertebrates, and plants. However humans make very little to no trehalose. It functions to protect the integrity of the cell against various environmental stresses like heat, cold, desiccation, dehydration, and oxidation by preventing the disruption of the cell’s protein insides.

Trehalose prevents cells from dehydrating, a phenomena that disrupts much of the cell’s insides in way that are not reparable. Trehalose-treated cells seem to resist this because the trehalose ‘splints’ their inner organelles in place, so that when the cells get a chance to rehydrate they come back good-as-new. Dehydrated cells are common with aging, as the aging process tends to thin out the cell membrane, making it harder and harder for the cell to maintain its internal water balance.

Trehalose has been accepted as a novel food ingredient under the GRAS terms in the U.S. and the EU. Trehalose has also found commercial application as a food ingredient and now from D'Adamo Personalized Nutrition, it is available in dietary supplement form.

Trehalose Complex acts on multiple levels:

• May protect nerves from the destructive forces of aging and environmental toxicity.
• Stimulates the activity of your own neural stem cells
• Energizes your existing nerves to maximize their functional capacity.
• May improve the activity of the brain and nervous system.