#449 Matt Kaeberlein Unleashed: Rapamycin, Peptides, Protein, Supplements Q&A

Matt Kaeberlein (0:00)

It's a fact that some people don't like, that resveratrol is the most debunked longevity molecule ever. Resveratrol does not increase lifespan in laboratory animals on average. Right now, my confidence is 100% that you can improve your healthspan and likely your lifespan through lifestyle modifications.

Siim Land (0:21)

I traveled to Seattle to talk with Dr. Matt Kaeberlein, who's one of the world's leading biogerontologists and longevity researchers. He's been researching aging and lifespan for over 20 years. I asked Matt questions from my audience about different longevity protocols, supplements, and lifestyle. The first question is, so recently Bryan Johnson stopped taking Arabemisin. What are your thoughts about that?

Matt Kaeberlein (0:44)

Well, I mean, in general, my thought is that nobody should take health advice from Bryan Johnson. Really, I mean, he has no expertise and he's not scientific in my view. So broadly speaking, it's a mistake to change anything about your health based on anything Bryan Johnson says. Specifically with respect to Arabemisin, I mean, I think first of all, the honest answer is nobody knows whether Arabemisin slows aging in humans or whether or not there are going to be significant benefits from Arabemisin. I don't know. Bryan Johnson doesn't know. Nobody knows because we don't have randomized clinical trials yet. At least for disease prevention, health promotion, right? They're all limited to organ transplant patients or cancer patients, things like that. So nobody knows. Bryan Johnson's specific reasons, as I understand them, for stopping taking Arabemisin. So to his personal decision, he has every right to do whatever he wants with respect to his own health. But his rationale, as I understand it, from what I've seen in the public domain, is nonsense, right? So he's basing it on one study that used biological age assessments that don't work. And in that same study, they found that exercise and quality diet doesn't have a positive impact on biological age. So using that as a reason to stop taking Arabemisin, because Arabemisin also did not have a positive impact on biological ages is dumb, in my view. Like, it's nonsensical.

Now, you know, he's also said that some of his biomarkers may have been perturbed around lipids and glucose. That's possible. Those are side effects that are associated with Arabemisin at high doses in organ transplant patients. They have not come out as significantly associated with Arabemisin in people using the doses that he's reported to use or that have been used off label. So I find it unlikely, because we've looked and other people have looked, I find it unlikely that Arabemisin had that effect on his biomarkers, but it's possible. It's also, there's no way to know for sure, because he's doing like a hundred other things. So again, the idea that you can attribute that to Arabemisin is not rigorous and not scientific, which is one of the many reasons I say that he does not take a scientific approach to those kinds of things. So again, I'm not suggesting anybody take Arabemisin, but I also, if you are taking Arabemisin and you feel like it's benefiting you, I would not pay any attention to Bryan Johnson, would be my opinion.

Siim Land (3:19)

Yeah, I guess it's like experimental therapy for life extension. We don't know if it's going to work in humans. Obviously, it has been shown to work in animals, which would be, in my opinion, a greater degree of certainty that it would have effects in humans than the biological age clock in that which he saw.

Matt Kaeberlein (3:37)

Especially when the things we know work in humans didn't come out with a positive effect in that same study.

So again, obviously, I'm a little bit frustrated with the fact that this gets headlines and it's just not helpful for anyone, in my view. But having said that, you're right. We have no idea whether rapamycin increases lifespan in people. It does in laboratory animals and quite robustly. I think what we have learned is that at least some people see a reduction in chronic inflammation and at least anecdotally report benefits like reversal of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, reversal of autoimmune disease, in my own case, reversal of inflammation of the shoulder capsule, commonly known as frozen shoulder. So it hasn't risen to the level of randomized double blind placebo control clinical trials. It's more like a series of case reports. I do believe some people get benefits. I do believe some people experience side effects. The only side effect that seems, again, statistically significant is canker sores. About 15% of people using rapamycin off-label get canker sores. There may be a slight increase in risk of bacterial infection, although that hasn't risen to the level of statistical significance at this point.