Timing Your Light, Food, & Exercise for Optimal Sleep, Energy & Mood | Dr. Samer Hattar

**Andrew D. Huberman** (0:00)
welcome to the Huberman Lab podcast, where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life.
I'm Andrew Huberman, and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today, I have the pleasure of introducing Dr. Samer Hattar as my guest on the Huberman Lab podcast. Dr. Hattar is the chief of the Section on Light and Circadian Rhythms at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Hattar has many important discoveries to his name. He was one of a handful of groups that discovered the light sensing neurons in the eye that set the circadian clock. This is a fundamental discovery made in the early 2000s that has led to an enormous number of additional discoveries on how light regulates our sleep, our immune system, our mood, mental health, metabolism, feeding, and many other important processes. If ever there was somebody who understands how all of these processes interact and can inform best practices for our daily behaviors, it's Dr. Hattar. During our discussion today, Dr. Hattar answers questions that are absolutely essential for us to know about our health and wellbeing. For instance, how to align our sleep schedule with our activity schedule, such as exercise, and how to align light, activity, and exercise with our feeding rhythms. He presents a new model of how light, activity, and feeding rhythms converge to support optimal health. And when those are not aligned correctly, how our mental and physical health can suffer. It's a discussion that is rich with scientific mechanism, made clearly, of course, so everybody can understand, as well as specific protocols to deal with shifts in day length, shifts in activity, and in order to optimize sleep, metabolism, and wellbeing of various kinds. I learned so much from Samer, as I always do. He is an absolute wealth of knowledge on all things related to light and circadian rhythms, physiology, and neuroscience. I don't think you'll find anyone else as knowledgeable about these topics as Samer. And so I'm delighted that he joined us here on the podcast to share this information. Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford. It is, however, part of my desire and effort to bring zero cost to consumer information about science and science related tools to the general public. In keeping with that theme, I'd like to thank the sponsors of today's podcast. Our first sponsor is Athletic Greens. Athletic Greens is an all-in-one vitamin mineral probiotic drink. I've been taking Athletic Greens since 2012, so I'm delighted that they're sponsoring the podcast. The reason I started taking Athletic Greens and the reason I still take Athletic Greens once or twice a day is that it helps me cover all of my basic nutritional needs. It makes up for any deficiencies that I might have. In addition, it has probiotics, which are vital for microbiome health. I've done a couple of episodes now on the so-called gut microbiome and the ways in which the microbiome interacts with your immune system, with your brain to regulate mood, and essentially with every biological system relevant to health throughout your brain and body. With Athletic Greens, I get the vitamins I need, the minerals I need, and the probiotics to support my microbiome. If you'd like to try Athletic Greens, you can go to athleticgreens.com/huberman and claim a special offer. They'll give you five free travel packs plus a year's supply of vitamin D3K2. There are a ton of data now showing that vitamin D3 is essential for various aspects of our brain and body health. Even if we're getting a lot of sunshine, many of us are still deficient in vitamin D3. And K2 is also important because it regulates things like cardiovascular function, calcium in the body, and so on. Again, go to athleticgreens.com/huberman to claim the special offer of the five free travel packs and the year supply of vitamin D3 K2. Today's episode is also brought to us by Element. Element is an electrolyte drink that has everything you need and nothing you don't. That means the exact ratios of electrolytes are in Element, and those are sodium, magnesium, and potassium, but it has no sugar. I've talked many times before on this podcast about the key role of hydration and electrolytes for nerve cell function, neuron function, as well as the function of all the cells and all the tissues and organ systems of the body. If we have sodium, magnesium, and potassium present in the proper ratios, all of those cells function properly, and all our bodily systems can be optimized. If the electrolytes are not present and if hydration is low, we simply can't think as well as we would otherwise. Our mood is off, hormone systems go off, our ability to get into physical action, to engage in endurance and strength and all sorts of other things is diminished. So with Element, you can make sure that you're staying on top of your hydration and that you're getting the proper ratios of electrolytes. If you'd like to try Element, you can go to drinkelement, that's lmnt.com/huberman, and you'll get a free Element sample pack with your purchase. They're all delicious. So again, if you want to try Element, you can go to elementlmnt.com/huberman. Today's episode is also brought to us by Thesis. Thesis makes what are called nootropics, which means smart drugs. Now, to be honest, I am not a fan of the term nootropics. I don't believe in smart drugs in the sense that I don't believe that there's any one substance or collection of substances that can make us smarter. I do believe, based on science, however, that there are particular neural circuits and brain functions that allow us to be more focused, more alert, access creativity, be more motivated, et cetera. That's just the way that the brain works, different neural circuits for different brain states. Thesis understands this. And as far as I know, they're the first Neutropics company to create targeted Neutropics for specific outcomes. I've been using Thesis for more than six months now, and I can confidently say that their Neutropics have been a total game changer. My go-to formula is the Clarity formula, or sometimes I'll use their Energy formula before training. To get your own personalized Neutropics starter kit, go online to takethesis.com/huberman, take a three-minute quiz, and Thesis will send you four different formulas to try in your first month. That's takethesis.com/huberman and use the code Huberminute checkout for 10% off your first order. And now my conversation with Dr. Samer Hattar. Samer, thanks for sitting down with me.