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Researchers have found an over-the-counter natural health product may help counteract negative effects of heavy cannabis use among adolescents aged 12 to 17, including depression, anxiety and diminished motivation in adulthood. Marta De Felice and Steven Laviolette demonstrated in animal models that interventions using antioxidant N-acetylcysteine (NAC) can mitigate the detrimental mental health effects of chronic cannabis use later in life. Sometimes referred to as "amotivational syndrome," chronic cannabis use in adolescents can result in a lack of motivation, diminished enjoyment from daily activities and other depressive effects. Currently, there is no known intervention strategy available. The study found that...

In a surprising development today, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) has withdrawn its proposed rule change previously submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to allow “Natural Asset Companies” to be traded in the U.S. market. Idaho Dispatch explained in this article that Natural Asset Companies (NACs) were defined by the NYSE to be, “Corporations that hold the rights to the ecological performance of a defined area and have the authority to manage the areas for conservation, restoration, or sustainable management.” Also mentioned in the previous Dispatch article was the strong opposition to NACs by Marlo Oaks, the...

To anyone who tracks the efforts of environmentalists, their policies often have an ulterior motive. They neither result in a better society nor do they produce better habitats. Their policy preferences also do not consider how using the land improves the land for man and wildlife. Instead, many environmentalists advocate for policies at the expense of farmers, miners, and others who create usable, tangible, societal benefits from the land. This often leaves observers to wonder: what are environmentalists really after? The answer is power and money. On September 29, the SEC, at the request of the NYSE, proposed a rule...

Treasurer Oaks opposes SEC proposal to allow for the creation of a new type of company designed to lock up private and public lands Proposal could cause significant harm to rural economies by removing land from productive use SALT LAKE CITY – December 11, 2023 – Utah Treasurer Marlo M. Oaks opposes a proposal under consideration by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that would allow for the creation and listing of a new type of company called a Natural Asset Company (NAC) on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The proposal poses a significant risk to rural economies by...

Supplementing GlyNAC—a combination of glycine and N-acetylcysteine as precursors of the natural antioxidant glutathione—improved or reversed age-associated cognitive decline in old mice and improved multiple associated defects in the aging brain. Sekhar and his team worked with three groups of mice. Two groups were aged naturally side-by-side until they were 90 weeks old, which is similar to a 70-year-old person. At 90 weeks of age, both groups of old mice were evaluated for their cognitive abilities, such as remembering the correct route in a maze that leads to a food reward. These results were compared to those of young mice,...

Many cancer therapies do not produce the hoped-for results. A common reason for this is that the tumors develop resistance to the medications. This is the case with alpelisib, a treatment for advanced breast cancer. A research group has now discovered that the loss of the neurofibromin 1 (NF1) gene leads to a reduced response to alpelisib. The researchers also found that the dietary supplement N-acetylcysteine restores the sensitivity of cancer cells to this treatment. At the moment, patients with advanced and metastatic breast cancer lack effective treatment options. The PI3K signaling pathway is often overactive in breast cancer due...

Decline in the hypothalamic Menin may play a key role in aging, according to a study. The findings reveal a previously unknown driver of physiological aging, and suggest that supplementation with a simple amino acid may mitigate some age-related changes. Leng and colleagues showed that Menin, a hypothalamic protein, is a key inhibitor of hypothalamic neuroinflammation. They observed that the level of Menin in the hypothalamus, but not astrocytes or microglia, declines with age. Another change was a decline in levels of the amino acid D-serine, known to be a neurotransmitter and sometimes used as a dietary supplement. The authors...

A study reports the discovery of a compound efficient in the treatment of SARS-CoV-2 that could be broadly applied to treat different variants of the virus. The researchers discovered that the compound piperlongumine (PL), extracted from the long pepper, the natural ingredient used most extensively in Indian medical systems, has a potent antiviral effect in the treatment of SARS-CoV-2 in mice. "We found that PL delays disease progression and reduces lung inflammation in a mouse model mimicking SARS-CoV-2 infection," says Gonçalo Bernardes. "The action of this compound in the organism, which was previously studied in the treatment of cancer, is...

"Do differences in metabolites in the brain affect our capacity for motivation?" asks Professor Carmen Sandi. "Could nutritional interventions that can affect metabolite levels be an effective vehicle to improve motivated performance?" Sandi's group published a study that shines light into answering that question. The researchers focused on an area deep into the brain called the "nucleus accumbens." The brain is often subjected to excessive oxidative stress from its neurometabolic processes—and the question for the researchers was whether antioxidant levels in the nucleus accumbens can affect motivation. To answer the question, the scientists looked at the brain's most important antioxidant,...

Includes NAC.

A randomized, double blind human clinical trial reveals that supplementation with GlyNAC—a combination of glycine and N-acetylcysteine—improves many age-associated defects in older humans and powerfully promotes healthy aging. This is relevant because until now, there have been no solutions toward improving many of these age-related declines in people. The study shows that older humans taking GlyNAC for 16-weeks improved many characteristic defects of aging. This includes oxidative stress, glutathione deficiency and multiple aging hallmarks affecting mitochondrial dysfunction, mitophagy, inflammation, insulin resistance, endothelial dysfunction, genomic damage, stem cell fatigue and cellular senescence. These were associated with improvements in muscle strength, gait...

Low back pain seriously affects the quality of life and increases the economic burden on families and society[1,2]. Intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD) is the main pathogenic factor of low back pain, but its pathological mechanism has not yet been elucidated[3]. Therefore, exploring the pathological mechanism of IDD and seeking new methods for the prevention and treatment of degenerative disc diseases is of great significance to human health. Nucleus pulposus (NP) cells play an important role by secreting a large amount of extracellular matrix (ECM) such as aggrecan and collagen type II to maintain the normal physiological function of the intervertebral...

A pilot human clinical trial conducted by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine reveals that supplementation with GlyNAC—a combination of glycine and N-acetylcysteine as precursors of the natural antioxidant glutathione—could improve many age-associated defects in older humans. The results of this study show that older humans taking GlyNAC for 24 weeks saw improvements in many characteristic defects of aging, including glutathione deficiency, oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction, inflammation, insulin resistance, endothelial dysfunction, body fat, genomic toxicity, muscle strength, gait speed, exercise capacity and cognitive function. The benefits declined after stopping supplementation for 12 weeks. GlyNAC supplementation was well tolerated during the...

FDA on Thursday announced the availability of a draft guidance that, if finalized, would state the agency’s “intent to exercise enforcement discretion” regarding the distribution and sale of products labeled as dietary supplements and containing NAC (N-acetyl-L-cysteine). The draft guidance, which is scheduled to be published April 22 in the Federal Register, was released three weeks after FDA reaffirmed its position in responses to two citizen petitions that NAC is excluded from the definition of a dietary supplement because the ingredient was first approved as a drug in 1963. FDA, however, is still considering commencing a rulemaking to permit the...

'It seems that we may also have to think of atrial fibrillation as an atrial cardiomyopathy -- that is, a challenged heart -- rather than as a purely electrical disorder', she says. Defects in muscle fibres and mitochondria Contrary to expectations, the researchers did not find any disturbances in the ion channels that spread electrical signals between the heart's muscle cells. Instead, they found defects in the structure of the heart muscle itself and in the mitochondria that normally function as the cell's power plant. The defects already occurred in the foetal stage of the fish and deteriorated exponentially with...

"Just like a car is subject to wear and tear over many years of use, limiting how long it works well, the natural aging process can progressively deteriorate the body and limit lifespan," said Rajagopal Sekhar. His work contributes to providing a better understanding of how glutathione deficiency, increased oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction and multiple additional hallmark defects of aging contribute to the aging process and how they can be reversed with GlyNAC supplementation. "We were excited to find that the mice that received GlyNAC lived 24% longer than those that did not receive GlyNAC," Sekhar said. "We next wanted...

A research team discovered that orally administrated bismuth drug colloidal bismuth subcitrate (CBS) together with N-acetyl cysteine (NAC) could be a broad-spectrum anti-coronavirus cocktail therapy. Oral administration of the cocktail suppresses the replication cycle of the virus, reduces viral loads in the lung and ameliorates virus-induced pneumonia in a hamster infection model. Not only could NAC stabilize bismuth-containing metallodrugs at stomach-like conditions but also enhance the uptake of bismuth drugs in tissues (e.g. lung) and antiviral potency through oral administration. Bismuth subsequently suppressed virus replication of a panel of clinically relevant coronaviruses, including Middle East respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus (MERS-CoV), Human...

Researchers have investigated the effect of infection with COVID-19 on the levels of oxidative stress, oxidant damage and glutathione, the most abundant physiological antioxidant. Compared to healthy age-matched individuals whose samples were taken before the pandemic started in 2019, patients hospitalized with COVID-19 had significantly increased levels of oxidative stress and oxidant damage, and markedly reduced levels of glutathione. The results suggest that supplementation with GlyNAC, a combination of glutathione precursors previously shown to reduce oxidative stress and oxidant damage and increase glutathione as well as improve health indicators such as inflammation, might be beneficial to COVID-19 patients. However, GlyNAC...

Marshall: So more COVID vaccines have now been distributed in such a short period of time, to such a generalized population, than any time in our history. And yet there's still substantial concern and a substantial amount of information that people are questioning. And perhaps for those who are reluctant to get the vaccine, concern about safety. So the FDA and CDC have a reporting system where some of these events are reported either by themselves or by their doctors. So, what are we seeing from that reporting system? Marks: Well, I think what we're seeing is robust reporting of...

I've read a lot on the use, and the global suppression of that usage, of HCQ in the treatment of Covid-19. A while back I ran across PQQ... Pyrroloquinoline Quinone. It could prove to be a useful substitute, in combination with the other elements of the HCQ Protocols.