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Selenium may explain brain boost from exercise
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- twofornone 5y agoSeems like its worth a shot as a nootropic. Can anyone recommend a reputable supplier for supplements? It's really hard for me to trust that contents match labels for anything sold online. Even "third party tested" claims are hard to verify...
- jvican 5y agoYou're better off eating brazil nuts and some of the grains that contain selenium.
- caiomassan 5y agotuna, beef, Brazil nuts. paying too much for a supplement u don't know the contents, doesn't look like a good idea.
- unlikelymordant 5y agoEat 1 or 2 brazil nuts a day, and you should get plenty of selenium. Apparently eating more than 5 a day can cause selenium poisoning, so probably do some reading before eating too many.
- encryptluks2 5y agoThere are a lot of reputable suppliers of various nutrition supplements. You can go on Amazon and search for products shipped and sold by Amazon, and as long as you pick a brand that is recognized then you should be good. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=selenium&rh=p_6%3AATVPDKIKX0DER&s=review-rank https://www.amazon.com/s?k=selenium&rh=p_6%3AATVPDKIKX0DER&s... Note that Selenium has been found to have toxicity at higher amounts. 200 mcg should be good once per day, but you should be aware of any signs of toxicity or interactions.
- akandiah 5y agoI'd read the following before eating too many Brazil nuts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazil_nut#Nutrition_and_human_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazil_nut#Nutrition_and_human...
- systemsignal 5y agoThere’s a lot of info there, what did you want to point out?
- rubyskills 5y agoAthletic Greens has some selenium in it
- DoreenMichele 5y agoEating Brazil nuts regularly is probably overkill for people without a serious deficiency. Selenium is commonly available in many foods in decent amounts, including cheese and beans. A cheese quesadilla with beans will get you a good spike of selenium in one sitting. You can google other foods containing selenium and put together your own preferred selenium-rich meal.
- ck2 5y agoSelenium is already in many multi-vitamins. It's also naturally in most fish. Can of tuna has more than the RDA. The reason why mercury in fish is mostly a non-issue is because selenium protects from mercury. This study is not actually "new", it's a known property one of many. Beware academics with "specialties", their one magic supplement becomes a cure-all for many things which never seems to pan out in the realworld.
- jandrewrogers 5y agoSelenium is extremely toxic, similar to arsenic. Both are necessary micronutrients in mammalian biology but this requirement is easily satisfied by traces in water and soil entering the food supply. Deficiency typically only occurs at the intersection of significant medical issues limiting the ability to absorb them and consuming food limited to the rare locales where soil and water is unusually depleted in these elements and therefore absent from the food supply. Supplementing selenium carries risk with very little reward. It is unlikely that you need more selenium than you are already getting with a normal, modern diet.
- VUETHEBROKENSYS 5y ago
- vishnugupta 5y agoI can’t be the only one to think about Selenium the testing framework!!
- santa_boy 5y ago:-D .... add me to the gang.
- memorydial 5y agoBingo
- pjerem 5y agoYep, same. But then I thought to myself that it was strange … anger and depression can’t be symptoms of "brain boost".
- eBombzor 5y agoI've been out of the industry for a while, is Selenium still a thing that people use or do we not do that kind of testing anymore? I was assigned a junior SDET role long ago and I really struggled to find any use out of the testing I was doing for Selenium. It seemed extremely useless and only there to satisfy the requirements for the PM to show to the shareholders on progress. However, I'll admit it wasn't really a good tech company nor was I even half interested in the work because, let's be real it's really monotonous and tedious especially if css selectors get changed all the time by the dev team.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- omot 5y agoI was like Hacker News did it again tied together completely unrelated things into a casual relationship.
- jakecopp 5y agoSelenium BrainDriver :D > the ability to copy drawings correctly in older adults That's an interesting measure of preventing cognitive decline - is this a common metric?
- santa_boy 5y agoPardon my ignorance and zero background in this, but, taking advantage of this fresh thread ... could someone explain What is the degree of relevance of mice testing and humans gaining insight from such tests? Almost all threads of this nature revolve around mice. As a layman and the "HN effect" I seem to be drawing enlightenment for self-improvement from such threads. How wrong am I?
- crdrost 5y agoSo it is the standard preliminary test subject. Preliminary being a key word, things get tested in them first for plausibility but those findings usually need to be reconfirmed in an actual human study. The first thing is that they're mammals. You might be able to get cheap chickens for example, do experiments on them, but they're birds, they're not mammals. In terms of how similar to us they are, the most similar thing is he could find would be chimpanzees or so, and great apes in that general category, dogs and cows would be more similar to us than mice, mice and rats are probably about the same, and then there are things that are older like opossums, they would be a worse fit than mice. And they are social animals like we are. Mice are cheap because they are good at making more of themselves, and at this point you can buy them fantastically inbred—genetically nearly uniform, a bunch of them all the same age. The short life span is the third killer feature, obviously when you do human studies you have to follow us around for 40 years if you want us to get old, free mouse you just follow him for 2 years. Other than that, it's mostly just that they're mostly domesticated, so you don't have to worry about them biting you or anything. They are small and easy to handle and when you need a larger creature there are rats available. You will notice that they are less used for certain other things, so for example if you wanted to test biomedical devices that you insert into a body, maybe something that you clamp around an artery, for those sorts of things the smallness really gets in the way... Then you might see cow or horse studies or whatever, something with bigger arteries that you can clamp this thing on. It would be irresponsible to decide what supplements you are supplementing with based only on mouse studies. It would not be extremely irresponsible—there is a decent chance that if it were actively going to kill you then that would have appeared in the mouse studies—but it's still generally irresponsible in a milder fashion. In the sense that you are kind of throwing the dice with your health rather than making an informed decision. But I mean it's a better habit than smoking I guess so do whatever floats your boat?
- LargeWu 5y agoBack in the early 90's, when we used to have the national news on TV during dinner, there was a little blurb to the effect of "Scientists recommend selenium in your diet." My dad, wanting something sweet after dinner, was quick with "you know what's got seleium? Butterfingers." And then he got up and grabbed a mini Butterfingers candy bar that we had stashed in the pantry. So after that, the running joke was "I need some selenium" as justification for having that particular sugary treat.
- culi 5y agoIf anyone else is wondering: Selenium 1.7μg (3%)
- kafkaesque 5y agoMost likely due to the peanut butter content. Other foods with ("a lot of") selenium: salmon, pork chops, and chicken breast
- clumsysmurf 5y agoJust recently read about Selenium & CoQ10 ... 200 mg each taken together provided measurable cardiovascular benefits https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33920725/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33920725/
- tryptophan 5y agoThat almost seems too good to be true... But then again the cure to scurvy was also really simple and people still messed it up for 100 years...
- jb1991 5y ago> A low intake of selenium is associated with increased cardiovascular mortality.
- tommiegannert 5y ago> A low intake of selenium is associated with increased cardiovascular mortality. This could be reduced by supplementation with selenium and coenzyme Q10.
- jb1991 5y agoWhat's unclear about the phrasing in this quote is... does "low intake" mean people who don't get enough selenium, thus their intake is low, or, does it mean that supplementing with low doses of selenium.
- tsol 5y agoThey mean an insufficient quantity of selenium, the wording is a little confusing but it's used a lot in medical contacts
- Terry_Roll 5y ago>2500mg of Q10 will see vitamin K and E like activity.
- 5y ago
- DoreenMichele 5y agoExercise also helps clear lymph from most of the body which seems to help the brain clear it while sleeping, at least anecdotally. See also this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25427090 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25427090
- ck2 5y agoThe reason why exercise does things that diet alone cannot is likely AMPK activation. AMPK is the "garbage collection" for the body/mind. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2779044/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2779044/
- leksak 5y agoI think you'd have to be more specific than "exercise" as heavy resistance training activates mTor and not AMPK. If memory serves they are mutually exclusive and cannot be activated simultaneously. Low intensity exercise, such as walking and easy running stimulates AMPK - as does extended fasting.
- ck2 5y agoSome really smart researcher applied clinical trial data to make a calculator to guesstimate what different intensities and durations of exercise will activate AMPK to various levels: https://rothschild.shinyapps.io/AMPK_dashboard/ https://rothschild.shinyapps.io/AMPK_dashboard/ Fun to play with.
- somebodythere 5y agoHow long is extended?
- inglor_cz 5y agoDuring covid, my 70 y.o. mom started going on long walks (like five miles) and fasting. Mostly out of boredom, she self-isolated. I noticed that she is a lot sharper now. Previously, she would forget something in a conversation or ask twice. Now she is absolutely here and if we for example discuss some video, she mentions details that I overlooked. That was quite a change.
- asimjalis 5y agoTitle should say “in mice”.
- hericium 5y agoExercise also promotes changes in norepinephrine (noradrenaline), dopamine and few other neurotransmitters, some of which are known to affect focus and cognition.
- guerrilla 5y agoThat would only be short-lived though, no?
- onenite 5y agoAnd so there’s the case to be made for a regular dose of exercise to promote optimal cognitive function and productivity :-D
- guerrilla 5y agoSure, but presumably unrelated to the formation of new neurons.
- onenite 5y agoSorry, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you please elaborate? Also, are you familiar with the research/info on the association between exercise and neurogenesis? https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24818140/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24818140/ https://www.pnas.org/content/108/7/3017.full https://www.pnas.org/content/108/7/3017.full https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4565723/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4565723/
- guerrilla 5y agoThe article that I posted as the OP explains the mechanism of exercise-induces neurogenesis but seems to have nothing to do with hericium's suggestion of monoamines.
- hericium 5y agoThere were studies showing/suggesting dopamine's relation to neurogenesis. Linked study mentions SEPP1 which can be found in dopaminergic axons so I maybe read too much from it but chained this as: exercise -> dopamine -> other goodies -> ... -> profit