How AI Is Changing Gut Health Forever with Moritz Wessely

Transcript

00:00
Can two people eat the exact same food and have completely different health outcomes? Yes. And this is actually where we have very very good data on it where we see that the postrenial meal response. So like the amount of insulin secreted, the amount of glucose and triglycerides is very much governed by your gut microbiome. People think that calories determine everything. Can the microbiome actually influence how much energy we extract from food?

00:26
The simple answer, yes. I'm Veronica Larisova and today I'm joined by Moritz Wessely, award-winning health tech entrepreneur. In this episode, we explore what we are getting wrong about gut health and how AI and personalised data could change the way we approach nutrition and long-term health.

00:47
You are listening to the Chief Life podcast. Moritz, welcome to the Chief Life podcast. Hi, great to be here. Thank you for inviting me. Oh my god, I'm so glad to have you. I wanted to talk to someone about gut microbiome and gut health and then I accidentally met you through the through the biohacking community and I'm like, "Oh my god, I have to speak to this

01:13
guy." So super excited. And before we dig deep into it, I have just some quick questions that I believe everyone wants to hear. What is the biggest lie people are being told about gut health? I would say that gut health is simple. I mean the gut is the most personal um and also the most complex systems we carry

01:33
around in our body and there is just no onesizefits-all answer that is good for everyone. Great. Why can't most gut tests be why can't most gut test be trusted? Um I think it builds on that as mentioned the gut is the most complex system and we try to analyse it with methods and models that are just

01:53
outdated. Okay. What do most health conscious people do every day that actually damages their gut microbiome? Yeah. Um, many things that are well meant are not actually good. Um, I see a big issue with all the fillers and supplements and consuming lots of sweeteners. Of course, reducing sugar is good, but swapping it for sweeteners in the end you pay the price with your gut microbiome.

02:16
Okay. Interesting. So, what are some of the mistakes that brands or food brands usually make in regards to food ingredients? I mean there is of course like a big trend with like fibre optimised supplements, fibre optimised sodas. Um and of course like everything we we don't want to um eat tons of sugar.

02:36
Still of course we don't want to sacrifice for taste. So everything has been swept for sweetness. And with the sweeteners I think there's the good, the bad and the ugly. Most of them fall into the latter two categories. For example, sucralose to great extent, stevia to lesser but still somewhat extent can make you transiently uh

02:58
insulin resistant. So it just desensitises your cells to the effect of insulin. This has been very well proven especially when you combine it with carbs and all of these bars of course like you never consume like a diet soda probably on its own. You never consume like a protein bar on its own. It always has some uh some carbs in it. Um and the effect how the desensitisation happens um immediately but also over time is

03:21
probably um governed and mediated by the gut microbiome on one thing. At the same time by fostering the growth of very specific bacteria they can cause imbalances and disruptions in your gut microbiome uh which then of course also build up over time and cause a whole lot of downstream issues. So I think this is like definitely a problem. Um especially of course as many people tend to consume

03:45
more of these like beverages or products exactly because they taste good and because they're sugarf free so guiltfree. Um not all are bad. I to be honest I have checked your products before going to the podcast. Uh I was like oh I'm like hitting on all the bars and all the supplement industry. But uh to be honest, you're doing a very good job because I think you use monk fruit um as

04:06
a sweetener in your products. And the interesting thing about the monogra seeds, so the sweet compounds in the monk fruit um which is also I think why they are proven and tested um establishment compound of traditional Chinese medicine for a very long time is that they stimulate the production of short- chain fatty acids in the gut which will be like they have certain range of beneficial factors where we can maybe dive in later. Um, but they are

04:32
actually like one of the sweeteners that not just like taste good but also have like a beneficial downstream effect on your gut. Oh wow. I'm pleased to hear that. So our products are actually good for your gut health. Don't quote me on that, but uh they're definitely not as bad as the others. Yeah, we hope they're good. That's why we developed them because we wanted to help people to have a snacks that actually good for their gut health. Last

04:53
quick question. What's the biggest misconception about probiotics? Um I think the biggest misconception about probiotics is a simple um cause and effect relationship. So like for example you are low in vitamin C so you take a vitamin C supplement or you for like you want to like boost your

05:15
like hormone regulation so you take alphaaganda. Um I think the this simple um relationship is already like just like a a very very bad description of what's going on with normal supplements with probiotics it falls apart completely because a probiotic is not a standard supplement is a live intervention. So it's in the best case when you take a good product that is not already that on the shelf,

05:39
it's a living bacterial strain that you introduce in an existing ecosystem and the effect that that living strain will have in the ecosystem is largely dependent on the um on the baseline state of that ecosystem. So it's very much dependent on what what's going on in your gut before and that is why you can't just be like oh like akamanti msinila is good for weight reduction or good for glucose control. So everyone

06:02
should like take that strain. I mean we see that some of the like like poster um star strains like bacterium akami that in certain for example psychiatric conditions that these are always chronically elevated um in in correlation with the condition. So I think this is something that one needs to be very aware of that it's not just

06:26
as easy as like oh yeah I want to have this and that benefit so I take that that probiotic. it can also backfire and for some people it does. So you really are able if taken in a certain dosage to mess up your gut with probiotics. That's why it always in my opinion has to be a very uh personalised um intervention when you want to use these compounds.

06:46
Yeah. So you need to do gut test and then just use the probiotics that are specifically beneficial for you. I would cut out adjust because it's not that easy. But yeah, that's generally like you need to you need to do it in a very very personalised way because as mentioned your gut microbiome in itself is a super potent system governing a whole range of different subsystems. So so you don't want to drift it off into perturbed state because it can have a whole range of unintended side effects.

07:11
Yeah. And what is the main thing people should stop doing right now to have healthier gut? the one thing the the one thing um I would say when you consume fibre consume it out of natural sources so because like in like a vegetable the the fibre for example like in so it's always like embedded in the cellia matrix which cause like a or

07:35
which which guarantees like a um um like a delayed release when you take like the same amount of fibre like in a bar it's bas like the one thing is like controlled fishision. Yeah, it just gives off the engine over time. The other thing is like a nuclear bomb. You don't want to have that. Okay. I mean, the metaphor is actually like for some people more like is a very fitting metaphor um because it can just make you

07:58
explode because you have like lots of gas build up of that like massive dump of fibre that your bacteria happily ferment. Um so I would definitely say for fibre you should stick to natural sources um and not just like go the easy way and just take a fibre supplement and think that's uh that's enough. Yeah, I love that. I always tell people to start with real food, whole foods and you can never go wrong with that. Mostly yes.

08:20
Mostly. Yes. Yeah. Mostly yes. Um you were named one of the top European entrepreneurs, young European entrepreneurs of the year. Which year was it? 2025 last year. Great. And what problem did you see that everyone else was missing? Yeah. So I think um it was not like the most directed or like conscious decision

08:44
in 2022. I uh first had uh like a co infection and that slipped off in a very severe long co and basically I was going from like being a marathon runner doing trons working all these jobs to feeling like an ultimate patient barely able to leave the house and that was a a state that like consisted for like over over two years and I was I was trying everything from neuropathic treatments to like more advanced or like

09:10
experimental uh therapeutic interventions and nothing of it helped like not even a bit and I was super frustrated after 2 years because I was 26 at the time. My life was basically just passing in front of my eyes and I was not able to like participate in it. Um and I was like I I tried everything and nothing had helped. So what was there left for me? And that was like when by I would say actually lucky

09:31
accident I became aware of the research of um a person who's now one of our scientific advisers a former Microsoft scientist who also due to like personal reasons started to research the question why do more and more people get chronically ill and why there's so little we can we can actually do to help them on a not just like symptom based but also like a curative root treatment base and he identified the gut microbomb

09:54
as a as a driver of many many chronic issues and chronic diseases. Um and basically based on his foundational research, I back then in the days built a technology platform that I used to heal myself that is now also the foundation of of our brand. Um and that is basically how it's how how I came to to see the gut microgram is like such a big driver because I experienced

10:14
it on on my own. Um like it has had I think the most profound change on my health within like one month of starting that self assembled treatment. I was able to go out again. I got my energy back and 6 months later I still remembered I was volunteering at a music festival. I was full of energy just dancing through night. Everybody was like, "Hey Morris, what are you doing?

10:34
That's crazy. You have so much energy." And I'm like, I'm just like very much into the moment enjoying the music. And at that moment, I I realised, hey, it's it's over. And at the same time, I was like, okay, like in some way, as mentioned, I I was lucky that I and yet I found my solution. And that also for me sparked the motivation to be like hey I want to make this accessible to anyone

10:55
else out there to the people who are suffering from it but also to the people who are already like performing at the upper end of performance spectrum. So pro athletes, business people, high performers because we might get into that also these people without like unknowingly might have gut microbiome based issues that they don't experience as like gut digestive issues but we're also our technology can have a profound impact and that's also what I'm now doing with our new brand Draan.

11:21
Amazing. So you got the award for your brand Draan. Um yeah for the company behind it. Yeah. Okay great. So tell us more about it. What is it? What do you guys do? Everything. Yeah sure. Uh so basically with um what we do with Ravan is we offer like the highest end and most personalised optimisation for your gut microbiome. In the end it's like a for the for our clients for users very simple three-step process driven by a very sophisticated

11:46
technology. So in the first step from a user perspective uh you take a stool sample conveniently at home. It gets then shipped directly to our specialised lab where we analyse the bacteria with a certain technology that allows us to give uh to to give us a 400 times higher um and more precise um resolution of all the different bacteria, viruses and code that are existent in the sample in your gut microbiome. And then we run all of

12:11
the data. It's just a very big data package. We run it through a specialised AI technology. Okay. um developed based on the foundational research of uh the that name certificate advisor um which uh then allows us over 70 million data points to figure out what are the specific imbalances that are present in your gut and as mentioned your gut is as individual as your fingerprint. You get it when you're born and from that very moment it only starts adapting to

12:36
yourself. Even amongst close family members who of course share similar genetics, share a similar lifestyle of that we only see an overlap in like gut microbiota of four to 5%. Really? So it's it's really really fascinating how how individual that system actually is and with the technology first of all we figured out to like hey what does your system actually need? So what of

12:56
all the thousands of bacteria are outliers for you? Because this is also something that um many people get wrong. There's no such thing as a good or bad like gut bacterium. Okay, colostrum deficially might be pretty bad but in general like if a bacterium is good, bad or neutral simply said depends on the context. So it depends on the like how

13:18
many of these bacteria are living in your gut. What are all the other bacteria? Because all these bacteria interact with each other. For example, like one bacterium uh processes or like different compounds from your food and based on that um secrete certain metabolites which are then taken up and processed by other bacteria which then produce another compound that gets processed again by another bacteria. So it's a very long chain reaction and that's why you always have to see that data in like a context dependent manner.

13:46
So, and this is basically like in the first step, we figure out okay, what is going on for you on on the gut bacteria base and as soon as we know which are all of the gut bacteria in your gut that might be causing patterns of imbalances uh which might then be connected to you like having bad sleep or lack of energy, lack of focus. Uh we then run a simulation against a specialised database of ours which then basically allows us to figure out which of all the

14:10
thousands of different substances that we know that modify bacteria per se are now the right ones for you. And based on that information, we're then able to on the one hand manufacture personalised pre and prootic supplements. So different bacterial strains that are individualised to your gut compounded with specialised fibers. Mhm. Uh and uh specialised neutrauticals. So this can be plant extracts, this can be different vitamins, different minerals that also in a very specific and precise

14:38
way um optimise the the growth or degrowth of bacteria in your gut and in that way shift the ratio of the bacteria to a more favourable state. Okay. Interesting. And so how is your gut test different to let's say gut microbiome mapping like a general test? Yeah. So when we speak about gut testing, I think it's important to to separate it out because basically like gut test are two different things. First

15:00
of all as mentioned it's the question how do we first identify which bacteria are present. So basically the sequencing part um which is the just biotechnological process in the lab where we like take the stool sample extract the DNA and then try to map that bacterial DNA to basically names of bacteria. So what if that long string of of DNA code belongs to bacteria ABC D.

15:22
Um and then the next step is of course what does that data actually tell me? because in the end it's just like a very long Excel file with like the bacteria ID and then like the relative abundances. So how much of the sample is actually made up of a certain material DNA which of course doesn't tell you anything about the um yeah but is this good or bad is this what it tells you nothing um and I think the the issue on that side is first with the sequencing so the first part how to

15:49
uh translate stool sample to DNA to bacterial name um is that we on one hand also here like use outdated methods because the cost for like sequencing has only gone run down recently. So we've only been able to unlock that commercially at scale in a very like recent time frame. And sometimes labs use um just outdated technology to to

16:11
analyse that that sample. And then also as there is no binding audit and binding standards for gut microbind testing. It's a bit like you know every lab is cooking its own recipe. One do a better job others do a worse job. And especially like in D2C testing we see that labs often optimise for commercial metrics over quality metrics because of course like neither the physician nor

16:36
the consumer understand like the biotech technology process behind it. So they also don't request and take it face value what lab delivers back to them. So this is the first step um where I think we with our lab and just rigorous um dedication to quality do a very good job. Then the second part is of course what do I how do I derive meaning from the data and that's where the AI that we developed there um that I just told you comes in where we don't just be like oh

17:01
yeah I know you have not enough bifidobacterium bifidom and this is bad for you because we determine bifid bacterium bifidobacterium bifidom to be good um but we are actually act on that context dependent character of all the bacteria present in your gut not just like 10 20 or 30 that over time also by more by dogma and by tradition than by

17:24
actual scientific base have been determined as like keystone bacteria. Yeah. Wow, that's interesting. And you know what blows my mind? I've read on your website that you have an AI that people can use to scan a menu in a restaurant and get recommended the food that's specifically beneficial for their microbiome.

17:44
Yeah, I would say that's like a nice little side feature. Um when we started with the MVP, we gave these recommendations as just like lists. Yeah, we figured out it's very hard for people to to follow that list and incorporate them into their day-to-day life. So we thought, hey, what we would be like a nice interesting feature to just make it easy and convenient for the user. And that's why we have implemented that AI agent. So when we get all the results back, the same results that we

18:09
also use to then manufacture the individualised pre-improbiotic formulas, we feed all of the data into an AI agent and train them on that use individual data. So it knows busy all your biology and can support it at every step along of the day. For example, as mentioned, when you sit in a restaurant, you can take a snapshot of the menu and it tells you exactly, hey, this is the best dish, the most suited dish for your microbiome. Maybe you want to ask the waiter if you can add like this or that.

18:35
Maybe some chickpeas or arugula. When you're like, "Hey, I want to go grocery shopping." Create like a grocery list for me. Be like, "Hey, I need a healthy breakfast recipe that actually supports my gut microbiome, not acts against it." This Yeah. Is basically covered by that little AI agent in uh in every user's app. That's super interesting. Well, they just proves my theory that there is not one diet that's good for everyone. We're all different, right? So you said before

19:01
that our gut gut microbiome is determined by our genetics and then also by our lifestyle. What is more like what has more effect on our gut microbiome? Is it the genetics or the lifestyle, the things we eat, the things we do? Genetics is actually the most negligible factor. Okay. So we see that even like in in twin studies. Um I mean there has been like um in the UK there have been like some really large twin studies. Um and we see

19:27
that the the correlation of like genetics um or um just like level of of hereditary markers are just like not um there's not like lots of lots of correlation with like the gut marker bomb. On the other hand um as you said like lifestyle factors like what you put into your body, medications you use, uh

19:49
sleep, stress, especially like sleep and stress um as the gut is heavily like very very sensitive to cortisol. um plain yet the largest factor on what shapes your microbiome. Yeah. So if someone says that they have bad gut because of their genetics, I'll tell them no, it's your own fault. Defin definitely not. Yeah. I mean this this definitely not what we what we see in the data.

20:10
Yeah. Okay. So the so let's name the biggest factors affecting the gut microbiome. You already said some like stress, poor sleep, obviously diet. Uh is there anything else? I think these are the the most impactful ones. Of course, like exercise is bit of a sits a bit in Goldilocks ratio. No exercise or no movement at all is um generally like correlated with less diversity in your

20:35
gut microbiome. But also like too much exercise in the end becomes a stress factor. So it diminishes the quality of your gut microbiome. It sits in like that that golden ratio. So what is too much exercise? Um that's of course is also something I think that is very individual like how much uh exercise and how much hormetic load can your system regenerate and bounce back from. Um and this of course also um context dependent like how well trained are you when you just like start

21:03
with a new when you just get started with hierox of course you can only take so much until your body says hey I need to regenerate. when you rate like a seasoned athlete, there's like you can bring much more performance and can regenerate from that quicker. Without testing, how do I know I have bad or poor gut microbiome?

21:23
Um, that's a tricky question. Sometimes you know it because you have like like digestive issues. That is of course a a strong hint. The thing with the gut marker mom is as it is so foundational and sits um upstream of so many different other systems, your immune system, hormonal regulation, neurotransmitter regulation, um it can mask often times as like other things as brain fog as like hormonal disregulation

21:47
as like a weak immune system or also like on the other hand as an overstimulated immune system. So I mean of course test it and test it with the right technology and then use uh the the right methods to derive meaning from from the data you get you get back. I think that's the most most straightforward way as in many many other things uh you should look what's under the hood.

22:08
Yeah that's great. So how bad is ultrarocessed food for the gut microbiome? I mean ultrarocessed food can mean many things. Of course, we know that there are certain additives to foods that are very very disruptive to the gut microbiome. For example, uh as we mentioned, artificial sweeteners, sucralose, um all of these, they can cause disruptions in the gut microbiome.

22:33
Um on the other hand, for example, titanium dioxide, which is um I think it's banned in Europe, but now it's still allowed to be added to like pills or like pharmaceutical pills. Um it's like a um a colouring agent um and it's like responsible for that shiny white um white colour in chewing gum in toothpaste and all of that that is um basically like a a nuclear bomb for your gut mark.

23:01
Um so definitely try to try to avoid that. I mean, of course, like we all want like these nice nicely looking nice colour products, but I think the the price to pay for that is is too high. And then, um, lost track. There was one one more thing. Um, what about seed oils?

23:25
To be honest, I think the seed oil it's it's a bit of a debated thing. Um, I wouldn't want to go into that as there are things that are much more direct on on the gut microbiome. Um I think another big thing um which I think is also more common sense but still it's obviously it is not don't use don't use antibiotics for a viral infection. I think we definitely like use antibiotics

23:47
um like yeah far far too too quickly. Um of course like when you have like a rampant bacterial infection you should give antibiotics. Please not don't stop taking antibiotics um way where you should take them but also don't take them when you don't need them. Yeah. Um and then another thing is um and that's also something we see uh if your uh

24:09
fibre consumption runs too low after 24 to 48 hours when you just cut out fibre from your diet. we see like a very very large scale shifts actually in the in the ratio of gut microbiota and after that time when you don't give your gut microbiota the the fibre they need to feed on actually they start feeding on you because they start to degrade the mucus um that is lining the the inside

24:32
of your gut which of course then cause leaky gut and all different kinds of diet stream issues. So definitely your you should feed your gut bacteria well so they don't turn against you. I have so many questions. So if someone is on a carnivore diet long term and they don't consume any fibre, will that damage their gut lining? Uh we definitely see that like carnivore also like ketogenic diets go together with very specific shifts in the gut microbiome. I am personally I'm not a

24:57
fan of like any diet that is too restrictive. Yeah. Sometimes especially like a ketogenic diet. It is well studied for like certain on like metabolic issues but for example also like neurological issues like epilepsia. I think it's um there it can be a brilliant intervention. Um but if you're not dependent on it um I think you

25:17
should you shouldn't like take it too far. Yeah, I think it's for me personally I I did keto for for some time. I like to be metabolically flex flexible. I think that's that's the main thing but also you shouldn't treat it like as the main panaceium because it might have some other unintended downstream effects. Yeah. Also on the antibiotics, I've read somewhere that if you do course of antibiotics and then you take just like a random probiotics afterwards, you can

25:42
actually delay the recovery from the antibiotics. Yes. Yes. Um because the thing is I mean luckily for us on so first maybe got like antibiotics don't kill everything. They're not the nuclear bomb. Yeah. Uh of course even broadspectrum antibiotics. Yeah. Really? I was told they could kill everything. It's not that easy. Luckily luckily it's not that easy. Um but it's not a it's not a nuclear bomb. So even broadsp spectrum antibiotics um act on different

26:06
bacteria in the gut while leaving others more or less untouched. But of course they are they causing a perturbance in your gut microbiome and as your gut microbiome is so fundamental it's not just the person most personal system but also like one of the most resilient systems. Yeah. So anything that causes like uh distress or like chaos in your gut microbiome. May it be an antibiotic cause. May it be a food poisoning. May

26:29
it be also like an infection which can just cause the gut microbiome. Normally in a healthy microbiome, you know, it has a little dent and then it bounces back. The problem is what happens when it stays and that's when when the issues arise. But yeah, you're you're completely right actually like taking probiotics like or also the wrong probiotics after and cause of antibiotics

26:51
can act like as an additional perturbance and prolongs the period until your microbiome gets back to its natural state. Yeah, in the same study I also read that have just eating um fermented foods is better than taking random probiotics in recovering the gut after antibiotics. I can't tell for that. I haven't read that study. But also like with the with the fermented foods, I'm I mean I love kefir, I love kombucha. I

27:17
just love fermenting around. I think it's just a fun fun hobby. Um but also there I would just with with probiotics I would be careful because uh some maybe sometimes you get the strains that your gut doesn't want. I take them as like a culinary experiment, as like nice little culinary detail, but also there I wouldn't go overboard and just like eat

27:43
like tons of like sauerkraut or kimchi or whatever because sometimes this might be exactly a thing that your gut doesn't need at the moment. So always treat it with a bit of respect and care, I would say. Yeah, that's a good point. So clearly you're big in probiotics. you prescribe specific probiotics for specific issues, but are there any other supplements or compounds or foods that you would recommend for someone to take to heal their gut lining?

28:06
Um, I mean, it's uh as mentioned, it's always complex and it's always individual. So I personally would refrain from being like okay like this is the one thing, the one supplement, the one food that everyone should eat to keep their gut healthy besides just like give them enough natural fibre and eat vegetables but eating vegetables has also a whole range of other different beneficial effects not just for the gut

28:30
also for the gut. Um so therefore I would in say it's just as we like discovered earlier there is like no one sizefits all diet that is healthy for everyone. So figure out what what is good for you and what works for you and then do that. Yeah. Okay. Great. Um people think that calories determine everything. It's a big controversy about calories. Can the

28:52
microbiome actually influence how much energy we extract from food? The simple answer, yes. Although not to the extent that maybe some listeners would like to hear that. I mean the thing is like of course our gut microbes they can ferment like indigestible fibers to short chain fatty acids like acetate proprietite burret that can also

29:15
then serve again as an energy source but that only makes up around like 100 to 150 um kilo calories extra that can be extracted from food. Although and this is I think like where it gets much much more interesting via bile acid conversion which is governed by the gut microbiota. Um our gut microbiome can activate the fioid ax receptor which then is able to upregulate UPC1 in like

29:41
brown and based fat tissue. So increase to thermogenesis in the fat tissue which of course increases your metabolism. also our guts um by certain pathways can upregulate uhk which is basically like the the energy sensor of the cell. So which just makes you to store less energy and um free up more energy from for example um like from from fat cells.

30:04
Mhm. And um on the other side on the flip side um like when there are too many like pathogenic bacteria in your gut and these lipopolyaccharides which are like certain like molecules on on the on the outer shell of this bacteria if they seep into the bloodstream this can cause low chronic inflammation which then also um in the end desensitize your

30:26
cells to insulin and makes you more and more insulin resistant and also I mean probably many many listeners of this podcast are familiar with peptides all our peptides, right? Um the cool thing is via like the fermentation, why the production of short- chain fatty acids, these short chain fatty acids can then trigger the release of our own endogenous peptides from the gut linen like for example our own endogenous GLP-1 or peptide Y which

30:52
then also promotes society and a feeling of fullness and makes people to eat less. So I think this is the much more profound effect that the gut has on weight regulation and metabolism. Uh which reaches much further than just like how many calories do we extract from food. Yeah, that's interesting. So what do we eat to release the natural GLPs in our gut?

31:12
I mean as as mentioned so our gut needs fibre that he can ferment into the short chain fatty acids. Um and again there are not it's not just like taking the fibre supplement but it's really eating whole vegetables. Yeah. And giving your gut the necessary substances that he can use to create the shorten fatty acids for you. Although of course like shorten fatty acids um have a whole range of like downstream signal effects over the whole body. Um they can even like um

31:36
some short fatty acid which also interesting like the the acetate can cross the blood brain barrier and also act as an energy substrate for the brain directly. Um which often of course then also like promotes satiety promotes uh like you just snacking less because your brain is um in the end like on simply speaking your brain is um supplied with enough energy from from the acetate.

31:59
Mhm. Um so yeah that's um it's in the end like as a gut is so foundational everything that happens you got travels far and wide through your body but uh especially for like also weight regulation society and production it is a very very important system. Yeah and so the actual GLPs not the ones that are natural in our body but the ones that people inject themselves with

32:22
how do they affect our gut health and our gut microbiome? M I mean the final verdict on that is still out as we of course like have not like that much like long-term long-term studies and uh long-term observation on the fact of those um there are like yeah I mean on the one hand we see that of course certain certain bacterial species which

32:43
are deemed favourable might be um increased by these uh by by giving like GLP ones exogenously. The question is is that directly from the GLP one or is it more like a like side effect from that people eat less and like enter a fasted state which of course also shapes your gut microbiome in different way especially if when these people have been prone to

33:07
overeating before. So that's that's why I'm not not too sure. We definitely know that there's also like a probably direct like interaction on a signaling base with the gap but if this is good or bad in the long run this is still something that we need to discover I would say. Okay. So we don't know if GLP are good or bad for our gut. That's we don't know yet. Okay. We don't know it. Okay. Can two people eat the exact same food and have completely different health outcomes?

33:32
Yes. And this is actually where we have very very good data on it. Um where we see that the postrenial meal response so like the amount of insulin secreted the amount of glucose or like the rise of glucose in your blood and trig triglycerides is um probably like very much governed by your gut microbiome. So I think extending on on the theme we on on the topic we we just like covered before.

33:57
So it's highly individualised. So okay so nutrition is highly individualised mainly because of our gut microbiome is individual. Are there any foods or one food that is healthy for everyone and everyone no matter what their microbiome is will get a good health outcome. I would I would refrain from making such a statement. I would say based on just what I what I see in our data. Um, also like what I see in our recommendations

34:24
that sometimes um things that like every Instagram gut healthy influencer tells you to to eat a lot of for example like oats or whatever like so we we for example see sometimes that things like betaglucen so like a certain certain fibre that is present in oats or for example pectin certain fibre in in different fruits like apples and pears um that this is very very high in the

34:46
avoid list um due to the effect it has on the growth of very specific bacteria in that gut of of the user that might already be like too high or like over a certain range that is healthy for that individual. So, it's always about like yeah figuring out what works for you and you can do that just by elimination diets and like slowly reintroducing different food compounds. You can do it by pun not intended by gut feeling to

35:10
just like sensing hey what is actually right what do I want to eat now um and of course like the the the safest or most direct way is uh yeah test it interesting so what is the most shocking thing you've seen in your data the most shocking thing um I wouldn't say shocking thing for me in the beginning definitely surprising because the the phenotype of these people was like super healthy when we

35:35
speak But pro athletes and all of these people due to the chronic stress they have been in for many many years. So as mentioned like people who did everything right on the outside. So they optimised their sleep, they optimised their diet, they optimised their exercise, they were like just only like the performance output that they could deliver. They were definitely like at at the upper edge of the range. Um also like top business people all of these people had like chronic immunis and they got microbiome and they weren't even aware

36:00
of it. So I think this was definitely where I was like, "Oh, there's uh there's more to do than than just like visible from the outside." Yeah. So these are people that exercise, eat well, sleep well, don't drink, don't smoke, but they're stressed and that's what affects their gut microbiome. Exactly. And this also I think like there's definitely an overlap between like very health enthusiastic up toactic people and just like high performers. Of

36:24
course, we're the ones who are always like feel drawn to like going into the extremes and discovering what's out there, seeing how far we can take our yourself, our body, our career. Um, and sometimes of course this can also have like some unintended side effects when we overreach, when we put too much stress on our body and our system can't cope with that especially on the long run.

36:47
Yeah. And what is the effect of alcohol on our gut health? Um that one is uh is is several fold. Um of course like alcohol is a strong disinfectant. It's antibacterial. Um at the same time ethanol for example can also be used as a fuel for our gut bacteria. Finally I mean the uh the

37:08
hangover is also because al alcohol dehydrogenase um the the enzyme that that breaks down like the alcohol and all different subroducts. um that one is also to some extent produced by your gut bacteria. So how much you drink without like having a bad hunger over the next day might also be um determined by your by your gut microbota. Funnily, this is not an endorsement at all, but there was

37:32
uh was is um a a company, I think it's actually from the US that genetically modified a certain bacterial strain, I think like some basel strain to produce more alkaline dehydrogenase. And their claim is take that probiotic before you go partying so your headache the next morning won't be as bad. Um I don't know if it works, but it's definitely like a an entertaining concept.

37:54
Yeah, it's an entertaining concept. My question is okay so you won't have as bad hangover but would that still damage your gut and change your gut microbiome despite not having the hangover? I mean that I can't tell because alcohol of course has many different downstream effects in just like the uh the byproducts and and cause the hangover. Um also um I mean alcohol is damaged in the liver and the whole bile acid metabolism is hugely important for like the well functioning microbiome. So I

38:21
wouldn't say that this has no no side effects. Um I mean I personally I don't drink for many many reasons. Gut health is definitely one of those. Um and I would definitely uh recommend uh yeah reducing the amount of alcohol one consumes on a habit base as much as possible. Yeah, drinking is going out of fashion. I don't know if this is true but I heard the statistics in Australia that 75% of people under 21 years old in Australia

38:48
don't drink alcohol at all. which I think is great because definitely like if you look at the like uh the impact and the damage um of all the different substances that that people take for for fun to get high alcohol sits very very high it ranks very very high in the scale and we like for for a long time I think allel has been encouraged more like by

39:12
traditions than by real safety data on the substance uh and I think it's good that it's changing that people like voluntarily and not so much by like no policy design or like strong enforcement or reduction and ban alcohol but but like bottom up um habit change decide to to phase that out yeah 100% don't drink alcohol drink water but what about water do you think

39:37
about drinking tap water is that bad for your gut I don't know I mean for me personally I had experience drinking tap water was very bad for my gut because I was in Koala Lumpur and somehow I don't know. I was late. I was tired. I decided to trust the water filter that they installed in the Airbnb. It was a bad decision because I woke up with like yeah just a very horrible water poisoning. The good thing also as my gut

40:00
was very resilient. I was in bad for like one day and the day after I was back and performing at my top again. So that was I mean your gut can be a good travel insurance. Um I mean I I wouldn't say like that drinking tap water is good or bad for your gut. It's always like the question where are you? Um, are there like any residues, any chemicals, any like uh stuff in that that you don't want to ingest at any base?

40:24
Yeah. So, well, I'll tell you my theory and it might be silly and might be right. You're the expert. So, I think so. In America, in Australia, they put chlorine in water to kill the harmful bacteria, which is great. But if we drink a little bit of chlorine every day, it doesn't choose which bacteria it kills, right? It can kill good bacteria, bad bacteria, whatever. So, if we drink

40:45
chlorinated water every single day and we drink 3 lers of chlorinated water every single day, would that negatively affect our gut microbiome or am I just being paranoid? I definitely have seen like any studies on that, so I can't put out claims to that. Um, I mean, in the end, of course, it's

41:05
always comes down to how much of a substance do you consume to so that it can have like any effect on your gut bacteria. I mean it's also the thing why most of the commercial probiotics don't have any effect at all which I think is great because um otherwise you could cause real issues with that. No, it's like in the end you have like that one probiotic supplement that maybe says on the label oh like two or three or five

41:28
uh billion colony forming units per dosage but then they put in like 15 to 20 strains. So like the actual number of colony forming units it's colony forming units per strain itself is very very low and then you got bacteria just like yeah we don't care. Um so in the end um drinking chlorinated water or not drinking chlorinated water and if that has an effect on your gut and probably

41:50
comes down to how much chlorine you actually like then consume as like a total amount over the course of the day and over the course of like months. But definitely like I might might look into that if if you can find any studies on it. Yeah, I did actually find studies on that and also on fluoride because the fluoride in water in Australia and in America and that's not bad just for gut but it's also affects your bones and nerves and

42:13
yeah so I just wanted to ask you how is it with the gut um so can we confidently say that buying probiotics in just any pharmacy that haven't been prescribed to us are waste of money all of them I would definitely say it's entertainment but so are many many supplements that people take. Yeah.

42:37
So I wouldn't say it's exclusive to probiotics. Um but probiotics are definitely amongst them. Yeah. Okay. There's so many experts on Instagram. They tell us this is the best diet. You should eat like this and that works for everyone. Are these people blatantly lying? I wouldn't say they're lying. I just as I said before for

43:02
many many decades actually we just didn't have the tools the understanding to really acknowledge how how personal how individual and how um how how optimised to our very own biology our gut microbiome is. So I think this was probably like one of the biggest discoveries of like the human gut

43:27
microbiome project to see like hey in the end it's like you can't build up some kind of reference or healthy microbiome because everyone is so so individual and therefore I wouldn't say that these people are lying. All of this is of course like I don't know some some kind of general knowledge or general mythology around this is what you should do this is what you shouldn't do. Um, but in the end it's far more complex and

43:50
the gut bum doesn't boow down to easy answers. This is definitely something that that I've learned over the time working with it. Yeah, it's complicated. So, Ravan, that's the name of your company. Do you guys just focus on gut microbiome or do you also test for skin, oral or vaginal microbiome? So, we can definitely test for that.

44:11
Some of our partners request that. uh when you look at it I mean it's like a uh like like a like like different islands so to say you have like the the gut microbiome you have the vaginal microbiome you have the skin microbiome but the gut microbiome in some ways binds all of these together um so uh and especially pronouns for example with like the gut microbiome and

44:34
the vaginal microbiome um this might sound gross but it's like a like describe process happening like there's cross seeding between like the rectum the vagina and like um like for example lactobacil might be seated from like the um from the rectum to to the vagina especially when like there's some disbalance. Mhm.

44:58
Um which is like a good um which is a um which is like a an effect that that we do want to see and also by regulating the estab. So like the whole regulation of the estrogen um of like the whole estrogen metabolism um for for the female body uh the the gut microbiome also um because like the the like okay let's let's start again that

45:22
yeah okay cut it then let's start again also by regulating the estro so like the recycling of um of estrogen before it gets excreted which is governed by the by the gut microbiome the gut microbiome then also again influences the the vaginal floor and the vaginal microbiome So in the end all of these systems are related in the end also like dependent on the state of the gut microbiome. This

45:46
is why when you want to for example optimise the vaginal microbiome when you optimise want to optimise your skin microbiome because maybe sometimes you have like some some skin issues. Yeah. um the most potent way to do so is in the end via the gut and this is also the system where we have the most data on because um I mean yeah of course like the technology has only been around like recently at scale that we're really able to test many many different different samples um at a way that's cost

46:12
efficient uh but like for the vaginal microbiome for skin microbiome we now now that the process of data collection is only like starting to really get going so I think even if we don't understand a lot about the gut microbi we and more by the gut microbiome than any of the other microbiota present. Yeah. So, it's all new. Um, so just to recap, what are the three main things people can start doing today to improve their gut microbiome?

46:37
I think generally speaking, as mentioned, like it's it's very personal, but what everyone should do is like eat a very diet consisting of like non-processed foods and vegetables. Um, to just like avoid that any additives in the food actively kill your microbiome. Um then definitely um as

46:57
mentioned when when you when especially when you already have like some existing gut microbiome issues um figure out if there's like a good test that you can trust to actually get more insights about what's going on for you and then also um have a have a good way of deriving meaning from the data into into action steps for you. Um and to be honest I think this already covers it to to a very very large extent. Maybe another thing that I'm also not a big fan of like people who

47:22
use like mouthwash that contains alcohol. Um also don't use it because like your gut microbiome can your oral microbiome can serve as a reservoir for your gut microbiome in some ways. Um we definitely know that bacteria are passing through. Um and at the same time also your oral microbiome is kind of the first line of defense for any unwanted microbes that you don't want to see in your body or especially in your gut microbiome. So when your oral microbiome

47:46
gets weakened uh then also like a whole lot of like dime issues and like pathogens can can infiltrate your system. So you wouldn't want that to happen. Yeah. Got it. That's a great advice and it's not the first time I hear it about the oral microbiome. It's super interesting. Okay. Is there anything that I didn't ask you today that you wish I had asked? I think we already covered many many different topics but yeah in the end I think this is something that I definitely want people to take home is you got micro is your

48:11
most personal system. Um so you should definitely take care of because in if if you do so it's okay we cut it again. Yeah. Um so if there's one thing I want uh people to take home of your gut mark is the most personal system and if you really want that most personal system to work for you in the best possible way you have to also approach it from the most personalised uh approach. Great advice. And one last question.

48:37
What is your favourite book? My favourite book which in some bit more distant way also ties nicely into the the topic of the discussion is it's a German book um uh called the disamiguation of the world and it's around the topic that especially like in the modern era so like western modern era since 1500 to to now there is a

49:01
stronger and stronger trend of like decline in tolerance for ambiguity uh favoring more simple more like direct and easier to digest. But in that way also less realistic models of the world and that we actually should not succumb to like the easy answers the direct answers that we feel we with our brain can actually compute and rather lean into also the beauty that comes when we

49:27
when we fully embrace the complexity when we fully embrace the ambiguity that sometimes it's not like neither one or the other but both things at once and I think especially nowadays this is for me always like a great source of of energy a great source of curiosity of asking these big what if questions and seeing that there's like probably more than one right answer.

49:48
Oh, interesting. I can't wait to read it and thank you so much for today. That was such a good information. I think everyone will find it super helpful and um I hope to talk to you soon again. Thank you for inviting me. Very much appreciate it. Thanks so much for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to the Chief Life podcast for more conversations on performance, nutrition,

50:08
and mindset. And we'll see you in the next episode.