Beyond Food: The Missing Nutrient Transforming Brain and Gut Health with Sarah Turner | E36

What if the missing element in your health isn't another supplement or diet change, but something as fundamental as light? In this illuminating conversation, Sarah Turner reveals how our modern indoor lifestyle has created a profound deficiency in specific wavelengths of light that our bodies evolved to require.

Turner, founder of CeraThrive and creator of an innovative red light therapy device, explains the fascinating science behind photobiomodulation – how red and near-infrared light penetrate human tissue to activate cellular healing mechanisms. Her journey from pharmaceutical research to developing light therapy technology highlights a crucial insight: our bodies function optimally when they receive the natural light patterns they evolved with over thousands of years.

The most compelling aspect of this discussion centers on the gut-brain connection. Turner's device uniquely targets both ends of this axis, recognizing that true brain health begins with gut health. She shares surprising observations about how many people have normalized their gut dysfunction, not realizing these issues directly impact their brain function, energy levels, and mood regulation.

With the precision of a scientist and the accessibility of a skilled communicator, Turner breaks down complex concepts around wavelengths, mitochondrial function, and the emerging field of "photobiomics" – how light affects our microbiome. She offers practical guidance for navigating the confusing world of light therapy devices, helping listeners understand what to look for and what questions to ask before investing.

This conversation expands our understanding of what constitutes essential nutrition. Beyond food, water, and supplements, specific wavelengths of light emerge as critical nutrients our bodies require for optimal functioning. Turner's work represents a fascinating frontier where ancient wisdom about sunrise and sunset meets cutting-edge technology to address modern health challenges.

Whether you're dealing with brain fog, fatigue, mood issues, or gut problems, this episode offers fresh perspective on a therapeutic approach that works with your body's natural processes. Discover how reintroducing the right light into your life might illuminate your path to better health.

Get 10% off your CeraThrive CeraSystem with this link and code: Recovery10

https://www.cerathrive.com/recovery

Instagram: @_rebel_scientist

Podcast:

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Red Light Therapy
• 7:12 Sarah's Scientific Journey
• 18:49 How Red Light Affects Biology
• 25:47 Gut-Brain Axis and Device Technology
• 31:42 Benefits and User Feedback
• 37:16 Device Selection and Safety Considerations
• 43:00 LED vs. Laser Technology
• 45:42 Photoreceptors and Future Research

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

We're looking at how light interacts with our microbiome. And you know, the microbiome is such an interesting and cool topic when you think actually we're we're more bacterial cells than human cells.

SPEAKER_01: 0:14

Welcome to Life After Impact, the Concussion Recovery Podcast. I'm Dr. Ayla Wolf, and I will be hosting today's episode where we help you navigate the often confusing, frustrating, and overwhelming journey of concussion and brain injury recovery. This podcast is your go-to resource for actionable information, whether you're dealing with a recent concussion, struggling with post-concussion syndrome, or just feeling stuck in your healing process. In each episode, we dive deep into the symptoms, testing, treatments, and neurological insights that can help you move forward with clarity and confidence. We bring you leading experts in the world of brain health, functional neurology, and rehabilitation to share their wisdom and strategies. So if you're feeling lost, hopeless, or like no one understands what you're going through, know that you are not alone. This podcast can be your guide and partner in recovery, helping you build a better life after impact. Sarah Turner, welcome to Life After Impact. It's so great to see you again and to be able to uh catch up. Thank you. Yeah, it's lovely to be here.

SPEAKER_00: 1:23

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01: 1:24

Yeah, a lot has happened since I talked to you quite a while ago. You have your own podcast, The Rebel Scientist. You started a company called Sarah Thrive, which has a really unique red light therapy device that targets the gut brain axis. And so I'm really excited to learn more about uh your journey with creating that device. And I know you're involved in a lot of red light therapy research. So why don't you start out by giving us a little bit about your scientific background and then what got you into this whole field? Thank you.

SPEAKER_00: 1:57

Yes, I had a bit of a um a random walk into this uh this kind of field, if you like, because I started out really in fairly orthodox science. I started off in pharmaceuticals, uh mainly working for um GSK. Uh, and at the time I was looking at drug delivery devices. So still in the devices, but at the time I was looking at how do you deliver drugs to people, most notably um asthma drugs. Uh, and it was during that time that I did a lot of experiments with the company about um what you need to do in order to get good drug deposition into the body. Of course, I was using a fake lung, you know, I was kind of on the benches, I wasn't in clinical. Um, but things like grounding have a big effect. So whether you're kind of grounded while you're delivering these uh drugs to people has a massive effect on deposition, certainly as shown in one of these kind of uh simulated lungs. And really, what that led me to conclude is really it's about the state of the person, not so much, you know, the the intervention that you're trying to do. Um and actually I left uh the drug industry shortly after that because I began to see that really it's it's about how we look after the individual, you know, your environment, the state of your own health, more than kind of trying to administer um a drug that has potential side effects long term. So I kind of stepped out of pharmaceutical and I went into nutrition because I thought, okay, maybe we can prime the body with nutrition. Uh, but that doesn't really go far enough. I ended up doing um a master's in uh clinical neuroscience. Um, and then I started to look very closely at light and how light interacts with biology. And the interesting thing was in all of the qualifications, in all the education, and in all that industrial experience, nobody had ever told me about how light interacts with biology. And it seems like it's uh a science which is only now beginning to kind of um gather some traction, although really it's has a very old history, you know. Um, Niles Vinson won the Nobel Prize from it, you know, a couple of hundred years ago. So uh we're just now beginning to see the fruits of all the research into photobiomodulation. So because I have clinical neuroscience, that's why I'm applying it to the brain. But of course, light therapy is used in a lot of uh different applications.

SPEAKER_01: 4:24

Yeah, one of my favorite research papers that really talks about the gut brain axis defines it as the gut microbiota gut brain axis, because obviously when we're interacting with the gut, we're also interacting with trillions of bacteria and other life forms that are in our gut and making things happen as far as digesting our food and turning that into neurotransmitters. And so, um, have you also kind of uh specifically studied what's happening when we shine light on all these gut microbes?

SPEAKER_00: 4:56

Yeah, uh that is a fascinating topic. And I think again, it's gonna become a new science. Already there's been a paper published, which you'll love if you like this topic, called Photobiomics. Uh, and it was coined by Dr. Ann Liebert and her team in Australia, but that that's doing exactly that. We're looking at how light interacts with our microbiome. And and you know, the microbiome is such an interesting and cool topic when you think actually we're we're more bacterial cells than human cells. You know, we really are a community of species. We kind of walk around like, you know, thinking that we're kind of this, you know, I'm Sarah, I'm doing this and that. But you know, actually, we are a colony of uh bacteria, viruses, microbes, you know, all kinds of things. So taking care of that part of our being is hugely important. Um perhaps we'll talk a little bit about how red light therapy works, but it mainly works by targeting the mitochondria, which are tiny organelles inside our cells. These are very similar actually to bacteria. And in fact, probably from an ancestral point of view, you know, these mitochondria or how we make energy in our body is probably a symbiotic relationship, you know, many, you know, millions of years ago when we had multicellular organisms. So it should be no surprise to us that bacteria are responding to light, that we can target our bacteria with light and that we have this effect. So you're totally right. How having this microbiome gut brain axis is hugely important. It's it's again, it's one of these topics that's gaining traction. And I'm interested to see how red light therapy in particular can target both our human cells and our bacterial cells to have that beneficial effect.

SPEAKER_01: 6:44

Yeah, yeah, fascinating. When we shine red light, there I was there's a lot of devices on the market. Yours has very specific wavelengths. Do you want to talk? I mean, a little bit, not get too sciencey or technical, but do you want to talk a little bit about the difference between red light, near infrared, the different wavelengths, and why that's important?

SPEAKER_00: 7:03

Yeah, I'll I'll kind of keep it top level because I think the thing that most people need to understand is this kind of uh wavelength of light. And when we say wavelength, we're referring to the colour. The colour defines the wavelength. So red light um has a specific wavelength range, and the near infrared light is just a little bit longer range. It's outside of our visible spectrum, so we call it infrared. But we're talking about, if you think about the rainbow of colours, we're talking about the longer wavelengths of light. And because of the angle of the sun at different times of day, we see a lot of this red light at sunrise and sunset. That's why we get these fabulous, you know, beautiful orangey, red, e-pink sunrises and sunsets. Because of the way the sun is angled at that time of day, that's when we get this light. And our bodies are very in tune with this light because really, up until 200 years ago, as humans, we would be outside most of the day, you know. Most of our evolutionary history would be living actually outside. You know, we we only have relatively recently lived this indoor lifestyle. So our bodies are very much designed to do certain things at different times of day. And when we see that red light, the red and near infrared at sunrise, it sets off a whole cascade of reactions in our bodies. It also kind of prepares us for the day, and then in the evening it prepares us for sleep and regeneration. So as a species now, we're very deficient in this longer wavelength light, the light we would see at sunrise and sun. So it is present at the rest of the time, but that's when we would kind of see the most of it in comparison to the other wavelengths. So I think, you know, for for people who don't want to get too much into the science, what we really need to know is we we are animals that have really evolved outside. We really do need to see that red light, which we see at sunrise and sunset. If we don't, and almost all of us don't now, we become deficient. It's almost like a vitamin deficiency. You know, if you're deficient in it, you need to put it back. And so, really, that's what this red light technology is doing. It's not doing anything alien to the body, it's just putting back those wavelengths of light that we've kind of removed from our lives by living in houses and having blue screens and doing all the things that we do now.

SPEAKER_01: 9:19

Yeah, I love that you just boil it down to that level of simplicity.

SPEAKER_00: 9:24

Yes. Because you can't, you know, there's so much to the science. But really, if we're kind of thinking about why would red light have this effect, that's why, you know, we we are still, although we're very um sophisticated in our technology at the moment, you know, this kind of time, this era of civilization, we're still living very basic bodies. You know, our bodies are still those bodies that, you know, have evolved 200,000 years ago. We still have the same light receptors, we still have the same little organelles producing energy. So we really need to think about how we can nurture that part of our evolutionary selves. If we can't be outside all the time, we need to find a way to replace that light that we're just not seeing.

SPEAKER_01: 10:08

Yeah, absolutely. And what makes your device that you created unique is that it has both a kind of transcranial component, a headband that you wear, in addition to a panel that you place on your abdomen to actually get red light to both places. Um I love that. So talk a little bit about kind of the interface of your device and how that works.

SPEAKER_00: 11:41

Yeah, maybe I'll demo it. I don't know if you do video. Yeah, yeah. But I can talk you through it because sometimes, you know, people see my device and they think it's like a visor. It looks a bit like Star Trek, you know, where you have the device over your eyes. But actually, it's very simple. So what I'm showing you now is the headband and it just has clusters, and you can see the red there, and in between, you know, those dots, that's near infrared, so it's just as bright, it's just not visible to the human eye. So the main reason I've put red in there is one because we want to get superficial, you know. Most of these masks that people are used to for collagen in the skin, they're red because it's superficial, but you're still getting through the skin. And then the near infrared will actually go straight through the skull and onto the surface of the brain. That kind of trips on people out. So there you just push it here against the forehead. So that's the frontal cortex. A lot of projections end in that area, and there's no hair there as a barrier. So you can go straight through onto that area, and then the body panel, very, very simple. You know, we don't need to kind of have really complicated tech. This is just red, and you can see the near infrared, and this you can just place over the abdomen because actually the abdomen is a really good site for getting light into the body, you know, there's less barriers, you haven't got to go through bone, it will go straight through, you know, five centimetres deep. In some people, that will go straight through the gut. In other people, depending on kind of visceral fat and things like that, it might just penetrate that. But you create by healing the gut, you create a better environment for the good bacteria. So whether or not you're directly getting to those bacteria, or whether you're just creating that environment by sealing tight junctions in the gut. For me, getting to the gut first is an intrinsic part of having a good brain. It's very difficult to have a good brain if your gut's out of whack or if you've got metabolites leaking into your body and and uh inflammation, communication via the vagus nerve. Really, to have a good brain, we we really want to heal that gut first.

SPEAKER_01: 13:47

Love it. Yeah. And then do you uh run that through a phone app? Is that how it works?

SPEAKER_00: 13:55

Yes, I use an app. Um and the reason I use an app is because as well as putting the light onto the surface of the brain, we can also pulse the light to different brainwave frequencies. So people may have heard of things like alpha and gamma brainwave frequencies because the brain is oscillating and we can detect that on the surface of the brain. Uh, and so we give those uh those numbers. So, for example, what we're attending to each other right now, we're engaged in this lovely conversation. So we're probably in a fairly uh consistent gamma phase, which means our brains are oscillating around about 40 times a second because that's the attentive phase. Some people find it difficult to get into these phases, maybe because of um injury or disease or or just being tired or whatever. So we can almost show the brain that 40 hertz frequency by turning that light source off and on 40 times a second, and then the brain responds by kind of upping its frequency. So we can go up or down. I have six different programs that enable you to get into different brainwave states. So I do use an app for that, but then on top of the device I have a Bluetooth disable. So for people who don't want to have Bluetooth on their head, and it's not a great idea, you know, you don't really want to have those things in your ears either. It's best to turn any kind of Bluetooth off. So you can set the uh program on your phone, get the device going, turn the Bluetooth off, and then you have um a program that's more bespoke to what you're trying to do that day. Awesome. You've thought of everything.

unknown: 15:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 15:35

Do you know that the dev team are like, why would they all kind of got their ear pods in? Why would you ever want to turn Bluetooth off? And I'm like, well, you know, some people are very sensitive, and it is a good idea. I mean, I know in the daytime we're kind of all sitting in the Wi-Fi, and you know, if you're living in a tower block, you know, it's something you can't really avoid. But I think, you know, little things to reduce it as much as possible. If you're not using your phone, have it on airplane, turn the Wi-Fi off at night. We can do little things to try and limit the exposure of these kinds of um frequencies that perhaps are not so healthy.

SPEAKER_01: 16:10

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Uh I definitely turn my phone into airplane mode every night before I go to bed. Yes.

SPEAKER_00: 16:17

Yeah, I think it's a wise thing to do. And so, I mean, you don't want to get phone calls waking you up anyway, and it's just a simple thing to do. And like I say, some of these technologies, it's just about okay, how can I just uh a little bit turn down some of these exposures that I'm getting? You know, I don't think we need to get too caught up with it because it is the world we live in, but little things, let's just try and reduce that exposure. It's like your diet, isn't it? Try not to eat processed food, you know, just try to cut down all the junk as much as you can.

SPEAKER_01: 16:46

Right. The the 80-20 rule or maybe the 90-10 rule if you're trying to have a little more discipline.

SPEAKER_00: 16:52

That's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 16:53

Yeah, excellent. Thank you so much. How long has this device been on the market? And have you heard a lot of feedback from people? Like, what has the feedback been?

SPEAKER_00: 17:03

So the device has been on the market now. We've just had our two-year birthday last weekend. Oh, happy birthday. The company's been going a little bit longer because actually there was a lot of product development went into the device. So we had a we had a whole year of product development before we actually went into producing the device. But we have had some excellent feedback. Um, we've had feedback from people with all kinds of conditions that have gone from wherever they're at to improved. Um, so we now have a group of people with um ALS, we have a group of people with young onset Parkinson's. And I do need to make the caveat that I'm not saying that we're in any way curing, treating, diagnosing, or preventing any of these diseases, but just people have seen they've gone from a baseline of where they're at to better. So better sleep, better movement, better memory, you know, enhanced relationships, being able to be resilient and deal with stressful situations. So we're we do have quite a lot of groups now for different things where people have really started to see the effect. I think healthy people also, you know, that's another interesting thing. Healthy people also have seen like more of a cognitive enhancement effect. And also, I was very amazed to hear how many people had low-level gut issues that didn't even realise. Because a lot of people will come to me and say, Oh, did I tell you that I had kind of, you know, bloating and all of that, and I don't get it anymore? And I thought, well, you didn't mention it, and they're like, Well, I just thought it was something I lived with. You know, I think we're at this crazy place at the moment where people are just living with all kinds of gut issues because it seems normal. Everybody's got it, so it's something, you know, people are very focused on what's going on with their brain. But a lot of the times the the gut is kind of the first, the first indicator that's something wrong. So any kind of gut issues, I think, should be nipped in the bud. And you and it's not normal to kind of have these things, you know, it is something that is uh you can do something about very easily.

SPEAKER_01: 19:07

Yeah, I would agree. I see a lot of gut dysfunction as well. And usually it's not it's not people's um main complaint. It might not even be the top five main complaints that they walk in with, but it's so often part of the clinical presentation that that people are suffering from different gut issues. And like you said, many of them do just kind of live with it and think that this is normal and this is just part of my life, and don't necessarily realize there are things that can be done. And uh, so I love that your device it works on both ends, the the gut and the brain. And I've been listening to some interesting uh information on the use of bitters, too, and just how important all the different bitters are in our diet and how many of them are removed because many people don't like the bitter flavor of things. And so uh hundreds of years ago, even our grains had more of a bitter taste to them, and we've since kind of like genetically modified that out. And so, even with like what we're eating every day, we're not getting those bitters that stimulate digestion before we even put food in our mouth or as soon as we do. So it's like we have to approach this gut issue from so many different angles, you know, from making sure the brain is healthy, making sure we have bitters in our diet, getting red light in our bodies, all the things.

SPEAKER_00: 20:26

All the things, and you're right. It's just I think we've moved towards this kind of comfort, you know, we've kind of moved towards a very comfortable lifestyle and things, you know, extreme cold, well not even extreme, but just uncomfortable cold, uncomfortable heat, like you say, bitter, you know, all of these things are are things that uh are like a home uh hometic stress, you know, a little bit of hormesis. A little bit of stress on the body is good because the body bounces back from that. And I think, you know, if we kind of coast along too in too comfortable a lane, there's absolutely no pressure on the body to develop any kind of resistance, and it's all very well and good until something happens, and then you haven't got the resistance to deal with it. So I I agree with you. I think trying to bring in some of these things which are maybe a little bit uncomfortable, you know. I do hot yoga, I I know I've got friends who do kind of the cold showers, you know, that's really what we need to do to kind of give our body that that robustness that we need.

SPEAKER_01: 21:28

Exactly. I mean, where I live, it gets pretty cold in the winter time. And so for me, as fall uh sinks in, I usually try to sleep with my window open and actually get my body used to sleeping in much colder temperatures so that when it then is below freezing, you know, my hypothalamus has kind of had a chance to be like, okay, I'm I've I've been you know worked into this. It wasn't just that I went from a 70 degree temperature controlled house to now it's negative 10 outside. And so yeah, for me, I even I don't love cold plunges, but I do definitely get a lot of cold exposure just by nature of where I live and kind of trying to get that cold air into my bedroom at nighttime as long as possible before it gets a little, you know, I don't want my house to be 30 degrees when I wake up, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 22:16

No, I get it. And that there's very easy ways to do some of these things, like you know, the ext, you know, you see these extreme buyer hackers sitting in these tubs of ice and things. But you're right, just having an open window or kind of, you know, on a frosty morning in England, standing outside without your shoes and socks on just for 10 minutes, you know, it's not something that has to be, you know, you know, you have to total the brave out or buy like a you know a 12 grand i've to no, you just have to kind of put your body in these uncomfortable things or or just be sensible. You like light is so important. Could you put your desk next to a window? Could you open the window? Could you do some of your meetings outside? You know, I think some of these things are much easier than people think.

SPEAKER_01: 22:57

Yeah, yeah. I know the recommendation is to try to get outside first thing in the morning for that morning sunlight. And luckily for me, I have a dog that wants to go outside first thing when he wakes up. So uh I can go and I can throw the ball to him first thing in the morning and get my morning sunlight. So he's kind of my um, I I don't know, I probably wouldn't just go outside and walk and just stand there for 15 minutes and do nothing. I like to be doing things all the time. So he uh he's my excuse for my morning sunlight.

SPEAKER_00: 23:26

Yeah, whatever works for you. I like to sometimes just go and stand there and kind of just try and see that sun coming up, or if I'm in a place where I need to walk to the sunrise, all the better. But it is so crucial and it is a simple thing. And if you miss out, it you really are like trying to get through the day with one hand tied behind your back because your body hasn't done the things that it needs to do. I mean, people talk about melatonin as the hormone of darkness, but you actually make it in the morning in response to seeing that morning sun. You know, cortisol levels, female hormones, male hormones, all these things are set. Even how your skin is sulfated to deal with UV light in the middle of the day, you know, people just uh really maybe don't prioritize that. I mean, that's what you know, red light devices are great for putting it back. So I always say number one, get outside as much as you can, see the sunrise. Number two, have a backup plan, have your red light therapy device because if you've missed it or you know, you're you're rushing around, you can very easily put that back. But if you consistently miss it, then then you know you're running your body without doing the things that the body needs to do to really, you know, be ready for the day. You know, it's kind of like never ever servicing your car, just running and running and running it. You know, things are gonna wear out.

SPEAKER_01: 24:47

Yeah. So I have a question. Obviously, where I live, it's dark, you know, we don't get the sun very high in the sky from September to May. And so many people do suffer from seasonal affective disorder. And I think a lot of people don't even recognize that they're suffering from seasonal affective disorder. They just are feeling more tired, more lethargic, a little, maybe not like full-on depression, but a little more down, not quite as motivated to go out and do things when it's dark by 5 p.m. And so usually, you know, when I was growing up, I always would see that people would have these sunboxes with certain wavelengths of light. But are you also seeing, or do you find that the red wavelengths of light are also therapeutic for kind of offsetting that seasonal affective disorder that people deal with in the winter?

SPEAKER_00: 25:35

Yeah, I mean, seasonal affective disorder is usually because people are missing out on all the wavelengths of light, because the light contains such a broad spectrum of the frequencies. So a lot of the light boxes that you mentioned are broad spectrum, they're not just the um red and the near infrared. Because although we talk a lot about blue light uh toxicity, you know, you need a certain amount for dopamine levels at the right times of day, you know. So if you're if you're in a very dark place, you know, you're not getting exposed to any of the wavelengths. But certainly the near the red and the near infrared light, the that seems to activate the body's healing mechanisms, probably because that's when we see it, sunrise and sunset. So you're setting your healing mechanisms up, you know, to prepare yourself for any injuries you might get in the day. And then at evening, you're kind of doing all kinds of things to heal the body as you sleep. So things things like you know, anxiety and depression and mood are very closely linked to that. So we do find for a lot of people it is a mood lifter, red light therapy. I mean, like I say, if you really have full-on seasonal effective and you're because you're in a very dark environment, I would recommend one of the full spectrum ones as well, actually. You know, get both. Sure. I have a lovely friend called Guti who's got a company called Mytolux, and he makes one that actually puts out the the UV as well, so you can your body can produce vitamin D because that's something that you don't do in these kind of very northern places. But from a perspective of improving mood, certainly these red light therapy devices have shown consistently to elevate mood. So if if you're kind of, you know, you're able to get outside, but you're still feeling a little bit down, I I would say to try the red light, because the red light will charge your mitochondria, give your body a lot more energy too. Sometimes, you know, what we're feeling is just a depletion of energy, just as simple as that. So if your mitochondria can produce more energy in the form of ATP, which is this molecule that the body uses for energy, then I think everything works better, you know. Everything works better, your mood's better, you're elevated, you can heal better. So, yeah, it is a slightly different topic having full-on seasonal effective, then you need the broad spectrum. Um, but yeah, red light therapy will definitely help with mood. Yeah. Still still helps with that mood lift. Awesome. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 27:59

And are you involved in any current clinical trials or studies? Or if there if there was a study you could do, what would it look like?

SPEAKER_00: 28:07

So I have a couple underway with my actual device. So I have a study actually in North Africa with autistic spectrum disorder, uh, which is obviously a childhood developmental disorder. So looking at things like uh mood regulation, um, and that is based on some previous research that's already been done that's shown that red light therapy could potentially help with that. So we're supplying the devices for that study. Also, as I've mentioned, um, ALS and Young Onset Parkinson's, we're doing case documented case histories uh in association with Professor Paul Shazau at Durham University. So it's not a clinical trial. Uh, we won't be able to publish any kind of clinical data, but we can publish documented case histories that have been properly reviewed with proper data collection. So we're kind of doing our little bit that we can do with the limited funds that we have for these trials because, as I'm sure you'll know, full-on clinical trials are a massive undertaking. I'm hoping that we will be able to raise some funds going forward to do these big clinical trials. But there are a lot of people who are currently doing that using very similar outputs and wavelengths to the one in Sarah Thrive. So that's another cool thing that's going on, is we can keep an eye on what's happening and then prove equivalence to other devices too.

SPEAKER_01: 29:26

Yeah, absolutely. Well, and I know you know you've mentioned Parkinson's and these neurodegenerative diseases, and it does seem like the future of neurodegenerative disease research really is on that intersection between mitochondrial health and inflammatory processes, and how do we actually improve the functioning and the health of the mitochondria and what are the downstream uh effects of that in terms of does that kind of mitigate inflammation and neuroinflammation?

SPEAKER_00: 29:56

Yeah, for sure. It's it's a very interesting uh uh field of study that's gaining a lot of traction right now. Let's say in the US, a lot of research is being conducted with the Veterans Association looking at things like, well, neurodegeneration, but also um TBI and PTSD. Um and yes, uh even at Harvard, uh Professor uh Paolo Cassano is looking at psychiatric conditions. So we're kind of I'm I feel like we're almost on the crest of the wave where we're going to start to see some of those medical approvals, then of course that will open the door for a lot of things to happen. Because at the moment, we just need to build the clinical evidence to a point where it's accepted by the regulatory authorities. We're not quite there yet, but I can see it. I can see it happening very soon.

SPEAKER_01: 30:41

Yeah, amazing. And then what kind of advice do you have for people who? I mean, I've had patients that have said to me, Oh, I went and I bought like a$40 red light device at uh the store down the street. So, how like what would you say to people in terms of like when they're looking for a device, what are the things that they need to be looking for so they're not wasting their money on things that are ineffective?

SPEAKER_00: 31:05

Yeah, every this is a very common question because it's very difficult to know. Uh What you need. I think the first thing is what is your goal? Because most of the devices are designed for a specific goal. So if your goal is muscular, for example, then you might want to either have like the bed or the big panel, something that you can stand up against. If it's general wellness, again, those panels that go on the wall could be cool. But if it's something like brain, you really do need to have something that's pushed up against the head and it's kind of a bit ergonomic because light will only go in a straight line. So if you have something that's kind of flat and you see light bouncing off of you, well, that should show you that it's not going in because you can see it coming off you. You know, I see all these pictures of people glowing red saying, Oh, I'm getting my red light therapy, and I'm like, Well, I can see most of the light coming off. Um, so you do need to have it contoured and round. It's best to have something that goes pushed up against the body, is my recommendation. So whatever you get, make sure you can curve it to the body and actually press it up against the body. Um, the beds are good, but often you have to go to the clinic. And then you just need to be able to contact the manufacturer and ask them, you know, what what is the power output? And again, this is where you have to rely a little bit on what the companies are saying because there's no um there's there's no absolute criteria that it has to be a certain wattage output, but most of the companies will kind of give that information and then let you know why they've done that. So, for example, my device is um 25 milliwatts per centimetre squared, it's 30 joules per centimeter squared. And if you look at all the research literature, it kind of sits somewhere between low to mid-dose. Um, and I do that deliberately because I'm obviously targeting the brain and we don't want to overstimulate, so I stay in the low to mid-dose range. So most companies will kind of be able to tell you that. But if you buy something off Amazon or something like this, you've just really got no idea what you're getting. If it's really old school, you know, if you're buying something that's meant to go on the back of a car or something, you could be getting heavy metals off them because LEDs are not all made in the same way. So you do have to be cautious. You know, you can't buy fairy lights or strip lights or something. You do need to have the the LEDs that are made to a certain ISO standard. If you're putting something on your head, you need to be especially cautious because you don't want to overheat the head too. So you need to have LEDs where you've got some kind of um heatsink so that you're not generating too much warmth.

SPEAKER_01: 33:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 33:41

And of course, any device that's been registered will have to meet those criteria. You know, anything that's been made in a factory where you are for human use or you're doing it for a certain application, they have standards that they have to meet. So really, some of these devices can be expensive, you know, it can be anything from like$500 to like$3,000. But what price do you put on your health? And if it's something you're going to use repeatedly, sometimes these things are worth the investment.

SPEAKER_01: 34:11

Right. And it makes more sense to buy the thing that's going to be effective versus buying a device that isn't as expensive. You use it a couple times, you don't notice anything, and then you it ends up in the back of your shelf and never to be used again.

SPEAKER_00: 34:26

Never to be used again, yeah. I and I think it that's why we try to do like webinars and trainings and support groups and things, so that you can get, you know, one, it's community, which is great for people if they are struggling with something. But two, yeah, you want to know that it's working and you want to know the right protocols and you want to have the science. Because the more you get into the, I don't know, I'm very passionate about it, but I find it so interesting that you start to want to know a bit more. So it's good to be able to have access to that information. So if you're just buying a device on Amazon, quite often people don't use it because you just don't know how to use it properly.

SPEAKER_01: 35:02

Yeah, absolutely. That is all really good, solid advice for people. Thank you for that. Uh, you had mentioned something, and this might get a little technical, but I do know kind of within the red light device world, there was some argument back and forth over whether the red light does actually penetrate the skull to reach brain tissue. And the I think some of the argument was over. Well, the studies were done on cadavers, which then can't translate to a living human organism. So where like have we officially ended up at a place where we can say definitively, yes, uh, red light does penetrate the skull, it reaches the brain at certain wavelengths and uh certain power outputs.

SPEAKER_00: 35:46

I think so. I think we've conclusively shown that. I mean, yes, you can do it with cadavers very easily, and you can kind of show it. But I mean, you can even, you know, measure the output, you know, if you're putting a device up against your hand and measuring it on the other side, you know, you that there are devices where you can measure that, and of course, there's we're going through bone there. But you can also do something called F NEARS, which is functional near infrared, where you can shine the light and then measure what's bouncing back and kind of see, you know, how far the light can go. So there's all kinds of things that we can do where we really do think that the light, not very far, I'm not saying it's going deep into the brain, but you know, at least three millimeters onto the surface of the cortex, you know, if you have the light source pushed up and you have the right wavelength. Because you do need to have near infrared. The red light is not going to go through. But yeah, I think now we have enough data from all different kinds of modelling, uh, actual physical experiments with cadavers, looking at how light bounces back and calculating well the light that's coming back. We have enough information to conclusively say yes, you can get through the skull. It's actually fairly transparent to these longer wavelengths light. And also we can, you know, we can use something like qualitative EEG and show differences before and after. So something is definitely happening to the brain during that intervention. Uh, functional MRI, we also have that data to show you shine light onto the brain, the brain responds directly, instantaneously. So something is happening to cause that. Um, yeah, there is quite a lot of data now around that.

SPEAKER_01: 37:26

Fabulous. Yeah. And then tell me a little bit about the difference between LED versus laser, because I know laser is the wavelength is cohesive. All the photons are moving together and LED is scattered. And so some people were saying, you know, this is this is why laser is more superior. So where is the research on all of that argument?

SPEAKER_00: 37:51

Yeah, so yes, you're right. The the initial use of light therapy was laser, uh, because really we didn't have the technology until the mid-80s for for making these LEDs that we could kind of use in a medical setting. So you're right, laser is a coherent beam of light. Um, so all of the light waves are going in in phase in the same direction, so you can get a very clear point light source. LEDs are non-coherent, so it's scattered. So, we like I say, a lot of the data does show we do see an effect on the brain using LEDs. So something is happening. Um, also, if you can imagine scattered light, you have these interference patterns. Some people say that could even be better. You have a bigger surface area and potentially you're covering more of the brain, whereas lasers tend to be pinpoint. I think I think both work. My my rationale for using LED is just that it's safer. I mean, because you have these coherent light beams, there is potential you wouldn't want to get it in your eyes or something. So you have to be very careful. It's not something you would just want to have lying around the house if you had kids or something, you know, if you had it in in the eyes. So LED is very, very safe compared to laser. Right. Um, and potentially it could be more effective or at least as effective as laser therapy. And so that's why, you know, if you go, it used to be um low-level laser therapy or um cold laser therapy was the terminology we use. We've changed it to photobiomodulation now to encompass both kinds because almost all professionals now recognize LED and laser as a good way to deliver light. Different. It could potentially be different, and I don't think we entirely know what the difference is to the body of um coherent versus non-coherent light. There are there are potential differences. The research is not there to say, you know, how we should apply those different light sources as yet. Not that I've read.

SPEAKER_01: 39:52

Yeah, well, and the I'm assuming the the sun is not uh coherent.

SPEAKER_00: 39:58

No, no, the sun's not laser beaming us, yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 40:02

And we're still getting benefit from uh the sunlight. Yes, that's right, yeah, for sure. Yeah, yeah. Yes, the sun is not the death ray.

unknown: 40:12

Yep.

SPEAKER_00: 40:13

Yeah, exactly. If you want to, you know, we want to mimic nature as much as we can. Well, certainly I do in these technologies, because I think, you know, really nature, nature cure is is the best medicine as much as we can stick to it. We have, you know, but we just have to utilize what we can in this modern society. You know, we can't go back to that. So we just need to kind of have that in mind. How can we be more like nature, but then bring this technology into something we can use in our modern lives? So, yeah, anything that mimics a natural process to me has got to be better.

SPEAKER_01: 40:46

Yeah, yeah, I love it. Excellent. Well, where can people find uh your device, your podcast, all the things that you're up to these days?

SPEAKER_00: 40:55

Yeah, so it's Sarah Thrive, it's C-E-R-A, uh, like the brain, like Sarah Bellum, cerebral, C-E-R-A-Thrive.com. And then all the socials are the same. And people can get to me through any of these channels. I do answer all of the uh questions and socials myself, or it's Sarah with an H, S-A-R-A-H at Sarah Thrive.com, if people want to get me directly. Uh, and Rebel Scientists is the podcast name. So that's a bi-weekly podcast. We also put out on actually on the Sarah Thrive page, on Amazon, on Spreaker, on Apple, however people find their pods.

SPEAKER_01: 41:32

Yeah, yeah, excellent. And I know that podcast, another great resource for people.

SPEAKER_00: 41:36

Yeah, we try and talk about things. I kind of always try and bring it into a light slant. It doesn't always work. But you know, things like stem cells, you know, stem cell migration and proliferation uh is influenced by light, you know. So this is an interesting thing. Diet, you know, we eat a lot of of foods that actually resonate with light. Our foods contain biophotons, we're emitting light. You know, all of these things are related, so it's just my aim is to try and uh get people as excited about light as I am, really.

SPEAKER_01: 42:05

Yeah, and now isn't there some research too to say that we have photoreceptors in more places in our brain or our body than just our eyeballs?

SPEAKER_00: 42:15

Oh, we're covered in photoreceptors. Really, if you think about um our biology, anything that kind of has that uh ring structure, which is almost all organic molecules in our body, will vibrate to some extent with water, uh with light. And water, which makes up most of our bodies, 70% of our bodies and our brains, also is a big light receiver. Um, anything in that long uh wavelength, our bodies are the water in our bodies also respond to that light. So we are really literally vibrating with light all the time. You know, our mitochondria vibrating, our bacteria, the water, you know, almost everything. The receivers in our eyes are just one very small part of it. You know, that they're very specialist receptors that help us know the time of day. But it's just one tiny part of our body that's oscillating with light. Actually, you know, almost our whole bodies are in tune with our light environment. Yeah, amazing. Yep.

SPEAKER_01: 43:15

So much that we still need to learn and understand about how our bodies operate, right?

SPEAKER_00: 43:20

That's right. Yes, that's right. I think it's yeah, we're continually evolving and uh as we get more sophisticated in the tech, you know, really we've only just had these like photomultipliers where we can look at light that's coming off the body. You know, really we're only at a stage now where we can assess that in any real term. You know, again, it's it's amazing. We're emitting light, and you know, what is that doing? And, you know, is that communication? We really don't know yet. So there is a lot more to discover.

SPEAKER_01: 43:47

Yeah. My mentor, Dr. Carrick, had published a study where he was using an infrared ceramic blanket and testing wound healing on um mice and kind of like a diabetic wound wound healing model. And so that's also what they were finding was that when you use the far infrared, that it was actually causing the stem cells to adhere to the the area that actually needed the healing. So I do find that research really interesting, this concept that you can use photobiomodulation to actually encourage stem cells to be attracted to the area that needs to heal.

SPEAKER_00: 44:26

Yeah. Yeah. It's just amazing all the different things that light is doing in our bodies for sure. And uh yeah, that there are some amazing technologies and things out there. Like I say, I do think it is a science that's kind of almost coming into its time now as we start to get more sophisticated ways to measure it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 44:45

Well, thank you for creating a device that people can trust to actually be helpful, beneficial on the body, the mitochondria, the gut brain access. I love it. Uh, so I'll put all of that information into the show notes. And is there anything else that you have going on or any other um places you would like to direct people to?

SPEAKER_00: 45:07

Um, I do do a bi-weekly webinar. So I would invite anybody who wants to attend that is free to attend. And we do a different topic every two weeks. So um more than happy for people to jump on that anytime, also. Amazing.

SPEAKER_01: 45:22

Cool. I'll add that in the show notes as well. Thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing all of your background, your hard work, and all the research and understanding on what could be kind of a confusing and complex topic.

SPEAKER_00: 45:36

Thank you. Yes, thank you so much. It was just such a pleasure to talk to you, really.

SPEAKER_01: 45:45

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