Pyruvate dehydrogenase function depends on thiamine (B1)

[Sidereal]

Long-Term Cognitive Improvement After Benfotiamine Administration in Patients with Alzheimer’s Disease

Five patients with mild to moderate AD received oral benfotiamine (300 mg daily) over 18 months. All patients were examined by positron emission tomography with Pittsburgh compound B (PiB-PET) and exhibited positive imaging with β-amyloid deposition, and three received PiB-PET imaging at follow-up. The five patients exhibited cognitive improvement as assayed by the Mini-Mental Status Examination (MMSE) with an average increase of 3.2 points at month 18 of benfotiamine administration.

3.2 points may not sound like much but it should be kept in mind that the MMSE is a 30-point scale.

 

[Chocolove]

Low blood sugar has been observed as a side effect of benfotiamine.
http://www.webmd.com/drugs/2/drug-145511/folic-acid-benfotiamine-mv-antioxidant-cmb5-oral/details/list-sideeffects

@Gondwanaland Did you take the Benfo with food?

 

[Chocolove]

I have taken a benfotiamine supplement at meal times off and on for several months with no problem. It is Doctor's Best brand containing 300 mg benfotiamine along with 40 mg L-Leucine. We are all different in what we can tolerate. And at different times one can tolerate more, or perhaps less, than what we used to be able to tolerate...

 

[alicec]

I think you may find the above research article of considerable interest.

Yes very interesting. I've been thinking about mechanism since it would appear that the positive effect on AD must not be related to increasing thiamine, or more to the point, increasing active thiamine in the brain.

"Benfotiamine has been shown to dramatically reduce plaques in the brain.[34] In this study, a comparison with the effects of furusultiamine, which does not alter plaques, suggested to the authors that the effects of benfotiamine were independent of thiamine and likely occur through benfotiamine's action on GSK."

I read reference 34. It is a small study in transgenic mice carrying mutant amyloid precursor protein and presenilin 1 genes.

Unlike previous studies which showed that benfotiamine did not increase thiamine in the brain, these studies did find an increase (much less than in blood), though not in active thiamine. Furusultiamine did exactly the same thing.

What a pity they didn't use sulbutiamine rather than furusultiamine. The former has been show to significantly increase active thiamine in the brain.

The main functional difference observed was an increased phosphorylation of glycogen synthase kinase, which would correspond with decreased activity of this enzyme. This in turn is thought to block formation of beta amyloid peptides.

Apart from that there is nothing else in the paper which might help explain what is going on.

As the cited review states, what is really needed are studies in humans with sufficient power, using various thiamine derivatives. I would suggest sulbutiamine and benfotiamine.

 

[Asklipia]

Yes very interesting. I've been thinking about mechanism since it would appear that the positive effect on AD must not be related to increasing thiamine, or more to the point, increasing active thiamine in the brain.

Yes and YES!
It is as though the massive presence of thiamine in the blood observed with benfotiamine were reversing the accumulation of plaque. A kind of reversal of polarities. I am wondering about the effect on cataracts.
Obviously the thiamine is going to a command center for these polarities which is outside of the brain.
Or could this be the wrong approach? Maybe the whole body is a command center in the sense that it is continuously adapting to the environment.
This is the idea behind a yogic view of the person.
I know that I am going to sink my credibility again! But I can take it.
In May 2013 @dannybex had started a thread Is Folate inhibiting Thiamine (B-1)? in which I posted this

About thiamine, have you read this : http://fr.scribd.com/doc/74090699/Astrophysiology-and-Yeast

especially p.42 :
Acetaldehyde stemming from yeast is a thiamine antagonist. It combines irreversibly with thiamine to form 2,3-butanediol, a stable adduct, that is excreted in the urine. The thiamine molecules thus imprisoned are no longer available for either aspect of the chi cycle. Thiamine is required for the liver energy requirements during the aldehyde dehydrogenase oxidation of acetaldehyde and for neutrophils that attempt to surround and destroy budding yeast as it shifts into its hyphal form. Responding to the metabolic impact of yeast in the system has increased the demand upon thiamine reserves already serving the energy requirements of every other active cell in the body's conglomeration of organs and tissues.
When all of these concurrent demands reach a critical threshold and the normal background chi pressure that keeps the body's chi spring wound up creates a sudden shift of thiamine out of the bloodstream, then normal chi pressure becomes excessive chi stress and body processes start to fail. The symptom first experienced might be a sudden headache, hot flash, night sweat, panic attack, fit of rage, dizzy spell, nausea, spike in blood pressure, or enervating fatigue that continues to worsen until the condition becomes chronic and internal organs begin to fail. When there is an overall insufficiency of thiamine in the system, so that both blood stream and chi field requirements cannot be adequately met, the body has slipped into a state of sub-clinical beri-beri, the thiamine deficiency disease.

and p. 46 on how to do thiamine loading.

For the thiamine loading part it seems that the availability of the lipophilic thiamines has provided a serious improvement.

 

[Asklipia]

The effects of endurance training and thiamine supplementation on anti-fatigue during exercise
It seems the Koreans have found a way to spend less time in the gym. More time for work or more time for leisure?
Note that the thiamine used is fursultiamine.

To sum up the previous, thiamine intake during exercise positively benefits carbohydrate metabolism in a way that will decrease lactate concentration, ammonia concentration, and anti-fatigue by reducing the RPE. Therefore, we can consider thiamine intake to be utilized as similar benefits as endurance training.

 

[Gondwanaland]

Did you take the Benfo with food?

I will have to research my notes and see if I find the timing. Back then I would only write dow what I took and not the timing. At some point I noticed that the timing is crucial info and started annotating it more precisely.

It is Doctor's Best brand containing 300 mg benfotiamine along with 40 mg L-Leucine.

That's the one I have, perhaps I will give it another go. But 1st I need to find out its possible interactions with xanthine oxidase

 

[Gondwanaland]

OK, here is what I gathered from my notes (2015) about Benfo:

There might be some confounding factors from other stuff I was taking

Improves mental energy, BMs,
Worsens thyroid, skin rash/eczema, stomach cramps, neck tension, hypoglycemia, do not take if caught a cold (worsens coughing), squinty eyes

I stopped taking it due to asthma symptoms (I don't have asthma )

 

[Asklipia]

@Gondwanaland Thank you for these details. Was your cough a dry one? Painful?
The reason I ask is that since starting this experiment with lipophilic thiamine (but not benfo), I found myself coughing quite a lot, but this is not feeling like asthma at all, it is a cough to expel blobs of mucus. Which I take as a way to clean the bronchiae, in fact is it exactly what was happening a couple of years ago when I was practicing an exercise for the upper body.
It does not feel as though I have a kind of infection in the lungs, no fever, no tiredness, just this need to spit out that very sticky phlegm from time to time.

 

[Gondwanaland]

@Asklipia I think it was dry cough. I will have to go thru my notes again for more details.

One thing that made me want to take it again is that in the 1st day I took it I was able to clean my desk that was a mess for several months back then. I have so many cabinets and closets to organize... I haven't touched them in years... I have been wearing the same 10-12 pieces of clothing again and again... There are moths flying out of my food cabinet But then I arrived at the part where I wrote about the asthma and am not sure about taking it anymore.

 

[Asklipia]

@Gondwanaland

 

[Sean]

"Humans store between 25-30mg of thiamine, much less than other animals. Due to thiamine being a water soluble nutrient, depletion can occur in 14-18 days."

Speaking as an Aussie, if you want a good source of B vitamins then a teaspoon of Vegemite will supply 50% of your RDI for thiamine (B1) and folate (B9), and 25% for riboflavin (B2) and niacin (B3).

It is not just a cultural icon, it is actually good for you, in small doses.

Avoid Promite and Marmite. They are only suitable for people with no taste buds, or class. Like New Zealanders.

 

[Valentijn]

Speaking as an Aussie, if you want a good source of B vitamins then a teaspoon of Vegemite will supply 50% of your RDI for thiamine (B1) and folate (B9), and 25% for riboflavin (B2) and niacin (B3).

It is not just a cultural icon, it is actually good for you, in small doses.

Unfortunately the source is yeast extract, which can have very nasty side effects for susceptible people. It's basically MSG/E621.

 

[Gondwanaland]

@Gondwanaland

This past weekend my husband attached this image on the fridge door:

At least he is humorous

I misplaced my driver's license last August and can't find it. At least I don't need it

 

[Sean]

It's basically MSG/E621.

Yes, the umami taste, which is the basic flavour of Vegemite, is glutamate based. But there is little evidence that glutamates are a significant health problem, except maybe in large doses for some asthmatics.

 

[Chocolove]

Bronchospasm (Adult). Bronchospasm occurs when the airways (bronchial tubes) go into spasm and contract. This makes it hard to breathe and causes wheezing (a high-pitched whistling sound). Bronchospasm can also cause frequent coughing without the wheezing sound.

http://www.webmd.com/drugs/2/drug-1...ntioxidant-cmb5-oral/details/list-sideeffects

folic acid-benfotiamine-mv antioxidant cmb5
Side Effects
List folic acid-benfotiamine-mv antioxidant cmb5 side effects by likelihood and severity.
The following side effects are associated with folic acid-benfotiamine-mv antioxidant cmb5:
Common side effects of folic acid-benfotiamine-mv antioxidant cmb5:
Infrequent side effects of folic acid-benfotiamine-mv antioxidant cmb5:
Rare side effects of folic acid-benfotiamine-mv antioxidant cmb5:

• Bronchospasm Severe
• Insulin Autoimmune Syndrome Severe
• low blood sugar Severe
• Confused Less Severe
• Depression Less Severe
• Easily Angered or Annoyed Less Severe
• Feel Like Throwing Up Less Severe
• Gas Less Severe
• Itching Less Severe
• Loss of Appetite Less Severe
• Not Feeling Well Less Severe
• Over Excitement Less Severe
• Rash Less Severe
• Redness of Skin Less Severe
• Sleep Disorder Less Severe
• Swelling of the Abdomen Less Severe
• Taste Problems Less Severe

 

[Chocolove]

http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...-edged-sword-due-to-sulfur-sensitivity.38246/

 

[Asklipia]

It does not feel like bronchospasm. Just spitting out phlegm from time to time.
The side-effects list is interesting.
The only ones I have are
- easily angered/annoyed but not really, just more energetic when I feel annoyed, which is not the same, and in fact I am very rarely annoyed, I like to let people go to hell their own way;
- over excitement could be one, but again just a little bit more enthusiastic than normal.
- the tiny loss of appetite has disappeared after a couple of days, now eating as much foie gras, oysters, risotto, lobster, roast chicken as usual.

I do take a lot of probiotics, started more than 18 months ago, maybe they helped for that too.

 

[Valentijn]

Yes, the umami taste, which is the basic flavour of Vegemite, is glutamate based. But there is little evidence that glutamates are a significant health problem, except maybe in large doses for some asthmatics.

The methodological contortions researchers go through to prove MSG is safe are a pretty good indication that it's not. Such as excluding anyone who has ever had any symptom which can also be present as a reaction to MSG, or serving it with fortified foods which likely mitigate the effects.

I get a migraine 23 hours after consuming the stuff. Replicated many times, including blindly on a few occasions, followed by tracking down what I ate and realizing MSG was an ingredient That's good enough for me. No asthma, by the way.

 

[Sean]

Certainly not advocating compulsory daily Vegemite for all.

But if it works for you, then it is a good source of B vitamins.