Glycine: The missing link?

Glycine is about to go mainstream, and here is why:

– When you are low in glycine, your immune system is “primed” for an over reaction to provocation into a sustained inflammatory response.

Check it out, they expose immune cells to a toxin from bacteria called LPS, the immune cells react and begin to depolarise i.e. they are going to start producing inflammation fast.

But then they add glycine to the mix with the immune cells and repeat it with the LPS challenge.

Note the cell does polarise a bit (which it should), but nothing like the massive shift in the first picture.

That means in a glycine deprived environment (like your body and your patients bodies), any perceived threat, be it infection or food being mistaken for infection (a food intolerance), will make the immune system produce a sustained inflammatory response very easily and inappropriately.

You can chug all the omega 3 oil you want, but that is not going to help and could actually make it worse.

And

So far it looks good in a petri dish, but what about animal studies with rats and reducing inflammation in response to bacterial toxic challenge?

Note: TNF alpha is a pro-inflammatory CYTOKINE, the orchestrator of inflammation and target of “biological” drugs for auto-immune issues.

The results are looking pretty good.

Oh and they even dosed them up to see if it reduced mortality.

You might then say, well rats are not humans, and you’d have a point, so let’s check in with some diabetics.

5g glycine daily or placebo, reassessed in 3 months.

They used TNF alpha again as a marker of inflammation.

Happy now?

But it gets even better.

Not only did it reduce inflammation but it also improved their diabetes markers, both fasting glucose and HbA1c (how sticky your hemoglobin is a 3 month marker of sugar control).

Over the next few weeks you will come to love glycine and wonder how did I ever live without it?

We are due Evolved collagen in around 3 weeks, after a series of exasperating delays, to satisfy your every collagen and glycine needs.