Sulfur Sensitivity with Dr Stephanie Seneff - Part 2

Nirala Jacobi:

Welcome back to part two of the SIBO Doctor podcast. Let's jump right back into it. Let's move on to other parts of your water paper where you talk about the methylation aspect being really disrupted because of this problem with cobalamin, what is it, absorption or I can't remember exactly.

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah, various problems with cobalamin. I can't explain exactly how glyphosate messes it up because it's pretty scary. I think B12 deficiency is probably systemic in our society in America. That's really serious because B12 deficiency can cause dementia. Sometimes people have dementia, and they find that they just get their B12 up, it goes away. So that's really exciting, positive news, but it would be really sad to have dementia on account of B12 deficiency, something you could correct and not know that. So, it's a really big problem. B12 is cobalamin. Cobalamin is a very big molecule and it's, of course, a B vitamin. It's a fancy, really, exotic, I think, molecule with very interesting capabilities. Cobalamin is difficult to get into your body because it's not just that you can take it and get it, because if you've got problems with absorption of cobalamin, you can take tons of it orally and it won't make a difference. It won't go in. So, there's a really big issue with the whole system that manages cobalamin.

There's an intrinsic factor. Also, there's a protein that binds to cobalamin. I think it's a protein. It's something that the cells in the stomach make that bind to cobalamin to protect it from the acid in the stomach, because if it's going through the stomach acid, it'll get destroyed.

Nirala Jacobi:

Not the intrinsic factor?

Stephanie Seneff:

Intrinsic factor is another thing. Once it comes out of the stomach and it's no longer acidic, then intrinsic factor grabs it and facilitates its transport across the gut. We talked about it in the paper. I don't remember exactly this business about the acid, but I do remember that there was something that was produced probably by the parietal cells in the stomach that protects cobalamin during the acidic transport, and then of course, it becomes less acidic and that's when that lets go. Then the intrinsic factor is crucial at that point to be able to let it be absorbed. The parietal cells are very sensitive to glyphosate because glyphosate goes through the membrane much, much better, hugely better under acidic conditions compared to non-acidic conditions. The stomach is very acid. I think that those cells in the parietal cells in the stomach are getting hit hard by glyphosate and that's causing impairment in the ability to absorb the cobalamin.

The other thing is the corrin ring. Cobalamin, of course, has cobalt and cobalt is a mineral that gets chelated by glyphosate. So, there's the issue of the availability of cobalt because glyphosate will grab hold of it and not let it loose, so then it becomes deficient. A study on cows looking at the different minerals in their blood, they found cobalt really, really low, eight different farms. The cows at all the eight farms had extremely low levels of cobalt in their blood, way below the minimum of the range that was expected. They suspected that was because of glyphosate exposure. That was the whole point of the paper, that the glyphosate was causing them to have a severe deficiency in cobalt. Cobalt is this wonderful atom, a mineral that goes into the center of this cage that cobalamin has as part of its structure, which is the corrin structure that's made out of four of these individual units that are produced by enzymes that are affected by glyphosate.

So, there's been studies that have shown that the glyphosate disrupts the synthesis of the corrin ring, which starts with glycine. Glyphosate disrupts because it looks like glycine, that it blocks the enzyme that begins this whole manufacturing process to make these pyrrole units that go into the corrin ring. So, the assembly of the vitamin is disrupted, the mineral supply is disrupted, the ability to get it across the gut barrier is disrupted. All these things are going to cause, I think, B12 deficiency in the context. Then of course, if you're eating vegan diet, you've got none in your diet because there's no cobalamin in a strict vegan diet. Really, the sources are going to be animal-based. So, for all those reasons.

Nirala Jacobi:

Yeah. So B12 is so important. I often check B12 in people and I can't say that I've come across super low levels. I would say my comfort level with B12 serum levels would be around 500. 500 to 600 is what I'm looking for. Anything below that, I do think that there is something. Then there're the various active B12 or transcobalamin, and then there's methylmalonic acid that looks at B12. Sometimes I have people that have very high levels, which I know can also be an indication that it's just not getting into the cell.

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah. Well, there's a problem with it getting oxidized. That's another issue with B12. You can be fooled into thinking that it's okay because it's been oxidized, and it doesn't work anymore. It's completely inactive, gets irreversibly oxidized. I think it's a cobalt plus three or something. I'll have to go back and look at the details of that, but I remember reading about that. It was really surprising to me that you could have high levels, but it might not be functional. And of course, glyphosate induces oxidation, so that could be a problem as well.

Nirala Jacobi:

There are some recent studies that link very high levels of B12, and they haven't looked at the oxidized versus unoxidized to higher cancer rates, right?

Stephanie Seneff:

That's very interesting. I want to go study that. That's new to me, but that's very intriguing because I do suspect that very high levels might be an indicator of this problem of it having gotten into this irreversible state. It's just there and it's not being removed, but it's also not functional. But the body keeps making more of it because it's not enough, but there's actually tons of it, but it just doesn't work. That's quite possible, I think.

Nirala Jacobi:

Yeah. I remember reading this few papers out in the UK. They think of it as an early cancer marker now to have high levels of B12 like that, but is the only way to fix that then to inject B12 or there's no use of giving it orally because that's all-

Stephanie Seneff:

I know. Well, people do that. I think they do get it up that way and maybe that is effective. It's terrible to think that that's the only way you can get it in. I just hate the fact that the system is so disrupted that you have to inject it, but that might be the case.

Nirala Jacobi:

Yeah. Well, that's why naturopathic physicians, we always look around and we're also creative thinkers, so we always think about how to increase stomach acid. Maybe what you're saying with glyphosate's effect on parietal cells, that totally gels with what I've experienced. People are just more in need of hydrochloric acid support. Doesn't mean that everybody needs HCl caps, but I use a lot of bitters and a lot of trying to coax these parietal cells back into producing, especially if B12 is low, I often do that. So that's very interesting. Okay. Besides B12 and with the methylation aspects, I think you mentioned something in your paper about other effects of glyphosate and how generally it affects methylation pathways. Was that the main-

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah, it was so fascinating, and I had so much fun. We both had so much fun writing that paper because we're trying to figure out the story. Whenever I write a paper, I want there to be a story and the story puts the puzzle pieces together. That one really had, I think, a fabulous story. You can take a look at it and see, but we have this one figure that we ended up putting in there that shows all this complex stuff that's going on. But it's really, really fascinating because it starts with the methionine, of course. Methionine, it's the supplier of methylation pathways collectively all over. It's the homocysteine getting converted to methionine to resupply methionine. When methionine has been used up, homocysteine goes back to methionine and makes more with an enzyme that needs cobalamin. So, there's actually only a few enzymes that need cobalamin and they're very interesting to look at them together to see how they're choreographing a whole symphony in terms of what happens when cobalamin is broken.

A whole compensatory mechanism takes place that ends up attacking the myelin sheath in the brain, so it's quite interesting. We show that in the storyline of our paper, starting with this defect in being able to make methionine, which then means methylation pathways are in trouble. There's not enough methylation and at the same time, it disrupts the citric acid cycle because there's another enzyme that produces succinate from malonate. It's an enzyme that feeds into the citric acid cycle. Succinate is a super important piece of the citric acid cycle, and it comes in from malonate, and malonate comes from propionate. Propionate is that short three-carbon fatty acid that's produced by the gut microbes. What happens is propionate piles up because it's blocked. It can't get converted to succinate and succinate becomes deficient. So, the citric acid cycle's going to be disrupted unless you have another way to get that thing going and that's where glutamate comes in. So, it's just really fascinating.

The propionate suppresses an enzyme that uses glutamate to detox ammonia. So, you end up with excess ammonia, and of course, ammonia goes to the brain and causes brain problems. But the ammonia is actually able to replace taurine in the brain so taurine can get loose and make sulfate. So, there's like this whole orchestra of things that happen, and when you follow each one of them through, it all makes sense. Ultimately, what you're doing is your immune cells are forced to steal sulfate, to steal raw materials to make sulfate from the neurons, from the myelin sheath in the neurons because the whole system is so disrupted. So, sulfate's playing a role too and the hydrogen sulfide gas as well. You can see how when you read the paper, it's really, really fascinating. They're all involved in it. And the eNOS, which we think is making sulfate in the red blood cells, also binds to cobalamin. We think that cobalamin binding is essential for it to make sulfate. We think that sulfate synthesis also gets derailed as well as the methylation pathways.

Nirala Jacobi:

This is nitric oxide you're talking about, endothelial nitric oxide, yeah.

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah. It makes nitric oxide, but it also makes sulfur dioxide. Greg and I have written papers on that. We think, again, this is theory, but it's quite compelling. When you look at the red blood cells, they're so interesting because they have this molecule, eNOS. It's an enzyme that makes nitric oxide. But if the red blood cells make nitric oxide, it's terrible because it'll bind to the hemoglobin and disable the same way as carbon monoxide does. So, the people are really puzzled. Why do the red blood cells have this enzyme which would actually destroy the hemoglobin and prevent them from carrying oxygen? Why would they do that? In fact, actually they work really hard to keep the substrate out. They don't bring in the arginine that you need to make the nitric oxide. So, they're like, what is going on here? It's a big mystery as far as why do they have this enzyme and how could they possibly use it.

In fact, it stays on the membrane in the red blood cells. On the membrane is when it makes sulfate. It makes sulfur dioxide instead of nitric oxide. This is a theory that Greg and I have developed, and again, it makes a whole lot of sense when you look at the red blood cells in particular. They need the sulfate to make the cholesterol sulfate to keep them with a negative charge. They do that, I think, using this eNOS as the enzyme that makes it. The eNOS has a place where it binds cobalamin and the cobalamin, I think, it's actually glutathional cobalamin. Cobalamin hangs onto these various small molecules to make it possible for them to react. The glutathione stuck to the cobalamin, stuck to the eNOS, holds onto a sulfur atom that came from hydrogen sulfide gas in order to make the sulfate. So, it's quite fun. The eNOS produces superoxide in that configuration instead of nitric oxide, and the superoxide oxidizes the sulfur.

So it's quite beautiful and cool and it all fits into the whole narrative of the cobalamin deficiency working on those three different enzymes, but all interconnected in the process that's going on with the disruption of methylation pathways, disruption of sulfation pathways, and then finally the erosion of the myelin sheath in the brain as a consequence of a desperate need for sulfate when things are so messed up.

Nirala Jacobi:

Wow. I'm sure that a lot of listeners are lost in our conversation, but that's-

Stephanie Seneff:

They could go back and read the paper.

Nirala Jacobi:

That's right. Read the paper. It'll be in the show notes. It's a very elegant theory. I really like how it all comes together. I love the fact that just the elegance of the body of trying to overcome a toxin and that it has these different mechanisms that we look at as disease states, but it really is just a way of the body saying, "I need this to survive." That's what I love. I love that. How does that scenario fit in? Okay, let me just say that I want to talk about deuterium in a minute, but I know that people at this point are just horrified by the levels of glyphosate and the damage that it does. Okay, besides banning the molecule, besides banning this herbicide, is there anything that you've come across that really helps to detoxify the body of glyphosate?

Stephanie Seneff:

There was a nice paper that I read by some folks in Germany where they had cows that were sick, and the cows were eating lots of glyphosate in their food. They measured glyphosate in the urine. It was high. I think they probably were motivated by prior knowledge, but they actually fed them bentonite clay, sauerkraut juice, and fulvic acid, and humic acid. Those were the things they tried. Probably makes sense to you. That's been catching on. Then I think now with people, people like yourself, certainly naturopaths are supplementing people with these kinds of things to help to clear the glyphosate. They showed that the glyphosate levels went down and the cows' health improved. So, it was pretty cool, what they did. The sauerkraut juice was just really cute.

Nirala Jacobi:

I love sauerkraut juice, but a lot of people wouldn't be able to tolerate that.

Stephanie Seneff:

I know. Little children, autistic kids are probably not going to be willing to drink sauerkraut juice, but even sauerkraut or apple cider vinegar is also possible.

Nirala Jacobi:

Well, and that's got other benefits as well, but always be careful with... These dysregulated people, they need to be super, super careful and work with somebody that really knows what they're doing, would be my recommendation. Then obviously, improving sulfur pathways because sulfation and the whole process of detoxification and phase one, phase two, phase three of detoxification system all relies on sulfur to some extent. Because if we find it in the urine, it means it had to go through the whole system. It had to go through detoxification pathways. We know it can be done. So yeah, I'll just put that.

Stephanie Seneff:

I certainly always encourage people to eat high-sulfur diet, and I'm rather obsessed with that. We eat lots and lots of garlic, also, of course, herbs and spices. Really spice up your meals and cook everything from scratch. I think that's an important message to get. I know people are so busy, they want to just eat processed foods. The processed foods are really toxic. We have a huge problem in America because of people being too rushed to spend time in the kitchen and so they end up just grabbing a bite from some fast food joint, which has absolutely terribly unhealthy food. Most Americans are just eating a terrible diet with these. So basically, you're throwing away a lot of the nutrition when you basically take these foods and then you process them into food-like substances that's like just pure flour, pure sugar, some artificial flavor. It's just disgusting. Then pure oil.

You've missed all those wonderful molecules that are present in the plant. When you eat, especially when you eat fresh vegetables raw, so salad, we try to have a salad every night here and everything's organic. Then of course, apple cider vinegar, you can use that on your salad dressing to help get some probiotics. Then sulfur-containing animal-based foods are terrific. Certainly, organic eggs are a fantastic food choice because they're rich in micronutrients. So basically, thinking in terms of eating foods that are rich in micronutrients and natural. So natural plants and natural animals are a basic message.

Nirala Jacobi:

That's the naturopathic creed and mantra. But obviously, we're talking about people that would just be so symptomatic. If you are sensitive to sulfur and you've listened this far into the podcast, then go back to my conversation with Dr. Nigh I had five years ago. It was December 2017 podcast on hydrogen sulfide and his whole conversation. He references Dr. Seneff a lot. That's a good one for you, listener, if you have issues with sulfur. This whole exclusion zone water is fascinating. You wanted me to also mention this other aspect of deuterium, this isotope of hydrogen. What's the deal with that and how does that fit into the picture?

Stephanie Seneff:

Okay. We'll see what we can do. It's hard to know where to begin, but deuterium is heavy hydrogen. Hydrogen's the smallest atom. It has one proton, one electron. Then deuterium has an extra neutron. Neutron is about the same weight as a proton and electron is practically weightless, so it's twice as heavy, essentially twice as heavy as hydrogen, which gives it very different properties. It's naturally present in seawater at 155 parts per million, which doesn't sound like a lot, but that means the level in our blood is five times as much as what we have of calcium, so it's not trivial. It's a very small molecule, but there's a lot of it. It turns out that it's extremely toxic to the mitochondria. I think biology has centered its mechanisms around the concept of delivering low deuterium protons to the mitochondria.

It's quite fascinating when you start reading about specialized enzymes that are able to choose hydrogen over deuterium. When I have an enzyme, I have a substrate, I'm going to pick off this hydrogen. I'm going to put it over here. If it's deuterium, I'll just throw that one away and go get a different molecule. I won't use it because I have really special skills as this particular kind of enzyme. These enzymes are disturbed by glyphosate. Many of them, most of them even are disturbed by glyphosate according to my glyphosate susceptibility motif. As soon as I heard about deuterium and realized that there were these enzymes that could select against it and knew that those were enzymes that were disrupted by glyphosate, at once, my ears perked up and I said, "This has got to be a problem with glyphosate." It's disrupting the enzymes that know how to select hydrogen over deuterium and it's a very, very important thing to do to make the mitochondria healthy.

It's because the deuterium gets into those pumps, the ATPase pumps that make the ATP, the hydrogen is pouring through those pumps. The hydrogen motor force is what drives those pumps. If you've got a deuterium in there, I liken it to sugar in the gas tank. It's basically that pump hates the deuterium. It breaks. It can break the pump. It can cause it to start releasing reactive oxygen species, which can cause mitochondrial damage, DNA mutations. So, you can get really in trouble with your mitochondria if you can't keep deuterium out of that intermembrane space. So that's really the center of the deuterium problem.

Nirala Jacobi:

Okay. Where are we exposed to deuterium? Is it in our diet, in our water? Where's it coming from?

Stephanie Seneff:

It's everywhere.

Nirala Jacobi:

It's everywhere. It's a natural substance and our body hates it. Especially our mitochondria, it hates it, and it has-

Stephanie Seneff:

Well, our mitochondria hate it, but actually our gelled water likes it.

Nirala Jacobi:

Right.

Stephanie Seneff:

It helps to gel the water and the body knows how to trap it in the gel. This is what gets really interesting. What I think is happening with the gelled water, I remember we said it pumps out the protons and it creates a battery with a negative charge. The protons that leave the gel are significantly reduced in the level of deuterium. I suspect. Again, this hasn't been proven. This is theory. However, what has been proven is that the gut microbes, some of the gut microbes can make hydrogen gas from hydrogen that was originally attached to organic molecules. They make hydrogen gas in the gut. I found a paper from the 1960s looking at a microbe that made hydrogen gas and they found out that that hydrogen gas that it made had only 20 parts per million of deuterium compared to 155 in seawater. 20, it's way, way down. It makes sense because deuterium stays in the liquid phase. Whenever you make a gas, you get low deuterium hydrogen, I suspect, which is really, really interesting because hydrogen sulfide gas also has low deuterium hydrogen, I suspect, and I think the body uses that.

Nirala Jacobi:

We make plenty of hydrogen gas. SIBO, I still have a hard time wrapping my head. That could be a compensatory event as a response to the lack of protons, for example, that's needed for exclusion zone water because SIBO has so many different causes. When we treat the causes, SIBO disappears without having to necessarily address that. But I get what you're saying that that is just part how the body recycles maybe hydrogen naturally, because it also-

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah. Well, it's really, really interesting in the gut because the microbes make this hydrogen gas and then other microbes take the hydrogen gas and put it together with carbon dioxide to make methane. So, I have methane gas, CH4. So that's four hydrogens and one carbon. Those hydrogens are going to be really low in deuterium because they came from hydrogen gas. Now that methane gets converted to methanol, and then that's no longer a gas. From methanol, it goes to formaldehyde and then formate, and then finally back to CO2. So that whole chain of methane to methanol, to formaldehyde, to formate, to CO2, that whole chain is very, very important in metabolism. The whole thing came from that hydrogen gas and so all of those hydrogens that are in that molecule are low deuterium, and the body knows that. Those things become the methyl groups that get shipped around by methionine. So, it's really, really fascinating. All those methyls that are thrown around everywhere in the body, the methylation of the proteins and the methylation of the DNA, those methyls are gold. They're gold because they came from hydrogen sulfide gas. That's what I think.

So, the body pays attention to those methyls and keeps them very carefully. Then eventually, they actually get metabolized to carbon dioxide in the mitochondria, supplying them with low-deuterium hydrogen.

Nirala Jacobi:

Right. Methane, to me, is just a carrier in a way and it's not a pathogen. It's not like the Methanobrevibacter smithii. It's not a pathogen. We evolutionarily selected to have methanogens on board, these ancient species, to compact hydrogen gas. That was always-

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah, to create low-deuterium hydrogen. That's the thing. The methane traps the low-deuterium hydrogen that came from the hydrogen gas at the other bacteria [inaudible 00:25:18]. Then that methane normally gets converted to methanol, which can no longer be a gas. From that point, it's no longer a gas, and eventually it can be metabolized. But the enzymes that take the methane and turn it into all those other things are all enzymes that they're deuterium depleting enzymes and they're sensitive to glyphosate. They have the glyphosate sensitivity motif. I think glyphosate is disrupting the enzymes that convert the methane back into organic matter that can be used in metabolism and that can provide low-deuterium hydrogen to the mitochondria. As a consequence, you get excess methane. Of course, methane is a big problem with greenhouse gases. People talk about the cows being bad because they release all that methane. My guess is that if you fed the cows organic food, they wouldn't produce so much methane. One way to solve the cow problem is to feed them organic food, I suspect.

Nirala Jacobi:

I think they've come across an algae product to feed the cows to reduce methane output. That would be interesting to see what that does to methane. Okay. This is just so fascinating. Okay, just as a recap, there's a lot to recap, but we covered all of the nasty effects that glyphosate has, not just on our microbiome, but also on our sulfation pathways and collagen production on exclusion zone water. We've talked about deuterium and its effects on the mitochondria, and also how it's actually a positive effect on exclusion zone water. It's a lot to digest really. Let me go back to the deuterium. Is there a way to manage that through diet? Because I think-

Stephanie Seneff:

There is. There is, yes. Fat. That's the interesting thing. Animal-based fats have the lowest deuterium. People can actually measure the deuterium levels in different foods. I have not been able to get a lot of data, but enough data to see that the sugars and the carbs have higher deuterium, significantly higher levels of deuterium than the fats. In fact, the lowest deuterium in the foods that I've seen in the measures that I've found was coconut oil. Coconut oil had the lowest deuterium. Then next to that was ghee, which is this butter that they use in India, and then regular butter. Organic butter has less deuterium than butter from cows that are fed toxic food. If the butter is made by the cow that's eating organic food, it has lower deuterium. So, the fats are all much lower.

This gets down to numbers like 110 compared to 155. So, it's not really low, but the sugars are the highest. Then the cottage cheese is somewhat lower and in fact, dairy. Interestingly enough, humans produce breast milk that's low in deuterium, low deuterium in the breast milk for the baby, which totally makes sense because you're trying to feed the baby, keep the deuterium low. Interestingly, deuterium was discovered by researchers in Russia by looking at people in Siberia who were super healthy. They were living a long, healthy life up into their 110, 120, and still going strong type of thing. I mean really amazing health. They were getting their water from the glacier. It turns out glacier water has low deuterium. They market glacier water; I noticed on the web. You can spend money to buy glacier water and that's because the water gets trapped in the ice.

The ice is like a gel. It traps the deuterium. So, the water that evaporates from the glacier can be down to as low as 90. The lowest levels of deuterium that I've found is in glacier water, naturally occurring in glacier water. You can buy deuterium-depleted water that's extremely low, like 10 parts per million, which is synthesized in this big fancy lab. It's very hard to make and therefore also very expensive. So, it's outrageously priced compared to what you would expect water to cost.

Nirala Jacobi:

Yeah, that wouldn't be necessary for your average healthy person, because it sounds like if we go too low on deuterium, wouldn't that affect this exclusion zone water?

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah, I wouldn't drink water that's only 10 parts per million, but I actually do buy it and I mix it with regular water to make something that's essentially like glacier water. I try to drink a glass of that every day even though I'm healthy. I believe it enough to think, well, I might as well do that. Because from what I've read, I really think it's a crucial part of the story. And of course, mitochondrial dysfunction is associated with all kinds of diseases.

Nirala Jacobi:

And we see a lot of that. There are so many different causes and sometimes it feels like we're just looking at one part of the elephant, but we're trying to see more of the elephant by having discussions like this because it fits in the disease model of many different issues that I've talked about with other experts on this podcast. Gosh, it's just been mind-blowing to talk to you, Dr. Seneff.

Stephanie Seneff:

I want to say, by the way, hydrogen sulfide gas is a low-deuterium product just like hydrogen gas. Both gases are going to have low deuterium in those hydrogens. I think that's part of what's going on when you have this hydrogen sulfide buildup. It's a way for your body to try to provide low-deuterium hydrogen to the mitochondria. Hydrogen sulfide actually goes into the mitochondria and gets oxidized to sulfate and thiosulfate. The mitochondria know how to oxidize it, but when they do that, they grab those hydrogens, and those hydrogens are very valuable to them. I think that this whole issue of all this hydrogen sulfide toxicity is a consequence of a desperate need for low-deuterium hydrogen in the mitochondria.

Nirala Jacobi:

Right. Okay. I think I'm going to stop there because my mind can't keep up anymore. But for everyone listening, Dr. Seneff has a great book on glyphosate. Do you want to mention your book?

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah, Toxic Legacy.

Nirala Jacobi:

Toxic Legacy.

Stephanie Seneff:

How the Weedkiller Glyphosate Is Destroying Our Health and the Environment.

Nirala Jacobi:

Okay. I'll put the link on there, yeah.

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah, I can send you a link and also a link to the paper, the water paper.

Nirala Jacobi:

That's great. The water paper was fantastic for sure. Thank you so much for joining me here on the podcast. This has been absolutely illuminating. I really appreciate your time. Are there any last-minute thoughts that you have on this topic that you want to squeeze in or you're good, you're good on it?

Stephanie Seneff:

I do want to mention sunlight again. Get out in the sun without sunscreen, without sunglasses.

Nirala Jacobi:

Okay. So, this is always a challenge.

Stephanie Seneff:

Yeah. I'll tell you a story about my eyes because I've been wearing glasses forever. I'm nearsighted from a young age. About 15, 20 years ago, I stopped wearing my glasses. I started taking them off when I was outdoors because I was reading about how important sunlight is and I think to the eyes as well. So, I stopped and eventually I just stopped wearing my glasses altogether, unless I had to be like, what, seeing a slideshow or something like that. But for most of my life, I don't need my glasses and I just went down. My glasses actually became dysfunctional. When I tried to put them back on again, they weren't right. I knew my eyes had changed and I couldn't wear them anymore. So just the other day, I went to the eye doctor. I had my eyes exam and he looked at my glasses, which were quite old. He said, "Well, these are completely wrong. Their prescription is way too strong compared to what your eyes are." "Your eyes have gotten better," he told me.

He said, "Most people's eyes get worse when they age, but yours got better." I don't have cataracts. I don't have any issues. [inaudible 00:33:23]. My eyes are fine, and my glasses are useless because they're too strong.

Nirala Jacobi:

Yeah, the benefits of sunlight, definitely I would concur. I do live in Australia, which has the highest rates of melanoma, so just take it always with a grain of salt, people, and do your own health research. But I also do feel that sunlight obviously is very important for other aspects.

Stephanie Seneff:

I need to say, by the way, that glyphosate disrupts your body's ability to protect itself from the sun, especially your eyes. So, when you have a lot of glyphosate in your eyes, it's going to cause them to become damaged by the sun. The melanin in your eyes and also the melanin in your skin come from the shikimate pathway, which glyphosate disrupts. I think a lot of the problem-

Nirala Jacobi:

Wait, humans don't have shikimate-

Stephanie Seneff:

No, but the shikimate pathway makes the precursors that the body makes the melanin from, the tryptophan, the tyrosine.

Nirala Jacobi:

The shikimate from the plants.

Stephanie Seneff:

Well, and in my gut microbes.

Nirala Jacobi:

Right.

Stephanie Seneff:

The gut microbes make those precursors to the melanin so your melanin can become deficient because of glyphosate exposure to the gut microbes. That's going to mean that you don't have natural protection from the sun. So, I think that's an issue. In fact, studies have shown that glyphosate disrupts the eyes in animal studies.

Nirala Jacobi:

Well, after everything we've said, I wouldn't be surprised if it disrupts more than all the things we've talked about today. It's like one of those things that it's surprising for such a small molecule because when you look at it, it just looks like glycine with a bit of phosphate, but it looks benign, yeah. Anyways, yeah. Okay. You know what? I do have to stop because my mind is blown officially. I'm officially out of questions. Right now, if I start for a while, I would have some more. But again, I want to thank you for your time and all of your contributions to this super important topic. I would not be surprised if you hear from me again soon, and especially if you write more great papers like you did.

Stephanie Seneff:

Thank you. Right. Thanks for having me. This was a lot of fun.