Teemu Arina dives into the world of Functional Mushrooms with Maximilian Endter, co-founder of Smaints.
Maximilian’s passion is to explore the potential of human beings. As a biohacker, mycologist and the co-founder of Smaints, he has made it his mission to combine the ancient teachings of traditional medicine with the modern findings of science – and to share it with the world.
This not only manifested in the form of products loved by thousands of people, but also practical ideas for reaching your highest potential. Max’s personal journey to optimal gut health 8 years ago led him not only to the incredible effects of functional mushrooms, but also to discovering everyday biohacks with the greatest possible leverage.
This conversation was recorded in April 2024.
Visit https://smaints.de/ and follow @smaints_mushrooms on Instagram to learn more!
Check https://biohackersummit.com for upcoming events & tickets!
Devices, supplements, guides, books & quality online courses for supporting your health & performance: https://biohackercenter.com
Key moments and takeaways:
00:00 Introduction by Teemu Arina
01:30 Maximilian’s background and the story behind Smaints
04:34 What Smaints stands for
06:11 About Yaks and Cordyceps
08:27 The first kingdom on Earth was the Mushroom Kingdom
09:32 The key pathways affected by several popular fungi
12:31 Agaricus Blazei vs. Hashimoto’s Disease, Cancer and Blood Sugar
15:03 Oxalates, Antioxidants, Selenium, Red-Belted Conk
16:44 Why the origin of your mushroom products is so important
17:25 The powers of Reishi
20:52 What is Maximilian’s favourite Functional Mushroom and why?
25:03 A mushroom that supports Sedentary Cognitive Work
26:19 Certain fungi may have effects which haven’t been fully studied yet
27:17 More powerful mushroom protips from Maximilian
28:37 Maitake vs. drugs in Fertility Treatments
29:58 Coprinus Paleotropicus and Blood Sugar
31:13 Birch Polypore and Skin Health
31:58 Paul Stamets, Turkey Tail and the European Market
33:23 Oyster Mushrooms are actually Functional Mushrooms
34:18 Different extraction methods for mushroom products
35:06 Why vegetable glycerin extracts are interesting
36:34 The benefits of triple extraction
38:35 Thoughts behind Smaints products and mushroom use in everyday life
41:25 Visit https://smaints.de for more information (also available in English)
42:15 Availability of lab certificates
43:06 Smaints at the Biohacker Summit 10-year Anniversary (July 2-3, 2024)
Transcript
Music.
Speaker:Hi, this is Teemu Arina from Biohacker's Podcast. Today I'm talking to Maximilian
Speaker:Endter and he's from Germany.
Speaker:He's an avid biohacker who turned into a mushroom enthusiast,
Speaker:those functional mushroom types.
Speaker:And we both share the fascination for the mushroom kingdom.
Speaker:And he has some pretty unique angles at which he looks at these functional mushrooms.
Speaker:Also, I think he's the only dude
Speaker:who I've met recently who likes to use glycerin extracts of mushrooms.
Speaker:I personally stumbled upon using vegetable glycerin as an extraction method
Speaker:probably a decade ago when I was making my own extracts.
Speaker:So a lot of people use alcohol and water extracts. The issue with alcohol is
Speaker:obviously if you don't want to use any alcohol and vegetable glycerin is probably
Speaker:one of the most effective means to do that. It's a sugar alcohol.
Speaker:It's also kind of a natural sweetener in that sense. And I've used it to extract
Speaker:a bunch of different things, not just mushrooms, but also adaptogens.
Speaker:But anyway, this guy is bright. I'm very happy to talk to him. Welcome to the show.
Speaker:Thank you very much. I'm very happy to be here and I've looked forward to it for a long time.
Speaker:Awesome why don't you share the story of how you got into mushrooms in the first place,
Speaker:that's a little bit of a story my co-founder and and
Speaker:i we know each other since few times then our ways left each other and we met
Speaker:again after our university time and then was the decision what are we doing
Speaker:with our life and we didn't know yet but what we knew was we should We should do something together,
Speaker:but we didn't know what.
Speaker:So we started our first little adventure, founded our first very little company,
Speaker:and we helped other people in marketing and stuff like this,
Speaker:but it was not the thing we really wanted.
Speaker:What was happening right then was we had our studies, we had hobbies,
Speaker:jobs, and many, many different things, and our to-do lists get longer, longer, longer.
Speaker:Productivity gets lower lower lower so what
Speaker:we became was biohackers we
Speaker:tried to optimize our biology body health
Speaker:spirit everything we tried also everything
Speaker:since this day it is seven eight
Speaker:years ago we start biohacking with the breath all
Speaker:the nutrition stuff meditation and supplements
Speaker:also and the funny moment
Speaker:we came across the mushroom was a very random one
Speaker:we listened to the podcast from tim ferrist big biohacker
Speaker:back then I think 2016 and he told the story that he took cordyceps mushroom
Speaker:we never heard of it before as he said he was lit like a christmas tree which
Speaker:we found really confusing and funny also because we thought about he's lit like
Speaker:a Christmas trees is legal,
Speaker:where does it come from and what does it do?
Speaker:And what we saw back then it was.
Speaker:7 000 studies I think now we
Speaker:have 50 000 studies for many many different functional
Speaker:mushrooms to 600 medicinal things
Speaker:you can do with them which is pretty awesome.
Speaker:And then we thought why there is not a product we would.
Speaker:Like to use because there were many many capsules from
Speaker:china where you don't know really what is in there how
Speaker:is the quality and stuff like this then there
Speaker:were some not so good tasting stuff on the market and
Speaker:we thought maybe that there should be a brand that encapsulates magic
Speaker:the mushrooms have not magic mushrooms functional mushrooms
Speaker:in like a very very good way
Speaker:and what we came across was that mushrooms were
Speaker:used on the planets like forever and
Speaker:only in europe it's kind of like people forget
Speaker:about it but in china they use it since 5
Speaker:000 years south america also like
Speaker:millennia and they talk about their mushrooms
Speaker:like they are the small saints so they
Speaker:think they are holy and we when we
Speaker:talk about mushrooms some people say mushroom doesn't
Speaker:taste that good or they are toxic or yeah
Speaker:they don't think good about them and we want to bring back that positive
Speaker:picture of mushrooms that's why we call our
Speaker:company smains it stands for small saints and
Speaker:that's the story how we came across them and since seven years there
Speaker:we are very hooked into the kingdom yeah absolutely
Speaker:the aztecs knew what they were talking about of course the small saints some
Speaker:are connecting that to some researchers to the psychedelic type of mushrooms
Speaker:people very often mistake to functional mushrooms and maybe expect similar functionalities
Speaker:but what is the big difference here with functional or medicinal These are mushrooms.
Speaker:And these psychedelic ones,
Speaker:it's not just the compounds and effects, but also the way it grows.
Speaker:Most of these functional mushrooms, they grow on trees instead of on the ground,
Speaker:and they are so-called polypore mushrooms. The exception is...
Speaker:The cordyceps that you mentioned, I mean, there is many exceptions,
Speaker:of course, but from the most popular ones, that this one is a parasite to insects.
Speaker:And this grows in Tibetan plateau.
Speaker:And it's an interesting mushroom because it infects the nervous system of ants
Speaker:and starts to control them like zombies, moving them to the highest point where
Speaker:they will get paralyzed, fertilized, rooted,
Speaker:and then there is a mushroom popping out from the forehead of the ant where
Speaker:it drops its pollen and spores.
Speaker:Then what can easily happen is just one infected ant can destroy a whole ant colony.
Speaker:I've also read that yaks do eat them in mating season.
Speaker:Why didn't you expand a little bit on this cordyceps?
Speaker:What kind of mushroom is that and why does it have an effect on humans?
Speaker:Why are we not that far from yaks eating
Speaker:yeah that's a really cool story the legend says
Speaker:that people saw this mushroom
Speaker:because the yaks kicked down in the ground and kind
Speaker:of got wild in the mating season and
Speaker:it's funny because it's also enhancing testosterone sexual
Speaker:hormones and is like aphrodisiacum it's
Speaker:the same effect on humans so to speak and
Speaker:this is the mushroom that got us hooked into the
Speaker:whole kingdom because as biohackers we want to have more energy more
Speaker:resilience more power and so on and
Speaker:studies show it is doing exactly this you see that the atp production in the
Speaker:cells is higher which is our true source of energy in the body you also see
Speaker:that people have more oxygen in the blood there's a parameter called bo2 max
Speaker:you can measure it and like four
Speaker:weeks to eight weeks, when you take the mushroom,
Speaker:you see people have more oxygen in the blood. In sports, they can have more endurance.
Speaker:Also, they have more strength.
Speaker:And for sports people, so to say, it's a really interesting mushroom because
Speaker:it's like doping, so to speak.
Speaker:And it's not on the doping list anywhere but for horses.
Speaker:So in horse races, it is forbidden.
Speaker:For humans, it's possible to take it. and some sportsmen use it.
Speaker:So 1993, I think, the team of Chinese women in sprinting, they had many records,
Speaker:world records, and they win.
Speaker:The championship and they asked the trainer the
Speaker:coach how did you do this because sometimes they
Speaker:think they do doping so he said they used cordyceps so it got really big into
Speaker:the whole fitness industry the mushroom and it's pretty known and really crazy
Speaker:mushroom so what you've spoken about in the second part of your question is
Speaker:i think the most fascinating fact about mushrooms.
Speaker:Why does a mushroom work in the human body or in animal bodies, so to speak?
Speaker:Because that's exactly the question I had the whole time when I started digging
Speaker:into the mushrooms and they work against blood pressure, they work against whatever
Speaker:problems there are on the planet. How is it possible?
Speaker:And there's this really, really cool theory that the first kingdom on the planet
Speaker:was the mushroom kingdom.
Speaker:So mushrooms were here before everything else.
Speaker:And they made small compounds out of the big organic compounds so that other species can evolve.
Speaker:We share, like many other species on the planet, DNA with mushrooms.
Speaker:And we share pretty much DNA with them.
Speaker:We are like more mushrooms than animals, if you compare it.
Speaker:And that's why mushrooms work in a very other way than plant compounds or anything else comparable.
Speaker:We are mushrooms. If we take it like this, and that's why we get some,
Speaker:I also say it's like a software upgrade for our immune system.
Speaker:If it's too overactive, for example, the mushroom can show, hey, this is our blueprint.
Speaker:Go back to homeostasis.
Speaker:And there's a very, very big intelligence in the mushrooms we can use because we share DNA.
Speaker:And that's why they have superpowers we can use.
Speaker:Yeah, it's interesting that we are genetically very close and there's some key
Speaker:pathways that many of these functional mushrooms do affect.
Speaker:So while it breaks down a functional mushroom and its compounds,
Speaker:you have polysaccharides where the key one is beta-glucans that has immune system
Speaker:modulating effects, especially in the gut.
Speaker:It increases the production of macrophages, so the cell eaters,
Speaker:and also natural killer cells that activates the immune system in that way.
Speaker:It also has three terpenoids, for example, in Reishi that are anti-inflammatory
Speaker:and anti-viral and anti-cancer properties.
Speaker:And then you have secondary metabolites where you have a bunch of terpenoids
Speaker:and steroids and alkaloids that have all kinds of effects from antioxidants to anti-inflammation.
Speaker:One of the key pathways is NFKB. is critical in regulating immune system response.
Speaker:And many of these mushroom compounds do inhibit NF-kappa and reduce inflammation that way.
Speaker:And one interesting thing that I find is that it also affects proteins like
Speaker:cytochrome C in mitochondria.
Speaker:So there's this mitochondria-mediated induction of apoptosis in cancer cells, which is interesting.
Speaker:It's kind of like, if you look at it, it's actually a hormetic stressor.
Speaker:So it's irritating to the system, like the compounds, to a level where it makes
Speaker:your body just function better in a sense.
Speaker:There is other pathways as well that these mushrooms modulate,
Speaker:MAPK, for example, or JAK stat pathway.
Speaker:Those are also immune system related and cell growth related pathways.
Speaker:If you look at, for example, cordyceps has cordycepin, and that inhibits the
Speaker:production of pro-inflammatory cytokines, such as interleukin-6 and TNF-alpha.
Speaker:And one of the kind of key pathways that operates here is NFKB.
Speaker:So it's a really central effect here, so to say. And I mean,
Speaker:cordycepin is interesting because it's quite similar to adenosine.
Speaker:Another compound that a lot of people consume is caffeine that blocks adenosine receptors.
Speaker:Cordycepin can do the same, and the result is increased alertness.
Speaker:But what cordycepin also does, there seems to be improved blood.
Speaker:There's cardiovascular effects, so it improves oxygen intake.
Speaker:And one interesting thing about cardiovascular health, specifically on cortisol
Speaker:is that it reduces platelet aggregation, so blood cells don't clump together when you use it,
Speaker:so it prevents formation of blood clots and in that way, it also improves blood
Speaker:flow and it also has effects on blood cholesterol levels.
Speaker:These are very interesting compounds and there's different compounds in different mushrooms.
Speaker:Now, one mushroom that you have on your product line is Agaricus blazei.
Speaker:Most people know Cordyceps, Reishi, Shiitake, Chaga, all of these.
Speaker:Why do you have Agaricus blazei and why is that such a cool mushroom?
Speaker:Yeah, that's a very special one. You said not that much known because it's basically
Speaker:from South America and all the healing tradition is more in China and Asian countries.
Speaker:But what's very special with this mushroom is it has the most potent effect
Speaker:on the immune system. It's the extract.
Speaker:It's also with chaga. We developed this with Dr.
Speaker:Simone Koch, and she is an expert for Hashimoto's disease.
Speaker:And this mushroom has some very interesting studies concerning autoimmune disease,
Speaker:Hashimoto's, and also thyroid stuff.
Speaker:So that's the main point we are using it in our immune product because it's
Speaker:one of the most potent immune balancing and stimulating mushrooms.
Speaker:And you need that kind of firepower, so to speak, in the immune system for these
Speaker:heavy things like autoimmune disease, also cancer.
Speaker:Cancer, it is used in South America in the therapeutics while people get chemotherapy.
Speaker:Because it's great for the immune system, that it brings the immune system back
Speaker:because most people die of the side effects of the chemotherapy because the
Speaker:immune system is killed.
Speaker:And this mushroom is so potent for the immune system, it brings it back.
Speaker:So they have much, much less side effects there because they use this mushroom
Speaker:and we use this immune power for regulating immune system, them also for allergies,
Speaker:very good and for stuff like this,
Speaker:but it's your favorite mushroom because of another thing it does, right?
Speaker:Yeah. One thing that I noticed about it is it's very potent blood sugar regulator.
Speaker:I have a friend who has diabetes and she told.
Speaker:Out of all the mushrooms that she has used, Agaricus blazei basically completely
Speaker:baselines her blood sugar levels.
Speaker:And that's a really interesting effect. There are some natural compounds there
Speaker:that do influence insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism.
Speaker:And yeah, it's not very well known, but most of the effects that are studied
Speaker:on functional mushrooms are in there.
Speaker:It does have beta-glucans, for example.
Speaker:That's a type of soluble fiber, which also reduces LDL cholesterol.
Speaker:So if I was having an unhealthy lifestyle or I would have, let's say,
Speaker:a very high saturated fat diet, oxalate mushrooms are great because of the way
Speaker:it also affects cholesterol.
Speaker:To me, what is interesting about it is also some of the antioxidants in these
Speaker:mushrooms that help deal with oxidative stress.
Speaker:And my knowledge also contains some selenium that people are deficient of.
Speaker:So that's a cool thing, which also has a role in the immune system as well as a mineral.
Speaker:But there is also hepatoprotective effects on many of these functional mushrooms.
Speaker:This is not on the market, at least easily available, but I think it's called
Speaker:the red-belted conch mushroom.
Speaker:That one is very potent on dealing with liver-related issues.
Speaker:I could imagine you could take these with or after alcohol and might have hepatoprotective effects.
Speaker:I know that's one of those things. For example, reishi potentially does.
Speaker:It's kind of anti-hangover because of the liver functionality.
Speaker:But the Alkidecus plaza is great for that blood sugar regulation thing.
Speaker:And it's South American, but you have actually a European version of that, right?
Speaker:We cultivate all our mushrooms in Europe. So we also use different species of
Speaker:this mushroom, for example, from Reishi, there are, I don't know, 50,
Speaker:100 specific ones in German, it's the Glänzender Lackporling,
Speaker:very interesting names in German language for these mushrooms,
Speaker:or in China, there's lingzhi.
Speaker:In Japan, it's reishi and so on. And we can use all of them combined and cultivate
Speaker:them in a very, very potent way, which is very important, organic.
Speaker:So mushrooms catch everything, which is heavy metals or whatever is there and try to decompose them.
Speaker:So it's very, very important where the mushrooms are coming from.
Speaker:As we started with our mushroom love back in
Speaker:the day we saw that many stuff is coming out of
Speaker:china and you have some problematic compounds in
Speaker:there we don't want yeah talking about reishi or lingzhi that's one of the most
Speaker:studied mushroom also one of the most appreciated mushrooms actually in the
Speaker:chinese medicine system not everything coming from chinese medicine is solid
Speaker:but many are and And Reishi is definitely one of those.
Speaker:One of its key mechanisms is actually the inhibition of nuclear factor kappa or NFKB pathway.
Speaker:Reishi has triterpenoids and polysaccharides and other compounds that inhibit that pathway.
Speaker:And it also affects the cytochrome P450 enzymes.
Speaker:That's the liver, especially when it comes to drug metabolism and synthesis
Speaker:of cholesterol, steroids and other lipids.
Speaker:Cytochrome B450 is key and it supports those enzymes, but there is no cross
Speaker:interaction with pharmaceuticals. That's why it also makes it very safe to use, I would say.
Speaker:That's one of those things that you can also.
Speaker:Support sleep in the evening. Cordyceps is more a morning thing that you mentioned
Speaker:earlier with alertness.
Speaker:I also see Chaga is kind of an endurance thing.
Speaker:If you want to, because of its high antioxidant capacity, if you do something
Speaker:which is potentially causing oxidative damage, Chaga is awesome.
Speaker:And Reishi is great for recovery and that kind of overnight immune system support.
Speaker:Port it's a really cool mushroom and there
Speaker:is different forms and types of mushrooms also when
Speaker:it comes to reishi when you go to china or thailand even
Speaker:wherever in asia you find a lot of different
Speaker:varieties of lingzhi and I found ganoderma lucidum it's the latin name from
Speaker:all different place of the world all the way from finland to recently in an
Speaker:island in thailand which I'm very proud of, that I like running into this mushroom.
Speaker:It's quite rare, actually, outside of cultivation.
Speaker:And what is striking about it is it's like really bright color,
Speaker:red, especially on the peripheries.
Speaker:And these mushrooms have slightly different compounds that are aggregated into
Speaker:different parts of the mushroom.
Speaker:And most of the health benefits are actually kind of almost skin layer of that mushroom.
Speaker:When the mushroom grows inside a tree, It forms these kind of like thicker mycelium
Speaker:and then it sprouts out from the mushroom to produce that so-called fruiting body.
Speaker:And the stuff that grows normally inside trees, like the way it's cultivated, is to produce that.
Speaker:There is actually more surface area to extract the health benefits of it when
Speaker:you have more surface area compared to a fruiting body.
Speaker:So actually in a cultivating situation you can produce more of the active compound
Speaker:than in wild nature, but at the same time wild nature provides the stimulus
Speaker:for the mushrooms to produce those compounds that we seek.
Speaker:There's different techniques to kind of of stress the mushroom,
Speaker:so it produces more of it.
Speaker:And my understanding of cordyceps cultivation is that they actually make the
Speaker:mushroom kind of fight each other a little bit, so it produces more cordyceps.
Speaker:So you can kind of see these compounds as part of the mushroom's own immune
Speaker:system that separates it from the outside world, which is a chemical-based immune system.
Speaker:And the more it is under stress from the environment, the more of these compounds
Speaker:will be produced for its own protective reasons.
Speaker:And then in the human body, lo and behold, we have the pathways where it can work with school.
Speaker:Out of all these mushrooms, which one is your favorite? In terms of more functional
Speaker:mushrooms, what do you like yourself?
Speaker:The most favorite mushroom for me is lion's mane.
Speaker:It's also a very crazy looking mushroom. It looks like a lion's mane.
Speaker:It has some white lines lying down.
Speaker:And it's also called pom-pom. it looks like it's
Speaker:a really cool looking mushroom you can google it and this
Speaker:mushroom is very special because it has
Speaker:two big areas of superpowers and
Speaker:the first superpower I like the most is it has compounds that regenerates brain
Speaker:cells and nerve cells so it's hiring a nerve growth factor and bdnf it's like
Speaker:rebuilding structures in the brain that got damaged it's neuroprotective and does studies.
Speaker:Which is very funny and they they measured the iq of
Speaker:people beforehand and after the intake of
Speaker:lion's mane and the people got more intelligent
Speaker:which is cool I think and it's a brain power
Speaker:mushroom and that's the one area and the second area which
Speaker:is very much connected with this is our
Speaker:gut this mushroom has some really cool
Speaker:immune system benefits and the most important one
Speaker:from this mushroom is it is repairing the gut
Speaker:lining it has also hundreds
Speaker:thousands of years in traditional chinese medicine they use
Speaker:it for every kind of skin or
Speaker:barrier in the body there are mucous membranes in the
Speaker:body every mucous membrane not only in
Speaker:the gut also in the stomach so if people have problems with
Speaker:stomach up from the down to after every
Speaker:mucous membrane is kind of
Speaker:repaired and made more wet by this mushroom
Speaker:which is crucial for the functioning of mucous membranes
Speaker:and that makes it very powerful I myself had some
Speaker:issues with leaky gut and I tried like the beginning of biohacking very many
Speaker:different things and this mushroom and other mushrooms were a catalyst for getting
Speaker:these kind of problems away from me so I like it very much you mentioned it It affects the brain.
Speaker:So I'll add a little bit of scientific details.
Speaker:The grain-derived neurotrophic factor is one of those growth factors that influence
Speaker:the survival and differentiation of neuronal cells.
Speaker:And it's vital for long-term memory and thinking processes.
Speaker:And lion's mane enhances the expression of BDNF and thereby supporting neuroplasticity
Speaker:and cognitive functions in learning and memory.
Speaker:And what is interesting about it is you don't really have an immediate effect
Speaker:from it. It's more like an effect that builds up.
Speaker:When you keep on using lion's mane, it rejuvenates your brain in a sense.
Speaker:If you have brain damage, you have stress, lack of sleep, whatever,
Speaker:it can stimulate that brain-derived neurotrophic factor.
Speaker:And other effects that I find interesting about it, you mentioned the gut effect.
Speaker:Of course, there is beta-glucans, and we think of something like inflammatory
Speaker:or irritable bowel syndrome, IBS.
Speaker:It exhibits these kind of anti-inflammatory properties, which influence the
Speaker:production of inflammatory cytokines in the gut.
Speaker:Technically speaking, it reduces inflammation, and in that way,
Speaker:you can manage the symptoms and help the body to heal itself.
Speaker:And one interesting possible effect is here that it might also promote the production of tight muscles.
Speaker:Junction proteins in the gut that fixes the leaky gut effect.
Speaker:You kind of reduce the intestinal permeability by using this mushroom.
Speaker:In a way, Lion's Mane can protect the stomach lining from damage and help the
Speaker:body to support healing.
Speaker:But of course, it will be more effective if you combine that with some other
Speaker:compounds, for example, L-glutamine. You mentioned Tim Ferriss earlier.
Speaker:I think one of the first things that I learned from him that really worked for
Speaker:me was to take 5 to 10 grams of L-glutamine after,
Speaker:let's say, you know, you eat something bad or you get food poisoning or whatever,
Speaker:you had to use antibiotics or something and you feel horrible,
Speaker:that can really speed up in the empty stomach the healing of the gut lining,
Speaker:which is interesting, and these mushrooms can definitely help in that process.
Speaker:But yeah, I think like this, these mushrooms are great for anyone who does cognitive sedentary work.
Speaker:Why? Cognitive because these mushrooms have these kind of reindeer neurotrophic factors.
Speaker:There is these antioxidants, there is anti-inflammatory compounds,
Speaker:and then there is all those things
Speaker:that modulate blood sugar and lipid metabolism, so cholesterol values.
Speaker:If you sit a lot throughout the day, this is one of the best things to add to
Speaker:your daily beverage, like a cup of coffee or something. and I have used over 10 years now.
Speaker:Functional mushrooms on a daily basis without a break.
Speaker:And I do attribute a lot of changes in my health in the last 10 years compared
Speaker:to 10 years earlier to using these mushrooms regularly.
Speaker:Like better functioning gut, then also better biomarkers like lipid metabolism.
Speaker:And then the third thing is, which I think is also key, is less seasonal flus and sickness.
Speaker:Or if there is something, thing, it will pass very quickly.
Speaker:So you are kind of more prepared for those moments when your biological organism
Speaker:gets challenged from the outside.
Speaker:That's also my favorite mushroom, but I've noticed that there might be effects
Speaker:from lion's mane to libido.
Speaker:And there's anecdotal reports on the internet.
Speaker:I haven't looked into the studies, but there's a lot of people who do complain
Speaker:that they feel less drive if they use Lion's Mane on a regular basis.
Speaker:I need to look into it, but I think it's solid that with a lot of these things,
Speaker:there might be effects that we haven't studied or understood yet.
Speaker:And cycling them in and out is key. That's why I also don't use the same mushroom every single day.
Speaker:I'm kind of like cycling them in and out. It works really well for me.
Speaker:There's days when I'm not having cordyceps at all.
Speaker:There's days when I'm not having Reishi at all, but it's different times of
Speaker:the week when I do different things. And that seems to work for me pretty well.
Speaker:Do you have any other kind of advice or experience that you want to share?
Speaker:About these wonderful creatures of nature? Yes, there are many the superpowers of mushrooms.
Speaker:You mentioned before you have a friend that has some problems like diabetes
Speaker:and things like this. We had the agaricus, which is a very good one.
Speaker:And there are some mostly unknown functional mushrooms, but they have very,
Speaker:very cool powers considering diabetes and also the blood sugar.
Speaker:And the first one, and it's my favorite study
Speaker:of mushrooms is about maitake and maitake is
Speaker:the hero of our metabolism it can it
Speaker:has really an impact on our sugar metabolism
Speaker:so it showed in studies that it can also
Speaker:invert the insulin resistances in
Speaker:the body and optimize sugar intake and that
Speaker:comes in very handy that's why we have it in the
Speaker:balance products where we say it's more like
Speaker:inner balance for you against stress combined with
Speaker:reishi and also the hormonal balance because reishi has
Speaker:also the hormonal balancing effects and we
Speaker:combine it with maitake because there's a really really cool
Speaker:study about the reproduction function
Speaker:of women and they had
Speaker:pcos so they have problems with
Speaker:their uterus and so what they
Speaker:used maitake extract against a drug
Speaker:which is called clomiphene what this drug does
Speaker:it also can bring the women back to have
Speaker:children again but with really really
Speaker:bad side effects like losing your ability to see
Speaker:or as getting blind and very harsh side
Speaker:effects and they but they can get women back to fertility to like 97 percent
Speaker:the maitake extract has done the same thing without any side effect in a very
Speaker:low dose so So 250mg extract for a study is not enough.
Speaker:And the maitake can do it like 76% of the time.
Speaker:And they found out that it is because of the reversing of the insulin resistancy in the uterus.
Speaker:Also, when the women don't have any diabetes or stuff like this,
Speaker:they can have an insulin resistancy because of the PCOS.
Speaker:The mushroom is reversing it, then energy flows and they become fertile again, which is awesome.
Speaker:Awesome really really cool and I think it's much more cool because you have
Speaker:the comparison with like a very very harsh drug so that's interesting for people
Speaker:who want to optimize their blood sugar stuff and so on and there's also a mushroom
Speaker:people don't know it's called coprinus.
Speaker:Paleotropicus in german it's shop tintling and it is a very crazy looking mushroom it does not
Speaker:grow on trees so it's on the ground and it has
Speaker:a very arrow formed head so to speak
Speaker:and then it is this head
Speaker:is turning up and it looks like it's blue
Speaker:that's why it's called tintling and these
Speaker:mushrooms have not only some effect on
Speaker:the blood sugar levels and sugar metabolism but
Speaker:also some very very good effect on our organ
Speaker:that is producing insulin also it's on
Speaker:the the pancreas it's a very special mushroom not
Speaker:many people know it but it has very very
Speaker:good effect on the pancreas and that's on insulin
Speaker:production and on the whole sugar game
Speaker:and it's pretty unknown interesting i
Speaker:can share a couple of lesser known effects on
Speaker:mushrooms as well that a lot of people know it actually
Speaker:protects the skin against uv rays and
Speaker:other forms of oxidative stress and the reason might
Speaker:be because it influences super oxidized dismutase
Speaker:enzyme activity so SOD that is crucial for breaking down potentially harmful
Speaker:oxygen molecules now there's another mushroom that works on skin health that
Speaker:is not very well known it's called the birch polypore the Latin name is Viptoporus petulinus.
Speaker:This one has all kinds of different effects that could help skin health.
Speaker:For example, the typical ones that all these mushrooms have is anti-inflammatory,
Speaker:antimicrobial, antioxidant capacity.
Speaker:But there's some wound healing benefits from this birch polypore.
Speaker:And the effect is that this mushroom promotes the activity of fibroblasts.
Speaker:Those are the cells that are crucial in wound healing and formation of new blood
Speaker:vessels. And if you want to repair your skin damage, all of that,
Speaker:like that mushroom, I find it's very interesting.
Speaker:Now there is also Paul Stamets, one of his favorite mushrooms.
Speaker:I think two favorite ones that he speaks a lot about is Turkey Tail as one of his top mushrooms.
Speaker:And it's very rich in PSK, which is polysaccharide K and also polysaccharopeptides, PSP.
Speaker:And it stimulates the immune system activity. It's a really good immune system modulator.
Speaker:And another one, which he used to treat his mother's cancer effectively,
Speaker:I think intravenously, was Agaricon, which is Omitopsis officinalis.
Speaker:And Agaricon has a lot of antiviral properties, has been studied against different
Speaker:viral infections, including influenza, smallpox, and so on.
Speaker:The exact effects are not very well known
Speaker:but something is happening there
Speaker:with viral replication where this mushroom
Speaker:inhibits that effect unfortunately a
Speaker:lot of these mushrooms which have all these cool effects don't necessarily have
Speaker:that commercial use in European Union before the year 97 unfortunately some
Speaker:of these are not available on the European market turkey tail is definitely
Speaker:one of those mushrooms that actually have to extract it.
Speaker:Grows in almost every ecosystem. It's quite easy to find, but that is an example
Speaker:of a mushroom, that although it grows everywhere here, you can't really sell it in European market.
Speaker:But yeah, oyster mushrooms, those you can eat, those are available everywhere,
Speaker:has commercial use and very few people know that that's one of the top potent
Speaker:functional medicinal mushrooms available in a typical supermarket.
Speaker:And oyster mushrooms are great for immune system
Speaker:support as well and in
Speaker:the end a lot of people do use functional mushrooms without knowing
Speaker:it by just eating those
Speaker:things or and so on but adding more
Speaker:of the superheroes of nature into your diet can definitely help prevent issues
Speaker:or help speed up healing and provide that well-rounded support for your immune
Speaker:system the way your body is dealing with stress and all the way from the gut, to uterus,
Speaker:to brain.
Speaker:Like these have many, many different
Speaker:effects. And kind of circle back into the best ways to use these.
Speaker:So a lot of people on the market, they use extracts that are double or triple
Speaker:extracted with alcohol water, maybe some more advanced processing techniques,
Speaker:powder to mix in their drinks.
Speaker:They might use straight powder, which I don't recommend because it doesn't really
Speaker:have most of the compounds in bioavailable form and are not standardized.
Speaker:Standardized then there's alcohol extracts but of
Speaker:course those are challenging in countries where you can drive
Speaker:in traffic with any amount of alcohol in your
Speaker:blood you may want to avoid alcohol extracts in that case and that's where the
Speaker:glycerin extracts are cool and it also adds kind of the sweetness to it it's
Speaker:one of my favorite herbs to add into my coffee is why don't you talk a little
Speaker:bit about the vegetable glycerin extracts and why did you choose to go with that one.
Speaker:It's exactly the thought process we had. We started with our powders,
Speaker:which were more like a lifestyle product.
Speaker:Many people drink mushroom coffee or mushroom cacao, and we made some functional
Speaker:mushroom powders with adaptogens and so on.
Speaker:And we always thought about what is the most potent way to consume mushrooms
Speaker:to have more of the benefits.
Speaker:And of course, we came across the liquid extraction.
Speaker:Back then we thought there's only the alcohol extracts. And when we tasted them,
Speaker:we said, okay, that's not for us.
Speaker:I can't really taste this.
Speaker:It pretty much tastes like an alcoholic beverage where you have fried mushrooms
Speaker:in, so you have to like it.
Speaker:So for us, for our brand, it's always very necessary that there's a good taste,
Speaker:like a good ritual you have with the product in the morning and so on.
Speaker:And alcohol is not the best to consume in the morning, for example.
Speaker:For us liquid extraction was then something we
Speaker:didn't look into and then
Speaker:we came across the glycerin extracts and
Speaker:when we first tasted them I said how is
Speaker:this possible it tastes like honey and then
Speaker:we looked into the compounds that are
Speaker:in there it's crazy so the liquid extracts we
Speaker:have so potent one tablespoon of it you can
Speaker:compare with 36 normal mushroom powder
Speaker:capsules which is pretty much compounds
Speaker:in there you can't get more mushroom compound in a
Speaker:bottle like this and it's because we do triple extraction so
Speaker:we first do that what every extract friend
Speaker:is doing it's the hot water extraction it's the cheaper
Speaker:extraction method and you mostly only
Speaker:get the polysaccharides out of there
Speaker:so all we talked about the immune system
Speaker:and stuff like that beta-glucane all these stuff
Speaker:you get out with hot water extraction and the
Speaker:fun stuff of the mushrooms we talked about bdlf in
Speaker:in lion's mane or all the 200 there
Speaker:are more than I think 300 tryptophanes in
Speaker:reishi all these are only extractable
Speaker:with alcohol and we do an alcohol extraction to get all these frayed compounds
Speaker:out then we have to get rid of the alcohol again and And then we do a third
Speaker:step and that is the cold water extraction so that you get also the compounds
Speaker:out of there that are heat sensitive.
Speaker:And then we have the glycerin and glycerin is a very special compound that can
Speaker:hold these big amounts of compounds, which are water soluble and fat soluble,
Speaker:which are extracted with the alcohol.
Speaker:And then you have a very very potent extract of
Speaker:the mushroom which holds basically anything
Speaker:that is in nature in the mushroom but potentiated big
Speaker:time and the very cool thing is the taste you mentioned
Speaker:it it's you can get a sweetness into your drinks and
Speaker:the power of the mushroom and it's without sugar the taste comes
Speaker:from the glycerin itself and if we use it
Speaker:in organic form out of sunflower seeds
Speaker:and it's yeah it was a very cool
Speaker:moment when we taste the first time the glycerin extract
Speaker:and it's a very very a hard process to do
Speaker:but then you have a very potent extract in the end you have a bunch of different
Speaker:mushroom extracts and you actually combine them and you don't just use mushrooms
Speaker:you also have some adaptogens in there I need to just share a little bit about
Speaker:the thought process why you combine certain mushrooms and to then add up the chance.
Speaker:We thought about the usage of mushrooms. We want to bring it into everyday life.
Speaker:So it should not be something you have to have a really, really long thought
Speaker:process. Which mushroom do I take?
Speaker:When and why? So we made this four categories. We call it four pillars for maximum performance.
Speaker:And the first one we started with was focus. That's what biohackers are striving for, energy and focus.
Speaker:In the morning, we want to get things done or we want to have a deeper meditation,
Speaker:more clarity and stuff like this.
Speaker:We combined the most potent mushrooms for this endeavor.
Speaker:It's cordyceps for energy, lion's mane for cocoa.
Speaker:And we put them into this high-dose extract you can use everywhere or into our powdered product.
Speaker:That's the mushroom cacao. In the mushroom cacao, you not only have cordyceps,
Speaker:but other adaptogens as well.
Speaker:And there are very cool effects. We studied back in our biohacking starting days.
Speaker:And there is citicoline. And that's a source for our neurotransmitters.
Speaker:But we use these neurotransmitters to think, use our brain.
Speaker:And when we use them, we felt with cordyceps together, the cordyceps also enhancing
Speaker:blood flow to the brain, oxygen to the brain, and you have some cognitive effects.
Speaker:But combined with the citricoline, we have pretty cool effects, which is long lasting.
Speaker:You can think faster, so to speak, and it felt more light in the brain.
Speaker:Many people are deficient in this compound because it's normally in eggs or
Speaker:animal products, and many people don't eat animal products anymore.
Speaker:And we use this because we really like the effect of it.
Speaker:Then there's Ginkgo biloba. And Ginkgo is known for the cognitive enhancement,
Speaker:the memory enhancement.
Speaker:It also enhances the blood flow to the brain.
Speaker:And it also has effect on the breakdown of the neurotransmitters.
Speaker:It inhibits it so you can reuse the neurotransmitters in the brain for longer time.
Speaker:And they really have a really cool symbiotic effect with the mushrooms.
Speaker:We have also vitamin B5, which is known to enhance cognition and a pretty good
Speaker:taste with organic, very high quality cocoa.
Speaker:And together, it's also like cocoa is also a little bit enhancing serotonin
Speaker:and gives a good vibe, so to speak, in the morning, which is another vibe than
Speaker:most of caffeine beverages, which is more stress to the body.
Speaker:We want to create this feeling of this light creativity you have to achieve
Speaker:your dreams. That was the focus of this product.
Speaker:Wonderful. And if people want to know more about your products,
Speaker:where can they find more information?
Speaker:You can find the information on our website. It's smainz.de.
Speaker:And if you are English speaking, which I think when you hear this one,
Speaker:You can scroll down and you can have the English version of the website.
Speaker:If you have any questions, you can write us an email.
Speaker:We are happy to help you in English language. And you also find us on Instagram.
Speaker:smaints_mushrooms. We have cool content there about mushrooms.
Speaker:Wonderful. So S-M-A-I-N-T-S.
Speaker:Smaints.de. And you can scroll down and get the English version.
Speaker:And this is a cool company because products are sourced in Europe,
Speaker:they're manufactured in Europe, and German company, high quality,
Speaker:high standards, and also you
Speaker:do have the laboratory certificates for everything you do. It's awesome.
Speaker:I can recommend everyone to take a look at,
Speaker:these products. I have a lot of different companies and mushroom products that
Speaker:I use, and this is definitely one of those, especially the glycerin extracts that I love.
Speaker:Makes it super easy to use with morning beverages like coffee or cacao even. So check it out.
Speaker:Yeah, you guys are also going to be in Helsinki, so we have the Biohacker Summit
Speaker:in Helsinki in July. That's our 10th anniversary.
Speaker:Last year you were in Amsterdam. It was a big success for you guys.
Speaker:You launched some products and there's some new products you can launch in Helsinki as well.
Speaker:If people are interested in witnessing these products themselves first hand
Speaker:on all these other cool brands that are coming to Biohacker Summit go to biohackersummit.com
Speaker:and you can find more information.
Speaker:It's going to be 2nd and 3rd of July. It's like the Burning Man of all the biohacking events.
Speaker:It's not really a conference, it's a festival. It's really cool.
Speaker:Looking forward to meeting you there, man.
Speaker:Yeah, I'm really looking forward. It's awesome events.
Speaker:In Amsterdam. We are on many events in Germany, some in England and so on,
Speaker:but this is very, very special and we are very happy to be there again.
Speaker:Thank you, Maximilian Endter.
Speaker:That was a good primer to functional mushrooms and their benefits and a couple
Speaker:of rare ones for people to look into, maybe forage themselves,
Speaker:maybe try out that glycerin extract on their own little little experiments and
Speaker:with that I wish you all a very very healthy functional week.
Speaker:Music.
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