NAD+ is a molecule that occurs naturally in your body and is vital in creating energy from food, as a body messenger to stimulate neurotransmitters in your brain and also to help in the process of repairing damage in cells. As you age the levels of NAD+ decrease so supplements can help boost these levels and prevent some of the signs of aging.

This guide will give you everything you need to know about supplements to help you raise NAD levels in your body as well as lifestyle changes in diet and exercise that can also augment the positive effects of NAD+ supplements.

So What is NAD?

NAD+ stands for Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide. It’s a natural molecule found within every living cell of your body. When you are young your body naturally makes high levels of NAD+ but as you age these levels can fall by 50% every 20 years. We depend upon NAD+ to convert the nutrients in our food into the energy we need. NAD+ also helps repair damaged DNA and activates a wide range of essential things your body does to stay young and healthy. We wrote a more in depth blog about what NAD is here.

NAD Health Benefits

NAD Vital Functions in Your Body

• Helps cells break down food into energy
• Helps special ‘dynamos’ in your cells called mitochondria to make the main energy storage molecule called ATP
• Is a precursor to form a molecule called NADPH which acts as a detoxifier and is essential for a wide rang eof enzymes in the body.

NAD and Anti-aging

We covered this topic in much more depth here. NAD plays the following vital roles in your body with aging.

• Influences the life and eventual death (apoptosis) of your cells
• NAD is used by molecules called sirtuins to help promote your lifespan.
• NAD+ is used by the enzyme used to repair damaged or mis-copied DNA in your cells.
• NAD+ is used by those cell dynamo
• NAD+ supports stem cell function
• NAD+ has been known to extend lifespan in research on mice.

SO What Happens when NAD Levels decline?

Increased chance of sunburn

NAD plays an important part in protecting your skin from the suns harmful UV rays so as your NAD levels reduce with age you have an increased chance of sunburn and damage to your skin.

Cell Death

Your body is made of cells and they are constantly being replaced when they are worn out or damaged. This is known as Apoptosis. NADH is known to help prevent or slow down the rate of apoptosis.

Cardiovacular Disease

There is a wide range of research that shows that NAD levels play an important role in heart health and that decreasing levels of NAD can lead to cardiovascular disease.

Decreased Metabolism

As you get older your NAD levels reduce and this has a profound effect on your metabolism, making it less efficient and as a result making you feel lethargic and impairing your mental function.

Impaired Brain Function

As you get older you will find more times that you walk into a room and stop and think…’ wait…what did I come in here for?’. Part of this ‘brain fog’ can be attributed to the reduced levels of NAD in brains of people over 40 who are finding it harder to ‘power’ their brains properly due to lower NAD levels. This also has an effect on mood, depression and anxiety.

Ways to Increase NAD+ Levels In Your Body.

NAD Supplements

Most NAD supplements come in powder or tablet form. On a rare occasion you can also find people that get injections of it in a clinical setting but this is rare. Its essential that you know you are sourcing the NAD from a reputable source and look for a well respected company operating in a well regulated country.

Most supplements online aim to deliver about 200 to 400mg in a daily dose. The doseage as actually less important, what is more important is that the ingredients used are in such a combination that your body can use them as effectively as possible.

Increasing NAD levels alongside NAD Supplements

There are a few ways a change in lifestyle can also enhance the effects from taking NAD supplements. In fact we wrote about this topic in much more depth in this blog here.

Exercise

Taking exercise is known to boost NAD levels, and raised NAD levels helps with feeling more energetic so this is a great positive feedback loop to get in to.

The Keto Diet Boosts NAD levels

There is significant evidence in research literature to suggest a ketogenic diet also helps boost NAD+ levels. You can find out more here. We also have a range of keto based products on our site here.

Eating Fruit and Fish Boosts NAD

Tuna, Salmon and Sardines are known to raise NAD levels as well as eating mushrooms. Fruits with fructose in them are also known to boost NAD levels as well as green vegetables and yeast.

Trubrain Clockwise

We’ve recently launched a product called Clockwise that boosts NAD levels in your body in 3 ways

• Boosting the ingredients your body needs to make NAD itself
• Boosting NAD levels directly
• Boosting your body to recycle more used up NAD

Summary

So now you should have enough information to use NAD supplements effectively and understand the anti-aging benefits they have in your body. You should also now have some useful tips for lifestyle and diet changes that will help you further boost NAD levels.