Layne Norton, PhD

When it comes to strength training, more isn't always better. I cut my strength workouts to about 20 minutes because recovery builds strength. Lifting sends your body a signal to build muscle. Recovery is when your muscles and brain adapt to that signal. Most people spend hours in the gym. They never question whether more training helps. Stop grinding at the gym for hours, it's ok to train hard but recover well and build strength that lasts for decades.

My plan to cure autoimmune gastritis To our knowledge, no one has ever done this to try and cure an autoimmune disease. Context: In May, I got diagnosed with autoimmune gastritis (AIG). We found it by taking a tissue biopsy of my stomach. My immune cells are confused, causing my stomach to eat itself. AIG stops your body from absorbing nutrients like iron and B12, and can eventually lead to cancer. It likely started decades ago when I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism when 21 years old. The thyroid and stomach are closely linked in your immune system. I feel fortunate that I've been taking such good care of my body for the past five years as my condition would otherwise be much more severe. Millions of people are affected by this disease and are undiagnosed. Standard of care tells you that you can’t do anything about it. That’s old fashioned. Here is how we are going to try and cure it: Step 0: find and diagnose the disease ✅ AIG is rarely caught early because symptoms are subtle. Early warnings are low iron and B12, but when hemoglobin and hematocrit look normal, doctors routinely miss it because there are no obvious signs of anemia. A standard colonoscopy won't find it either, because it only checks the lower digestive tract, not the stomach. It was only through a highly targeted stomach biopsy that we found it. Even biopsies can miss it if they don't sample the exact right spots. Most people with AIG go undiagnosed. Step 1: Map my immune system ✅ Last Thursday, I had a blood draw to isolate and decode 1 million of my immune cells. Think of your immune cells as trillions of soldiers. Each carries a unique key designed to unlock and destroy a specific threat, like a virus or bacteria. A standard blood test allows you to see how many soldiers you have, but not their keys. Sequencing one million individual immune cells allows us to read the exact pattern of the teeth on every single key. This is important for my autoimmune gastritis (AIG) because a specific platoon of rogue soldiers has developed keys that unlock an attack on my stomach lining. Right now, we don’t know who they are. This test will inform us of which soldiers have gone rogue and are attacking me from within. Once we know the soldier and key, we know what therapy path to pursue to shut them down. Step 2: Catch the rogue soldiers I will be getting a second biopsy from my stomach because we need to collect live tissue. We are currently planning out the logistics of getting the sample from my stomach to the lab. We need these live cells because the initial blood tests showed the antibodies, which prove that an attack is happening, but doesn’t show us the actual rogue soldier doing the damage which is a T-cell. The live sample will allow us to match the immune system mapping we did to the live T-cells. Step 3: Build an early warning system To keep an eye on the disease as we work towards a therapy, we’re building an early warning system. I'll have my blood drawn every two weeks and we’ll pair that information with wearable data to look for flare ups. This is important because the attack happens without producing symptoms that I can easily feel. Step 4: Create a “Bryan in a dish” testing model, a miniature of my immune system At the same time, we are taking a massive sample of my immune cells and deep freezing them (cryopreservation) for two reasons: a) we’ll create a living lab: using these cells to replicate my immune environment in a lab dish. This allows us to test experimental drugs and therapies on my actual live cells before putting them into my body. b) it creates a back up plan for me by preserving the raw cellular material needed for targeted rejuvenation therapies in the future. Step 5: Build precision guided therapies to end the attack Once we know who the rogue soldiers are, we will engineer a therapy designed uniquely for them. The trick is only turning off the rogue soldiers while leaving all the other healthy ones functioning as they are. For safety checks, we’ll do two test runs: 1) we’ll run the therapy through a computer model that has my biology to evaluate how my molecules interact. 2) We will take my actual cells that we froze in Step 4 and watch them interact for real. If both are successful, we’ll pursue one of four therapies: a) fix the mistake my cells are making, restoring my immune system's natural off switches b) teach the rogue cells to tolerate my stomach instead of attacking it c) design smart molecules that physically plug into the rogue cells and turn them off d) build soldiers who will track down and eliminate the rogue soldiers causing the damage

I added red light to my routine years ago because I wanted to make more energy where it starts. Your mitochondria make ATP, the fuel every cell needs. More ATP means your body has more energy to repair and recover. Most people chase symptoms. They never look at the cells. Twenty minutes a day can make a real difference. I use EMR Tek panels. Use code **DAVE** for **30% off**. Power the cells. The rest gets easier.

My morning routine before I work out is non-negotiable. Before I touch a weight or step on the mat, I do the same thing every single morning: at least 16oz of water with a hydrogen tablet (a powerful antioxidant that helps neutralize free radicals first thing in the morning) a handful of macadamia nuts, and my supplements. When you wake up, you’re already dehydrated. You’ve just gone 7-8 hours without water, and your cells are depleted of the minerals they need to actually function. Drinking plain water sometimes isn’t enough. With sodium, magnesium, and potassium, water can fully cross the cell membrane and get inside where it’s needed. That’s intracellular hydration — and it’s the difference between feeling sharp and feeling foggy, between a strong workout and a sluggish one. The macadamia nuts give me the protein and healthy fats I need to stabilize blood sugar before I move. And my supplements (tailored specifically to my body and what it needs) work significantly better when I’m properly hydrated. By the time I’m ready to train, my body is actually primed to perform! Your morning routine is either working for you or against you. Make hydration the first thing you do, and make sure it counts. 🙂