The Quest For Clean Energy Caffeine

0:09 Hey everybody, this is Thunder Williams. I hope you're doing amazing wherever you might be in the world. Today I have a little bit of a different video. might have an issue, but t-accharine and paraxanthine are two compounds that I kind of view as caffeine alternatives and just a little bit of background on this. I've made some videos in the past that are more along the lines of normal supplements that i use or am fans of and i've typically gotten really good feedback

0:42 on those and I know I tend to talk about peptides or hormones for the most part right but This is one thing I've thought about doing for a long time now. And I'm just always kind of in my own creative battles inside of my mind. Like, do I talk about some of the other stuff that I really enjoy and have interest in or do? I kind. Of stick to the peptide thing. Obviously I built an audience of following around peptides, but there's so much of this other. Stuff that. I have knowledge about and. Have geeked out on for years really. Before I got into the hormone and peptid game, I was definitely a supplement junkie or supplement nerd.

1:15 I was that guy that was always at vitamin shop or GNC or even like in sprouts and whole foods, crawling up and down the supplement aisles, looking for different things, Looking for what does this? What does that? And probably in another life, I, was someone that worked at the health food store. Cause I've always been fascinated by that stuff. But anyway, really love caffeine. Obviously I usually drink one to two cups of coffee a day. Usually one kind of depends on the day might have to usually no more than that. But I really love these other two compounds, one being tiacrine and one, being paraxanthine.

1:49 And they are more or less modifications of caffeine, I guess would be the best way to say it, that are pretty cool. I think in terms of harnessing the benefits of Caffeine, we can get the benefit without some of the downsides of a ton of downside to caffeine at the right dose for most people. But what I like about these is we can use them in alternative situations or alternative scenarios, or even if you're trying to quit caffeine, it can be something that kind of helps break you from that. And they're pretty cool. They're distinct from caffeine.

2:20 they have some overlap, but they are pretty. So that's what want to talk about today. I know a little bit side, maybe outside of my lane. However, I think it would be helpful to you guys. And if you like stuff like this, if like the form and format that I present things in, in the same way that do peptides, maybe this will be help for you and kind of show you a different thing that maybe instead of just caffeine or coffee or energy drinks, you can kind harness to kind get some of that same effect. I always talk about like me not being a nootropic head, but I'm not someone that uses a ton of nootypics.

2:52 But I thinking the process of doing the work that we do using Caffeine is obviously helpful to me and my life, and I enjoy it. I've quit caffeine for long stretches of time, probably the longest. But I didn't really use caffeine until I was like in my early 20s. And the reason was I just never was a coffee drinker. My mom drank coffee, but no one else in family drink coffee. So I never had it growing up. And I got through college, never was really someone that used caffeine. You know, I'd have energy drinks here or there, but never it was like a coffee drinker. I think coffee is more of an acquired taste.

3:23 Early twenties started drinking coffee and I was, like, oh, okay, this is interesting. It's cool. So that's my background with caffeine, anyway, again, a different type of video today, But I you'll enjoy it nonetheless. And before I share the slides, as always, thank you guys so much for the support. by the overwhelming support and just the fact that people continue to find me even with the limited social media or the throttled social presence that I have. So thank you guys for that. As always, the best place to stay in touch with me is the email list. That's the way to make sure that if any of my social medias gets deleted again in the future, thankfully I was able to get my Instagram back.

3:56 But if that gets delete in future that you have a way stay touch me and again I just use the e-mail list to send out notifications and new videos and then share articles. and different things that I write up about things I'm working on. And then also too, if you want to join the best private community called Axion Collective, that's my private committee alongside with my wife Taylor that we have. There's over 220 people in there. It's going really strong. We have some amazing calls. we do live calls every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern that you can come on and ask us questions live and get to chat with us. You can also message us and then talk with people on the forum.

4:26 So check that out. Without further ado, I am going to share my screen and today we are going talk about caffeine, tiacrine and paroxanthine. All right, let's get into it today. We're going to go over caffeine, tiacrine and paraxanthine. And we're gonna talk about them specifically for energy, cognition, and maybe even a little bit longevity too. I just want to walk you through these and kind of walk through how I use them and what I think they're good for. But let us talk the quest for clean energy. In this whole entire biohacking space, all of us are on the Quest for having Limitless abundant energy that is clean.

4:56 That is non-stimulant. I think if there's one thing that people could do in their life is just have better energy, right? That's so much of what we do. In the space is optimizing for our energy levels and that's that kind of within range, we don't want to be too low. We don' want it to. Be too high and we can use some of these molecules that are not necessarily peptides to help us do so. Obviously peptide are great and I love them, but there are some really cool stuff that we could use that I But obviously, longevity enthusiasts and biohackers are always looking to sharpen our mind without jitteriness, poor sleep, or burnout.

5:31 And most people know caffeine, obviously coffee, energy drinks, et cetera. But fewer have heard of tiacrine. Tiacraine, I believe, is the trademark name of it. Then the chemical is thiacrene, T-H-E-A-C-R-I-N- E. There's also paroxanthine, which is pretty cool and I think more recent. And if I'm not mistaken, the great formulator Sean Wells was responsible for developing both of those as far as I know. Don't quote me on that, but he's an amazing guy, a super smart person. You should go follow him. He's really cool. And I don't think he gets enough credit in the industry for some of the stuff he has done.

6:03 he is probably one of best or the greatest patent holders of supplements that exist that we have today. but Teakreen and Parazanthine are two caffeine cousins making waves for their smoother, longer lasting effects. And we're going to walk over how they work kind of across all the different things that we are interested in and specifically for energy, metabolism, stress, sleep and brain health. So that's what we going cover today, but let's get into it. First, we have caffeine. Obviously you probably know about caffeine, right?

6:34 It's everywhere. you can reach arm's length pretty much anywhere you are at any time in the world and find some caffeine. But how does caffeine actually work? I think a lot of people use caffeine, they don't know really what's going on in their body. The first way is that it blocks adenosine receptors, preventing the tired signal. So that's the main thing that is actually blocks these adenosine receptor, which keeps us from falling asleep. And in doing so, it boosts dopamine for mood and epinephrine for energy levels. Obviously it's world's most consumed stimulant, It reliably increases alertness, focus, and physical performance.

7:08 There's also a physical-performance side to caffeine. And then the downsides is it often causes jitters, heart rate, racing, then crashes. Obviously, if anyone's ever taken too much caffeine, you know that effect. You go up and then you come down hard and they can also can trigger anxiety and GI discomfort in a lot of people. And you know, we've seen a. More of that in recent years. Now, whether that is from the mold that comes in, a lotta coffee or whether it's just from overuse. I think there are a But when we look at it, we have paraxanthine makes about 80% of the caffeine molecule.

7:43 And this is where we see the benefits. Then we a theobromine, which is around 12%. And, this can have some of side effects we were talking about. Theobronamine is good in its own right. Don't quote me on this, but I think that's in chocolate and we kind of get that feel good effect from theobromine and chocolate. And then 4% is theophylline or theophiline, however you pronounce it. That's around 4 percent of caffeine. This is what causes the tremors, the upset stomach, and really those unwanted side effects. So although caffeine can be good, when we take the dose too high, we get these negative effects, which obviously is not what we want.

8:18 Enter to the next slide, we have tiakrine. And this is much more of a slow burn booster. So tiacrine is found in kucha tea and the cupatial plant and is structurally similar to caffeine, but has very unique properties. One, it has a clean energy profile. It delivers long lasting enhanced energy. enhance focus and improve mood without any sort of crash or jitters. I can attest to this as well. It really gives you the benefit of caffeine without. Any of the downside, which is kind of crazy. First time I took it, I was like, what's going on? Cause this feels really good.

8:48 But then like nothing is, nothing bad is happening. And then typically almost in zero cases, do you see any of increased heart rate? And what is cool about tiocrine that I love is that there is no tolerance buildup. Obviously with caffeine, it's kind of this, we're doing this dance with it that we built up a tolerance to caffeine. And if you're using too much of it, all of a sudden the body desensitizes to it and you have to get more and more, and to give the same effect. So you can kind find yourself sometimes.

9:19 I've found myself here before too, not often, but I have, to where you were playing this game with the caffeine to like, okay, two cups of coffee a day to just get me through the day. This is obviously too like before I was on hormones and a lot of the peptides that I Taking in my life and I would find myself relying on caffeine to kind of get through the day and it's like, okay, you have a cup of coffee in the morning to get you up. But you need another one in that afternoon and another, one, another and then it ruins your sleep. And then there's just this whole cascade that doesn't go well. What's cool about tiocrine is you can take 200 milligrams of tiocrine or 100 milligrams or 400 milligrams tiacrine.

9:50 and you do not build up tolerance, at least rapidly. I think you'd have to do really high doses, and I've never even pushed doses that high with tiocrine, to which you would get that. But it works consistently even after weeks of daily use without higher doses. And so you can keep taking tiacrine. Now, I don't know what's specific to the molecule that makes it do this, but you could keep take tiocrine and it just seems to work at the same dose without ever having the sensitization effect. And so you could take it every single day for a year. And 200 milligrams of tiocrine is still going to feel like 200 milligram to tiacrine.

10:21 I think I've seen that in my own life and a lot of people I have worked with, but it's really good. Again, super simple molecule, it is kind of a nice alternative. One thing, just as an aside, I always thought about doing is I had experience, obviously, founding consumer packaged good companies, CPG companies as they're known, my oatmeal company, Zero Oats, and I thought it would be really cool to have a decaf coffee for people that don't want to caffeine, but they want coffee, But they still want the boost without the downside to make a tiacrine infused coffee.

10:53 Tiacrene infused decaf coffee could also pair it with caffeine because it actually feels really good with Caffeine too. It kind of enhances the caffeine Because you get this extra boost from it without any sort of the jitters And so I sometimes will put it in my coffee or take it With my Coffee and I really like the effect there. it's really Good for cognitive work and energy. but I always thought that would be a good idea. So if you're an entrepreneur out there, if your a young aspiring entrepreneur, and you want an idea to start a business, I will be the first customer. so go start Decaf coffee with Tiacrine in it. I'll be first customers I probably buy, you know, a thousand bucks worth right off the bat.

11:25 If you are, If your out their, so reach out to me if, your interested, but it's always a bussiness idea if I wanted to do. And then the cool thing about Tiakrine is it has an extended duration compared to have caffeine. So the half-life is around 16 to 26 hours. Some sources even say it's up to around 30 hours as single dose provides gentle sustained alertness across the day. What's cool about this is in most cases, obviously this might differ if you're really, really depleted, but in those cases you'll notice kind of like a good eight to 10 hour window. So if we take it in the morning, it kind gives you energy throughout the.

11:55 Or if take in in afternoon, say you have a cup of coffee in morning. Then you'd have some tea or cream in an afternoon. It kind will work throughout the rest of the day, but it doesn't affect your sleep. And that's what I really like about it is I can take it at 7pm at night if I'm still working or have a show to something to do. It gives me a great boost kind of that feeling when you drink coffee in the morning. But then if i need to go to bed by 10, 30, 11 o'clock, I'm out and I don't see really any increase in heart rate or any decline in my deep sleep, at least when I've tracked it on my aura ring. But we see around 400 milligrams of tiacrine taken during the day, improve next morning vigilance without significantly disturbing that night's sleep.

12:32 And I think that's what's cool, especially among these three molecules that we're talking about, is that, we are going to get a benefit from tiocrine without affecting our sleep which I, think if I am being honest, I thing tiocrine is far superior as a molecule to coffee, The only thing that's kind of stinks is coffee's still fun to drink, right? And so I still have a cup of coffee every day, but I love tiacrine for that reason. Now let's talk about paraxanthine. And paroxanthanine is kind like caffeine 2.0. It's going to be different than tiakrine. I think it still would be superior to caffeine. But parxanthenine, again, when we go back to Caffeine when I was telling you about the breakdown of what's in it, it's caffeine's primary metabolite.

13:07 it is responsible for caffeine desirable effects, which is Energy, focus, fat burning, but with fewer drawbacks and rather than waiting for your body to convert caffeine, you can take Parazanthine directly for sharper focus and steady energy without the jitters, anxiety or crashes. So it's pretty cool. It is much more of a cleaner stimulation than coffee itself. it does block adenosine and boost dopamine in a smoother, more controlled fashion than caffeine. But it is still doing that. And then it's a faster clearance. So it has a shorter half-life of around three hours, which means there's faster onset and quicker offset and it won't linger into the night.

13:42 And again, so if you take paroxanthine in the afternoon, there is much less of a likelihood that it is going to kind of carry over into nighttime like caffeine would. However, I would say if you wanted to be safe, Tiacrine would be the better option, but you could take paroxanthine in the afternoon and not have to worry about it as much as you would like drinking coffee or an energy drink in afternoon. And it has consistent effects. It bypasses genetic variability and caffeine metabolism, and 100 milligrams delivers the same punch every time. I think with this one, you will see more of a sensitivity buildup than you with Tiocrine, But still cool nonetheless.

14:16 Let's look at head to head comparison of these two. And so when we look at brain chemistry, how are they different? Well, they all have a dopamine boost. They all increase dopamine signaling for mood and motivation. T-acurine directly activates dopamine receptors. Then when you look stress response, caffeine spikes cortisol and adrenaline, and then paroxanthine and theocurene deliver alertness with less stress hormone surgeons. So that's why I like these as an alternative. because caffeine really does spike cortisol and adrenaline.

14:46 And in some cases, that could be a potentially beneficial thing. However, we don't want to overdo that. Then we look at adenosine blocking, all three antagonize adenosine receptors, preventing drowsiness by stopping the brain's tired signal. And then again, we have caffeine, strong adensine block plus significant cortisol and adrenaline spike equals powerful, but the downside of potentially being overstimulating.

15:16 Then, We have tiacrine. It does block adenzine. it does activate dopamine. And that also has minimal cardiovascular, if any stress, which means it gets smooth, sustained energy. And then we have paroxanthine which is efficient adenosine blocker plus a controlled dopamine boost with less of a cortisol spike equals clean and focused stimulation. So I would say you probably have caffeine on the one end of the effects that it has, and then teacrine on other and paraxanthenine kind of sits somewhere in the middle.

15:46 brain energy. Let's look at alertness, focus, and the feel. And so with caffeine, we have a jittery power. Again, there's going to be a quick onset. You really feel it. Usually feel that even in the first couple steps of some coffee. Within 15 to 30 minutes, they're strong, immediate alert. It often comes with jitters or edginess at higher doses. The peaks last a few hours, then notable energy crash. For anyone that kind of gets in that loop of the caffeine spike and trough, it's not fun, right? It's fun to crash from the coffee, but it is best for short bursts of intense focus.

16:16 And then with theocrine, I think the best way to say it is I call it smooth zen. So the slower onset takes up to 60 minutes before it really kicks in, but there's a very long duration in terms of the feel. Usually that's six to 10 hours where you really feel it. Then there is a clear headed focus and uplifted mood without nervousness. And I that is for me one of biggest things because if I have too much coffee I do kind of get those like anxiety or existential angst. Like the walls are closing in. But there are virtually no generators or increase in heart rate and then no sudden crash because it tapers gradually.

16:46 And then paroxanthine, we have clean precision. So a moderate onset a little bit longer than coffee around 30 minutes does take a bit of longer to hit, but it's smooth and consistent energy, a focus and alertness without feeling wired. And there's little to no jitter or anxiety, the minimal crash and easier sleep usually later and you're awake but not wired, I would say, you know, caffeine would be the strongest, paraxanthine would the next strongest and then tiacrine would a little bit weaker, but you're going to have more of that sustained effect over time. And then paroxantheine improve reaction time and reduce cognitive errors significantly more than caffeine in post exercise cognitive tests,

17:22 which is pretty interesting than I thought. Let's look at some of the metabolic effects. All three compounds enhance metabolic health and physical performance, but through different mechanisms and intensities. And so with caffeine, we see a 25% increase in fat oxidation during exercise, which is pretty cool. I think caffeine is a great pre-workout. Do some coffee and do your cardio. It works really well. Tiocrine also has a 15% increased in energy expenditure and metabolic rate. Parazanthine does enhance exercise performance by around 30% in most people.

17:54 And then caffeine, again, we have it as a proven fat burner and endurance booster and increases metabolic rate and fat oxidation. It can also cause dehydration or GI issues at high doses. Tiacrine also is pretty cool. And activates AMPK and CERT-3 for metabolic health. it also improves lipid metabolism and energy production without any strain on the heart. Parazanthine is efficient at fat, fat oxidization and strength gains and it increases nitric oxide for better blood flow. whereas caffeine a lot of times is more vasoconstrictive and it's lower perceived exertion during exercise.

18:24 So I think, you know, in terms of pre-workout caffeine or paraxanthine probably going to be a little bit better than tear cream will. We look at cortisol, circadian rhythm and recovery. When we look a caffeine and stress, it triggers cortisol and adrenaline release, which can also delay our circadian clock by around 40 minutes when taken three hours before bedtime. That's one of the reasons I definitely avoid caffeine in the afternoon if I can. we look at tiacrine it's surprisingly gentle on sleep despite its long half-life 204 milligrams during the day had no significant effect on sleeve quality

18:54 in studies and it doesn't suppress melatonin as strongly as the other two do then we'll compare xanthine it has a shorter half life so it makes it more sleep friendly than caffeine and there's less cortisol overdrive and you can take it before evening training and probably still sleep well so if you train in the evening, you can still kind of get that bump from caffeine or the caffeine feeling without the downsides. And so if you were going to use a pre-workout, Chris Gethin has a really good workout from unmatched supplements that has paroxanthine in it as a, pre workout. That would be one that I would take in the evening as opposed to a caffeine based prework out.

19:26 Paroxantine provides stimulation without this sleep disruption often seen with caffeine and it's kind positioned as the stimulant for those who want to sleep like a baby after crushing the day. Now let's look at tolerance, habituation and withdrawal. Obviously caffeine has pretty big tolerance build up within days. The brain up regulates adenosine receptors and withdraw causes headaches, fatigue, brain fog and irritability within 12 to 24 hours. Fortunately for me, I've haven't really had this happen too much in my life, but you can kind of get on this loop where you do have that caffeine buildup

19:56 or you're dependent on it. And then, you know, it's not fun coming down. Tiacrine, obviously, like we said, little to no tolerance. Eight weeks of daily use showed no habituation. And then the minimal or non-existent withdrawal symptoms were observed there. You can use it daily without dependency. The one thing with tiacraine, I'll say, is if you were trying to quit caffeine, rather than do it cold turkey, you can go right to tiakrine and still get the same effect. Then all of a sudden you do that for four weeks where you have no caffeine. you've used tiocrine. All of the sudden, I don't need caffeine anymore." And you stop the tiocrine and you don' really feel any sort of come down from stopping tiocrine.

20:30 I would say in terms of habit formation, caffeine makes me want caffeine. Even for me, like caffeine is stronger of an addiction than nicotine would be when I've used nicotin. Tiocrin has zero addictive properties whatsoever in my experience. You can use it and they're like, I dont need it. And so that's why it's really good to help people quit caffeine Parazanthine is lower dependence potential, I would say more so than tiocarin though, low abuse liability in animal tests, milder withdrawal than caffeine, and consistent effects without escalating doses. We look at safety profile, 829 milligrams of paraxanthine, which is a lot, by the way, most people take two to 400 milligrams,

21:05 had a similar safety threshold to only 300 milligrams have caffeine, owning two shorter half-life and lower blood pressure impact. So again, think about that 300mg of caffeine. That's like one monster energy drink or one, no, I think monster is like 150, but maybe one bang energy, drink, you're basically could do three times, almost three, times a dose of Paraxantine with the same threshold reaching there. We look at long-term brain health and performance. We have caffeine, which is associated with lower risk of Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and type 2 diabetes, and it's neuroprotective via adenosine A2A receptor antagonism.

21:41 However, it can disrupt sleep and elevate chronic stress if ever used. And so there's a sweet spot, right? With Tiacrine, It activates SIRT3 and reduces oxidative stress. It has anti-inflammatory effects and also supports mitochondrial health. And the fact that it has no tolerance means that stable cognitive support does exist for healthy aging. It protects dopaminergic neurons and animal models. And then we look at paraxanthine, it delivers the neuroprotective effects of caffeine without the downsides, which makes it far superior, at least as a molecule. Enables consistent cognitive enhancement with good sleep and low stress, and has more uniform safety across diverse populations.

22:16 and it also can service a potential treatment for ADHD. So what I say that, for longevity minded individuals protecting sleep, managing stress and avoiding dependence or paramount. Teocrine and paraxanthin clearly have advantages to these areas and they represent an evolution towards stimulants that work with our biology, if there ever was a way to do so with stimulant, right? We look at the differences. Caffeine is going to be the workhorse. It's effective and well-studied. We get a reliable surge of focus, fat burning and performance, and it's best for acute boost, but requires self-regulation and discipline and self policing

22:49 for long-term wellness. T-acrine is slow, subtle and long lasting energy. There's no tolerance buildup and is ideal for daily use as a nootropic or pre-workout. You can really take it any time of the day. You know, obviously I wouldn't get in the habit of taking it at night all the time, but you can get stimulation without overclocking your system. And then paraxanthine is basically caffeine 2.0. Like we said, it gets caffeine's core advantages with cleaner side effects, and it's the focus motivated mindset that feels just right and go to for higher performers wanting consistency. So some combo strategies that I would recommend is small amount of caffeine plus tea cream in morning for an immediate sustained effect.

23:23 You can do caffeine early in It's an alternative and then paroxanthine in the afternoon to avoid second coffee. And then you can also just use tea or green daily for baseline energy and caffeine for specific performance needs, maybe for workouts or just times where you want to add a little fuel to it. Then there's references to those studies we talked about if you wanted to go look up those and that is it for the slides. And that is my overview of caffeine, tiacrine and paroxanthine. Hopefully that was helpful to you guys.

23:53 I know this was a little bit different than most of my videos, but I think it's still cool. Nonetheless, there's some really good benefits to all of these and I use all them. If I need something in the afternoon, that's when I typically use paroxanthine. And then tiacrine is more or less something that I will throw in nighttime if I'm working. Then also too, if for any reason I am tired, getting up from the day before, I would throw some tiocrine in in morning to kind of help get me through and

24:24 not experience that crash of the caffeine. Because I think when we get up and we're tired caffeine is great to get us going, but then usually by around noon or the after noon there's a lot of crash there. And so you could use paroxanthine, but that's kind of how I do it in my life. And then I'll just change it up from there. I think the cool thing about this is if you're someone that wants to quit caffeine for whatever reason, I don't think it's bad. But if. If you've abused it too much for too long, it could be good to switch over to tiacrine, maybe even a little paraxanthenine to kind wean yourself off and then get used to not having caffeine and just kind to use it as needed.

24:55 But I love all of these. I loved using them and they all have kind of different use cases. And I think when we look at the improvement in life quality versus the downsides of them, I would have no problem using these, obviously. The difference is just going to be how you dose them in the strategy around that. So let me know what you guys think of this one. Obviously, like I said, a little bit different, but I'd love to do more of If it aligns with what people in my audience like to see, you may say, Hey, this is terrible. Go back to doing peptide videos. But I just kind of have a calling to do some of this stuff.

25:25 I take obviously so many supplements like you guys, and I'd love to talk more about them and present the information and the way that I do my peptid information. So let me know your thoughts and feedback. You guys send me questions, you guys sent me messages, and I use that and incorporate those into my content to hopefully make it better and more useful to you, guys. So in closing, thank you so much. I'm so blessed, humbled, privileged, honored to get to do what I do. And whatever form or fashion you support me, whether it's just watching these videos, liking, commenting, subscribing, sharing with your friends, using my code at places, or even being in my private membership group, I promise you that goes so far in helping me bring these messages to your.

26:01 Hopefully in doing so, this helps make your life better, You reciprocate that to me. So thank you guys so much. It means the world to that I get to do this. And I just always want you to know you are loved and appreciated. That's it for this one and I will see you in the next one. Peace.