Welcome back to What's the Juice podcast. Today I have a very special guest for you guys, Max Lugabeer. I'm sure that many of you are familiar with his work because he is a science journalist and a New York Times bestselling author, the author of Genius Foods, a book about how you can utilize medicinal foods, food as medicine to protect your brain and hopefully slow or prevent

cognitive decline, a topic that is very close to our hearts. Unfortunately, Max and I both know

all too well the unfortunate experience of having a mother who is suffering or has suffered

from Alzheimer's disease. And that is what we've dedicated

this episode to today because we are both extremely passionate about the current research

around Alzheimer's disease and all of the things that we're now discovering we can do as

individuals when it comes to diet and lifestyle to hopefully prevent or slow this terrible illness.

This is an episode all about nutrition science and brain health. And Max and I are going to

have a huge conversation about the root causes of Alzheimer's disease and most importantly

the misconceptions that we've had about Alzheimer's for so long in the science

world. So we get right to the root of it. Max is going to explain to us what Alzheimer's disease

actually is, how it develops, how many people are suffering from it, and who is at the highest risk.

And he's going to explain to us why amyloid plaque is not actually the root

cause of Alzheimer's disease, even though that's been the dominating hypothesis and the target

of drug development for many years now. He's going to explain how amyloid plaque is something that

appears in the brain in some, not all people with Alzheimer's disease and how it's more so a phenomenon

that's happening in the face of the disease rather than the actual root cause of the disease.

He's also going to talk about the findings that he has unearthed after many hours and years

that he spent researching and writing about this disease and different therapeutic avenues that you can take

once you already have symptoms of cognitive decline, such as a ketogenic diet and how that can

essentially be used as a band-aid, but a very helpful band-aid when it comes to helping the brain

switch its energy source to something that it can use to stay healthier for a longer

...