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Summary
On episode 440 of 40+ Fitness, Coach Allan sits down with Dr. Barrie Tan, hailed as the world’s foremost expert on vitamin E and credited with discovering tocotrienol in three major sources: palm, rice, and annatto. He earned his PhD in chemistry and biochemistry from the University of Otago in New Zealand, spent several years as a professor at UMass, and today focuses his research on lipid-soluble nutrients that reduce and slow chronic conditions.
Barrie explains why decades of vitamin E research left the public confused: most of the studies that found little or no benefit were testing tocopherol, the common, well-known form, while the far more potent and lesser-studied form, tocotrienol, was largely overlooked.
The conversation covers how tocotrienol protects the fat in your cell walls, what the animal and clinical research shows across heart disease, bone loss, fatty liver, and cancer, and what to look for if you want to try a supplement yourself.
Links
- https://barrietan.com
- https://designsforhealth.com
- https://nutricology.com
- https://acgrace.com
Key Takeaways
- Vitamin E research has been confusing because most studies tested the wrong form. Tocopherol, the common form people know from cereal boxes, showed weak or no benefit in the big studies of the 1980s and beyond, and some even suggested harm. The far more potent, lesser-known form, tocotrienol, was largely left out of that research and out of the public conversation.
- Tocotrienol protects the fat in cell walls about 50 times more effectively than tocopherol. Its shorter molecular tail lets it move around the cell membrane 50 to 100 times faster than tocopherol, so it intercepts stray oxygen before it can oxidize, or “go rancid,” the fat that makes up the cell wall.
- Only 2 of the 8 forms of vitamin E account for most of the documented benefit. Vitamin E splits into four tocopherols and four tocotrienols (alpha, beta, delta, gamma), but more than 90% of the research showing real effects comes from just delta-tocotrienol and gamma-tocotrienol.
- Annatto is a uniquely concentrated source of the two most potent forms. Unlike palm or rice, annatto (the “lipstick plant” of Central and South America) contains no tocopherol at all, only tocotrienol, and specifically the delta and gamma forms Dr. Tan identified as most protective. He discovered this about 22 to 23 years before the interview while studying the plant’s intensely oxidizable red color.
- Animal and clinical studies point to benefits across several chronic conditions. Cardiovascular studies found cholesterol dropped about 15%, triglycerides about 20%, and the inflammation marker C-reactive protein 30 to 40%. A bone study in postmenopausal women slowed bone loss, and a liver study in patients with non-alcohol fatty liver disease saw participants lose 10 pounds in 3 months and 16 pounds in 6 months without changing exercise.
- An ongoing Denmark cancer study shows striking survival numbers in late-stage ovarian cancer. Among stage 4 patients on standard care alone, most did not survive past 6 months. Among those who added tocotrienol to standard care, half were still living at 6 months and 25% at 24 months. Dr. Tan is careful to call this early, published-but-ongoing research, not a cure.
- Taking supplemental tocopherol alongside tocotrienol can work against you. Dr. Tan compares it to having one foot on the gas and one on the brake: high-dose supplemental tocopherol competes with tocotrienol for the same protective job in the cell wall. He stopped taking tocopherol supplements more than 20 years ago for this reason, though the small amount from food (about 10 to 12 milligrams a day) is not enough to interfere.
- Diet alone cannot supply a therapeutic dose of tocotrienol. A typical Western diet provides only about 2 milligrams of tocotrienol a day, while the studies Dr. Tan cited used doses of 200 to 900 milligrams, roughly 100 times more than food can realistically provide, meaning it takes a targeted supplement to reach those levels.
- Dr. Barrie Tan’s three strategies to get and stay well: shift your focus from deleterious findings to nutritional, health-building ones rather than dwelling on what’s bad for you; move from strict moral rule-following toward a spiritual awareness of your own being, which he credits for lasting happiness rather than fleeting material pleasure; and keep your heart cardiovascular with at least 20 minutes of walking a day, while working toward adding resistance exercise for stronger bones and muscle.
“So if I can ward it away by taking 300 milligrams, why not? It’s a very inexpensive insurance.”
Dr. Barrie Tan
