Ray Peat HATED manganese
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Almost everything Ray Peat ever suggested doing to increase energy in regards to diet, was almost a guide on how to limit exposure to manganese:
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Grains, nuts and seeds are the highest sources of manganese.
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Fruits are in general lower in manganese than most other sources of carbs.
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He did not like bananas and pineapples. These don't have the problem that they are high in serotonin, it's that they are relatively higher in manganese in comparison to other fruits.
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The hypoxia response is a trigger for displacing manganese in the cell with iron. Living in higher altitude increases hypoxia and thus facilitates manganese detox.
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All dairy products, coca-cola, table sugar, orange juice are very low-manganese with dairy, table sugar and coca-cola practically having no manganese at all.
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The only grain product that Ray Peat liked was corn tortillas. Corn tortillas are the lowest manganese starch source, because of the nixtamalization.
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He liked potatoes. Peeled potatoes are the second lowest manganese source of starch.
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Mushrooms are very low in manganese, while a carrot a day is about 0.2 mg of manganese, so it still works on a low-manganese diet.
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In general most foods Ray Peat suggested are nutrient dense while also being low in manganese.
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Shortly before Ray Peat diet he started eating oatmeal, which is one of highest sources of manganese in common foods, perhaps undoing all of the manganese limiting he has done.
I have come to this conclusion while strictly limiting my manganese to about 1.5 mg per day by tracking my food intake on cronometer. Strict limitation of manganese produced almost the exact diet that Ray Peat was eating, without me even trying to eat like Ray Peat.
Limiting manganese to 1.5 mg has resolved all of my chronic health issues I had since childhood, with chronic copper deficiency (despite eating some beef liver everyday) resolving shortly after limiting manganese being the most data driven part of this improvement.
The central mechanism of manganese toxicity is producing a CoQ10 deficiency, which is the key molecule in the mitochondria, required for energy production. This mechanism is outlined in Chris Masterjohn's article: Manganese Toxicity Is a CoQ10 Deficiency
For me personally, Ubiquinol (CoQ10) was the only supplement that helped improve my health before I had started limiting manganese. After I limited manganese in my diet for about a month, I had an amazing surge of energy and euphoria. The ubiquinol, which I depended on for my health before, had started to make me overstimulated, rather than improving my health further, which I am sure was because my internal synthesis of CoQ10 had restored on this low-manganese diet. After this I stopped taking the ubiquinol and felt its effects without being overstimulated.
In this article Chris Masterjohn explains how common it is to have a manganese toxicity problem because of your genetics: Iron Overload: Forget What You Thought You Knew
As far as I know, Ray Peat has never mentioned limiting exposure to manganese, so I don't believe he was being deliberate in his manganese avoidance. I believe he was being vigilant about how different foods affect his health and came to this diet using his intuition naturally.
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alfredoolivas said:
Tidbits on manganese toxicity. I think anyone should be concerned on consuming large amounts of it, which is easy if you are a fellow autist that is prone to consuming stupid amounts of foods like pineapple or orange juice.
"In the rat, the half-lives of 16 brain regions are between 52 and 74 days [6]."`
"Mn concentrations in the cerebrospinal fluid, however, continued to increase even at the eight week. It is possible that a slow elimination of Mn from the cerebrospinal fluid may contribute to the high level of Mn in the brain "
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@kimarunas thank you for this detailed post. An interesting and unique take worth looking into
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@kimarunas hi, answering there too for other readers, and adding as i did read a bit more about it.
Ray peat never stated that he hate manganese, there is one statement associated to him saying commun diet probably has enough if i recall correctly.
nuts and seeds can Also be high in zinc, copper, molydenum, selenium, many elements that have balancing or antagonistic effects on manganese, i have never seen someone mentionning getting symptoms associated to excess manganese from nuts, i have not experienced it either even while consuming from 400g to a kilo of nuts most days for months/years, including macadamia.
Fruits it depend wich ones, going by average values, fruits such as grapes, pinnaple, raspberries, Blackberries, strawberries have good or high amount of manganese per weight, and even higher amount per carbs/calories compare to lot of foods, These fruits are communly consumed bu fruits eaters living in northern enough climates. Other communly consumed fruits such as apple, pears, watermelon, are much lower.
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The central mechanism of manganese toxicity is producing a CoQ10 deficiency, which is the key molecule in the mitochondria, required for energy production. This mechanism is outlined in Chris Masterjohn's article: Manganese Toxicity Is a CoQ10 Deficiency
Are there other ways manganese can interact to cause stress or health problems? Is it possible he was absorbing too much manganese? If so, what would cause this?
Do any of his preferred foods or combos help chelate manganese?
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nuts and seeds can Also be high in zinc, copper, molydenum, selenium, many elements that have balancing or antagonistic effects on manganese, i have never seen someone mentionning getting symptoms associated to excess manganese from nuts, i have not experienced it either even while consuming from 400g to a kilo of nuts most days for months/years, including macadamia.
Same, I don't recall him advocating NOT eating nuts. I thought the main thread is "brazil nuts" and certain others can be good for these specific micronutrients and minerals but are not very good for much else. Personally, I rarely eat nuts or peanut butter. They're more of a winter food.
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In this article Chris Masterjohn explains how common it is to have a manganese toxicity problem because of your genetics: Iron Overload: Forget What You Thought You Knew
I used to think Chris Masterjohn was a pretty decent health writer, but that article is pure Clickbait, full of sensationist claims and outright falsehoods while presenting no evidence to back up his claims. It reads more like Grant Generaux or Garrett Smith rambling rather than a studied PhD.
This line particularly stood out-
"You can’t just donate blood. 90% of your iron is stored in your blood, but most of your manganese is stored in your liver."
First, the 90% claim isn't even true of people with normal iron status. It's more like 60-70%. In those with hemochromatosis, the percentage is far less, as iron is stored anywhere the body can put it, like the liver, skin, vital organs and such. Normal people have about 3-4 grams of iron, while people with hemochromatosis have 50 grams or more. This could put the iron in blood percentage around 5-10%, a far cry from 90%. Still, even when someone is seriously iron loaded, their blood contains about the same amount of iron as someone with normal levels. Blood donation works to remove iron because hemoglobin is a very rich source of iron, so the body starts releasing iron from wherever it's stored to make more. No idea on how this affects manganese, but his reasoning is so flawed in this quote that blood donation may indeed help to lower manganese to some degree.
Second, Masterjohn seems to only focus on the genetic component. This is a major flaw of most of the iron overload research, and people can get iron loaded simply by eating more iron. Considering many foods are now "fortified" with iron, and iron supplements are widely available, and iron is often part of common multivitamins, high iron can be an issue for many without the HFE genes. Considering the USDA puts iron comsumption in the US as historical highs over the past few decades, it's very likely most cases of high iron don't even have the HFE gene. Since Masterjohn mostly freaks out about HFE increasing manganese, his article wouldn't even apply to the vast majority of those with high iron.
Third, he seems to think the "real" issue with hemochromatosis is high manganese, and not high iron. This ignores all the published research from Weinberg, Zacharski, and Faccinni, and anecdotal stories of people seeing health improvements and relief from symptoms from undergoing an iron lowering strategy. I know I personally saw benefits like increased energy and better mood from lowering iron, mostly with blood donation and some complementary strategies like IP6. Some still have some symptoms, even after getting de-ironed, so high manganese could be a complementary issue in some cases.
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@ZackVegas hi, any idea/assumptions if blood color, Darkness/lightness, opacity/transluscence Can be indicative/associated with blood Iron content?
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