touched them

all.

We've, yeah, we've, I mean, so all the ones that say they have sulforaphane, we've tested and it's good breath.

And, and we're at, you know, we're, we're conferences and John will speak and then we'll have doctors come up afterwards.

And so in, in, you know, John always says, you know, well, what I just said, the only, there are only two stabilized sulforaphane products on the market.

And ours is the only one sold in the U S there's prostate for France.

If you have a broccoli supplement, it is glucorap.

So make sure you're eliminating microplastics in those ways.

So why would broccoli come into the conversation about breast cancer?

Yes.

Well, it came into our conversation because we ended up growing Mara's cells in our lab, her cancer cells.

A good friend of mine, I call him the cell whisperer.

He can grow anything.

And he, Dr. John Gilday, was able to put 60 different supplements on her type of cancer to see what directly killed it.

So basically, he put... a cancer cell right next to a normal cell, like a renal proximal tubule cell.

So what are they, where do they come from and why do we need to care about them?

But what about that? Is there like just a limited sum of electricity? And if the data centers are taking more, that means that people are going to be paying more for their own power.

No, the short answer to that is no, that is not the right way to look at the electricity system for a number of reasons.

One is we build electricity systems to serve peak demand.

So like the highest demand on the hottest day of the year.

Which means that a lot of that electricity infrastructure, generating capacity, carrying capacity, is sitting around idle, not being used a lot of the year.

And so if a big load comes along, like a data center, that can soak up some of that capacity that's not being used without requiring any new capacity to be built, then you are sharing the same fixed costs of that infrastructure over a larger scale.

consumer class and thereby you can bring down average electricity rates.

Let's see how we can solve these challenges that data centers present.

Mm-hmm.

And the glucoraphanin is the precursor molecule.

You start chewing the broccoli, it releases an enzyme from the cell wall called myrosinase, and those two create a chemical reaction that cleaves a glucose molecule off the glucoraphanin and produces sulforaphane.

You swallow it, you get the benefit.

If you try to harness sulforaphane after that reaction, it degrades within hours because it's not stable.

And so all broccoli supplements except for two, because of that instability of sulforaphane and stability of glucoraphanin, have glucoraphanin in the capsule.

And so there's ours, the Broccoliate you just held up has a stable form of sulforaphane, and then one out of France called Approstaphane.

Yeah.

Uh, what, what piqued your interest in that?

Yeah, I mean, it, uh, it, our interest got piqued when a researcher, uh, out of North Dakota, John Budvig, uh, was able to, he, he, without our knowing it, he bought some BroccoliT Plus, uh, and he basically did a, a study.

Um, he had a hypothesis he wanted to test, and he thought that if you take sulforaphane, it will mobilize microplastics out of your cells so that you can excrete them.

And so he showed that.

He used Bryan Johnson's blood test, and he sh- and, uh, he showed that he actually had the highest, um, blood microplastics level after they were mobilized of anyone human that they had seen at, at that time.

So that was last June of So that was June of 2025 and so we heard about the study in twen- August, which is when I texted you after I, I was here.

I was like, "Oh my gosh." We, um-- And so that got us interested and, I mean, I think it's important also to just-- Not everybody knows what-- I mean, of course, microplastics have been talked about a lot, um, but a microplastic is basically a microscopic, so sort of a dia-diameter of your hair fa- your, your hair's or, or less, um, that size piece of plastic that basically gets sloughed off, um, regular plastics.

Right? It's like [chuckles]

What does that mean for a business like yours and for the many, many other businesses and the 100,000 jobs all feeding into this giant company?

Well, just to correct your felicity, it's more than 100,000 jobs.

It's approximately 180,000 jobs in the direct automotive chain.

And we're all faced with the same headwinds, really.

We've got Chinese vehicles taking an increasing share of markets all over the world, particularly China and now the UK.

We've got all the tariffs and trade friction, of course.

We've also got the highest electricity costs in the developed world, which is a real problem.

Are you seeing lots of pivoting and repositioning among the many companies that have previously been so dedicated to the automotive industry?

Like why is it important? Why do we even care about something like NF Kappa B? And why do we care about s- sulforaphane? Like break it down for me.

Basically, you know, just to keep it simple, so y- you have estrogen metabolites.

Some of them are neutral, some of them are bad.

Sulforaphane works in all three phases of detoxification.

It's the best natural phase two detoxifier of any compound.

And so basically it can get rid of those bad metabolites.

And the reason it can is because of this enzyme that it releases in, it's NRF2.

Hmm.

Let's do that

... um, and typically it's in the, in the, um, we t- we've been talking about it, uh, in the framework of microplastics with, uh, BPA, uh, microplastics being porous, BPA, um, basically being a plasticizer that makes the plastic softer and not brittle.

And, um, and so y- you know, each microplastic can have tens of thousands of different chemicals in them, like BPA.

But, um, but with BPA being an endocrine disruptor, you know, the, and a, and a estrogen mimic, basically, um, it can, um, if you th- if you think about it, it's, it's a s- you know, estrogen is a signaling molecule.

That's what the hormone is.

And, and so when it sends a signal, um, and you have, um, a mimicked estrogen s- also seemingly sending a signal, it's like I, uh, a analogy I make is it's like you're watching two TV shows on top of each other.

You may notice A character or you may be able to tell what shows you're-- they're, they are, but you're not gonna understand the plot.

And so tell-- like, what is sulforaphane, and where is it coming from?

So share with us, how did Mara Labs start?

Yeah, basically in 2012, my late wife, Mara, was diagnosed with breast cancer and she wanted to treat it naturally.

She was a nurse or integratively.

And so I had a background in sciences.

and basically did a lot of research.

We met my current business partner that first week, Dr. John Gilday, a researcher at the University of Virginia.

His wife had breast cancer a decade earlier.

We don't have any issues with that.

What's your experience in doing profiles? What's critical in writing about somebody else? I found I was

pretty good at writing profiles.

I liked doing it.

And the trick is to fall in love with your subject when you're interviewing him or her, and then to fall out of him or her when you're writing.

So even as I was interviewing, I would always try to dig for the thing that the person liked.

might not be so happy to have disclosed.

I don't mean I was a Snoopy expose writer, but I would try to catch all of their grandiose statements at the point where they maybe had a little flaw, sort of see if I could dig into that.

So who have you ghostwritten books with now?

I would love for you to tell us a little bit about y- both of your journeys and what led to where you are today and the impact that you all are having.

Yeah, I mean, my journey started when my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2012, and that very same week a mutual friend, uh, introduced me to John and his wife, uh, Heather.

And, and so for probably a, a span of about five years, I emailed or called John every day except Sunday and asked him questions about cancer, sort of, uh, 'cause he's sort of an expert.

But yeah, basically we were able to grow Mara cancer cells in our lab and put 60 different, uh, substances like supplements on them to see what directly killed her cancer cells.

And so sulforaphane, which is the good molecule from broccoli, was number three in directly killing her type of cancer.

And so, uh, of course, I went out to buy some, but all I could find was this precursor molecule called glucoraphanin.

So if you have a head of, of broccoli, you start chewing it.

Yeah.

cardiovascular disease, cancer as well.

Yeah, I mean, the Netflix just came out with, in March, a documentary on microplastics and fertility.

Okay.

And so the microplastics themselves are porous.

And so they have things called plasticizers, which makes the plastic less brittle.

And BPA is one of them.

and phthalates, but it can have toxins, other toxins like metals as well.

It'd be a good test for someone to develop is just, you know, take whatever cells of blood drop, pellet the cells, wash it once with isosmotic so you get rid of the potassium magnesium that's outside the cell, lyse the cells, measure the internal.

It's going to require more than that.

Yeah, I mean, it is.

I think you're right, because, you know, it is silent and you don't you don't have you don't notice it until you have a problem.

So like with one of my family friends, their daughter had.

regular menstruation and I'm like, have you basically thought about coming off of microplastics or decreasing your burden of microplastics? But it's typically not until you have a problem that you start thinking in those ways.

And it's because once microplastics gets inside of you, they get into your cells and they get engulfed in things called lysosomes, which are the digestive centers of the cell.

But your body can't digest microplastics.

What is it about you that we trust?

So, so talk to me about kind of like the comparison between, you know, trying to get sulforaphane from glucoraphanin sources like broccoli or supplements versus figuring out a way to stabilize it and have it available in something like capsule form.

I mean, I think the, the main thing to... uh, there are a couple things to keep in mind.

First, that not every broccoli seed, uh, has glucoraphanin in it to produce sulforaphane.

We, uh, back in...

I think ba- it's been about five years now that we, we were testing a bunch of sources, and we were shocked to find that not all of the sources that we were, uh, like in fact, most of the sources we were getting couldn't...

You know, we were getting some from Amazon.

We were looking for organic brands and trying to, you know, figure out sourcing, uh, for seed and, and I think we got six, and five of the six or six of the seven couldn't make sulforaphane and didn't have glucoraphanin.

So that's sort of the, the logic in how we added compounds to, to our SKU.

One and two, uh, very strong inducers of sulforaphane.

Yeah.

So for...

I mean, it, it is kind of...

It's funny, but it's also pretty amazing.

It's amazing product, right? So sulfo- sulforaphane, we try to talk about, just focus on, you know, a handful of its benefits, but it has 39 pro-health benefits in the, in the science literature, and the, this, this detox pathways, glutathione, pha- it's the best natural molecule at in- inducing phase two detox because, uh, of the NRF2 pathway.

Um, and so yeah, it's, it's, it is a, an amazing supplement, not just because we sell it, but c- b- but because of what it is.

Do you wanna, uh, kinda share with the audience what happened?

But how-- what impact has that kind of continued high price pressure had?

Uh, well, it's a slightly bigger increase than, than the dollar one because the, uh, sterling rate has also gone against us.

So a-actually, aluminum's up over fifty percent in, uh, since the end of twenty twenty-four.

And that, that-- there's a number of factors, uh, that, that do that.

As you mentioned, the Iran complex, certainly one of them.

Uh, two big smelters in the Gulf, one in the UAE, one in Bahrain, have been attacked.

They've both said they're not gonna come onto full production for months, possibly a year.

Beyond cars, just give people some other areas g- 'cause I think that's interesting, isn't it, about where people might see sort of unexpected price rises, David.

These, I, I know you guys, we got into it a little bit, but-

I just wanna say, f- I think the most important thing to, to take from this podcast is that we, uh, so sulforaphane is, uh, infamously unstable, and so we have the only naturally stabilized form of it that's in a capsule that you can take.

It's five milligrams per capsule, which is roughly equivalent of two and a half pounds of mature broccoli.

Um, and so there, I, we have, we go to conferences, we have doctors come up to us every conference, "Well, what about this brand?" So, so, and they, it says on the back sulforaphane glucosinolate, which means sulforaphane p- precursor.

And so I'm like, "I'm sorry, that's not, so it doesn't have sulforaphane in it." It has the molecule that comes before sulforaphane, which is stable.

So if you have a head of broccoli, you start chewing it, the glucoraphanin, the precursor molecule's in there, you break the cell wall through this chewing, and it releases an enzyme that converts that glucoraphanin into sulforaphane.

You swallow it, you get the benefit.

I agree.

[laughs]

Um, I think I may have given him a couple Sundays off, but, um, just question after question, just he's a wealth of knowledge about cancer.

Um, and, you know, I have a science background, but, um, but John is so-- he's-- ha- was ten years ahead, um, in knowing what he knows and, and knowing, knowing what he knew.

And so, um, basically, you know, um, we ended up...

I, I asked him, uh, we-- he actually grew Mara's cancer cells in our lab, um, and so, um, he-- and he basically determined that sulforaphane was number three in directly killing her type of cancer, and that was sort of, um...

I mean, we, we went out to source s- source it in supplements and real- realized really quickly that all the broccoli supplements on the market are the precursor molecule glucoraphanin.

Even though they... uh, most, most of them say they have sulforaphane, they do not.

Maybe, maybe you could do a pulse or something, but anyway.

But the new money does loosen bottlenecks.

What it's done is that the plans that we had to improve our operations, to increase the input of apprentices, for example, or to acquire tooling or spares that were being throttled back because of the financial restraints that we had in the past, now we're able to and proceed with those procurements.

One of the main jobs has been to change its batteries.

Each one of them would be about the size of a person, and, uh, weight, it is, uh, over four or five hundred pounds, so quite an impressive evolution when they're replacing them.

They barely fit in the hatch that they're being brought on board through, and that is done using a, a crane, so obviously there's some limitations with wind and to make sure we do it safely.

And they're, uh-- Once on board, they're actually moved on teak boards using dish soap.

Uh, when you guys connected, what was the conversation like behind the scenes?

So yeah, I mean, basically, um, I would...

I still have a background in sciences, so I, I would read about different sup- supplements and cancer, and, um, I'd always like, "John, what do you know about this? Is this true? It's not true." That's actually how we, um, you know, found out about the-- I found out about the good molecule in broccoli called sulfor- sulforaphane, um, that, uh, basically, John actually, uh, grew Mora's cancer cells in his, in our lab, and we put sixty different supplements on them to see what killed her type of cancer, and the sulforaphane was number three in killing her type of cancer.

So went out to buy it, couldn't find it because it didn't exist, 'cause all the broccoli supplements on the market are the precursor molecule called glucoraphanin.

And so it was like, you know, we ended up just growing a lot of broccoli sprouts for years.

And, you-- at the time, I had a one- and three-year-old, uh, boys, and, um, you know, so you're, you're caring for them.

You're, I-- we were growing, like, enough broccoli sprouts for, like, the joke, it's like ten families because it was like an operation.

But are there certain things you guys have discovered that make somebody more, um, likely to get cancer compared to others?

What is it doing to our bodies, our metabolisms, and what can we do about it? So David, I'd love for you to share why this is a huge concern and a problem these days.

Yeah, I mean, I think part of the problem is that they're everywhere, right? And so even like an apple has a million microplastics on it.

Even glass bottled water, depending on the top, can have 100,000 bits of microplastics.

So you think I'm drinking water from a glass bottle, not a plastic bottle.

And I'm doing better or I'm good, but you're not necessarily.

So the fact that you are ingesting, you know, quite a lot of microplastics daily, not I mean, if you microwave your food and, you know, get one of those microwavable dinners, you're There's a lot.

There's millions of microplastics.

You're talking about the

But data centers, we are just having to pay for Google using more electricity.

Yeah.

Well, there's a lot of people working right now, (laughs) and there's a lot of thinking going on.

I mean, one of the sort of hot topics in my area of the world right now is how, because these data centers need to hook up to the grid.

If you build a data center and you're waiting to hook up to the grid, you are literally wasting millions of dollars a day in opportunity cost.

So these people desperately wanna hook up to the grid, but there's no room for them on the grid.

So how can we get them to pay for the reforms that would make room on the grid, right? How can we get them to pay for grid upgrades? Rather than us paying for them, how can we get a little money out of them to pay to upgrade our grid? And the amount of money, Molly, that is going into AI and data centers, you would need like 2 or 3% of that money, and you could transform the US (laughs) electricity system.

What about the sort of temperature damage, like the hydrocarbons, the microplastics in our brains? Like, what about the irreversible stuff?

Whether that was through new policies or new pledges, like I mentioned, what do you like? I guess, broadly speaking, what do you think is possible or what could be possible in the wake of this bill?

Well, I mean, that's a very good question.

It was like, I mean, it's just anybody who's lived through it knows this just strikingly different.

The first time Trump was elected, I think it was widely viewed as...

An anomaly, a weird one-off quirk that happened because a bunch of different things came together all at once in just the wrong way.

Timing was bad, so it was a little bit of like a fluke, and it inspired resistance.

And so it did inspire, actually, quite a bit of climate action at the state and city level.

So you might as well go down that path.