Dr. Rhonda Patrick

The omega-3 index is actually in the red blood cells and red blood cells take 120 days to turn over.

So if you're going to do a baseline test, if you want to know before supplementing what your level is, you have to wait 120 days before doing the second test after supplementing to know how much you went up because that's how long it takes for your red blood cell to turn over.

Some of the most well-known mechanisms do have to do with the omega-3 fatty acids being very powerful regulators of

the inflammatory process in some way, shape, or form, whether that has to do with resolvins that are produced.

So from the metabolites of like DHA, for example, resolvins play a role in resolving inflammation.

Like you want your inflammatory response to be activated when it's supposed to be, but you want to resolve that inflammation and inflammatory response in a timely manner, right?

And resolvins help do that.

And so resolvins are one.

And then there's these specialized products

pro-mediating molecules, the SPMs that also help resolve the inflammation, just so many different ways and inputs.

And so when we talk about inflammation, honestly, it's a big general term, but you're talking about when you're talking about serotonin release, you know, at the level of neurons, you know, we know that these inflammatory molecules cross the blood brain barrier.

It's known that omega-3, actually specifically EPA, is able to help

inflammation inhibits the release of serotonin.

And so EPA is actually able to blunt inflammatory responses along with DHA as well.

DHA does that through resolvents and stuff.

And this then helps more serotonin be released because you're not having so much inflammation getting into the brain and affecting serotonin release, right?

That's one mechanism.

And then another would be, well, DHA itself has been shown, it's a very important fatty acid that makes up cell membranes, many cell membranes, including in our neurons.

And as you very well know, Andrew, the structure and function of receptors, of transporters, these membrane-bound proteins on the surface of our cells, including neurons, are affected by the membrane fluidity, you know, like how rigid and how fluid the cell membrane is.

And DHA plays a role in that.