Phosphatidylserine and Phosphatidlycholine

By Xavier Fox 

If you are spending time in the gym every day trying to develop the kind of physique that brings home the trophies, then there is a good chance that you are always looking for a way to increase your workout capacity and block cortisol. Your ability to achieve these two things will help you stay on the path to maximum growth. Of course, things like proper nutrition, sleep, recuperation, and good training planning will help, but there is a supplement out there that will make the job easier. Phosphatidylserine and phosphatidlycholine are the names… building muscle is the game. 

Let’s begin with phosphatidylserine, which is a type of phospholipid. Phospholipids are fat-soluble substances within all cell membranes that are comprised of two fatty acids and a phosphate group that is attached to glycerol. They act as a barrier for the cell by surrounding the cell and protecting it, and they also act as structural components inside the cell. Phosphatidylserine is critical in cellular repair; it is imperative for normal brain function and transmitting signals between brain cells. Around 50% of the phosphatidylserine in your body is found in the brain. The other 50% is found in the immune system, and in muscle tissue where it plays a part in making those guns bigger.
The majority of studies into phosphatidylserine have been done using a form known as bovine-cortex phosphatidylserine. However, with the breakout of mad cow disease in 1990’s, fear that the infection could be transferred by supplements produced from the brains of cows led to the development of a soy-based phosphatidylserine. If you see a phophatidylserine (PS) supplement in the store, it will most likely be manufactured from soy. These two forms of this supplement have different types of fatty acids (long-chained polyunsaturated fatty acids in bovine-cortex PS and saturated and monounsaturated fatty acids in soy PS), so they are chemically very different. Therefore, you cannot make assumptions about the soy-based type from studies done on the bovine-cortex type.
As we stated in the opening paragraph, PS has been shown to block cortisol. Cortisol is a corticosteroid hormone produced in the adrenal gland. Some of you athletes out there may have had to get hydrocortisone shots to combat severe inflammation at some point… hydrocortisone is simply the synthetic form of cortisol. It is known as the “stress hormone”, because it is released when the body is under various forms of stress ranging from depression and psychological stress to fear and physical exertion. Cortisol causes an increase in blood pressure, rising blood sugar levels, and it even inhibits the immune system.
Cortisol will slow down the formation of glycogen and thus reduce insulin, which is the most anabolic hormone in the body. It will also break down proteins and lead to increased levels of glucose in the blood. A prolonged excess of cortisol in the blood can actually lead to hyperglycemia. These things are definitely frowned upon, but as bodybuilders our main concern is that it decreases amino acid uptake by the muscles and inhibits protein synthesis. Well, if you are not turning those broken down amino acids back into muscle tissue, then your road to the stage is going to be full of potholes. This will also be bad in a couple of different ways. First off, it is obvious that you will not be adding new muscle at levels that coincide to the amount of work you are doing in the gym, which is always frustrating to a dedicated muscle maniac. Even more importantly, you will not be able to recuperate correctly because your body will not be able to properly repair muscle that is broken down. What this means is that you will actually lose muscle, because after breaking muscle tissue down in the gym, the effects of cortisol will keep it from recovering back to where it was before you started. I cannot speak for our readers, but it is probably safe to say that they go to the gym to get bigger and stronger… not smaller and weaker.
Cortisol will also act as a diuretic: as cortisol levels become higher and higher, more and more water is lost. Muscle cells are 75% water, so if you are dehydrated, muscle cells will not function properly. Dehydration is the main cause of fatigue and poor athletic performance. Being dehydrated will also increase the chance of cramps, heat exhaustion, and life threatening heat stroke. Dehydration causes your joints to be more brittle, so prolonged excess water loss due to surplus cortisol can lead to joint problems, which will inhibit your ability to train. In addition, if we do not have enough water our kidneys cannot function correctly. The liver must bear some of the load that the kidneys cannot handle. This causes you to burn less fat, since the liver is where fat is metabolized to energy. The liver cannot burn fat when it is doing work the kidneys should be doing. One more time: water is good, diuretics are bad… cortisol is a diuretic.
All righty then, let’s get back to phosphatidylserine. In the Department of Sports Sciences at the University of Whales, Swansea, a study was performed on fourteen males who had to perform three 10-min stages of cycling at 45%, 55%, and 65% VO₂max, followed by a concluding session at 85% VO₂max that was sustained until exhaustion. Respiratory data and heart rate were continually recorded while they cycled, and blood samples were taken during the rest periods between the exercise cycles, at the end of the cycling exercise, 20 minutes after they finished the exhaustion phase, and the day following the exercises. The study showed that the subjects using the phosphatidylserine supplement derived from soybean in dosages of 750mg for a period of 10 days were able to increase the time it took them to reach exhaustion while cycling at 85% V0₂max by a statistically significant amount. On average, the time to exhaustion went from 7min 51s (471 seconds) to 9min 51s (590 seconds), which is almost a 25% increase! The data makes clear that soy-based phosphatidylserine can influence physical performance in a positive manner.
One study at California State University had a group of men of an average age of 22.8 take 800mg of soy-based phosphatidylserine each day. Some members of the group were given a placebo in this double-blind experiment. Subjects were instructed to use as much weight as possible for each exercise of a whole-body workout and to train as hard as possible for four days a week during two-week training periods. This was done to purposely create a high release of cortisol. The blood samples that were taken 15 minutes after each workout showed that soy-based phosphatidylserine reduced cortisol levels after exercise by 20%. The group using the phosphatidylserine also reported that they felt better and more energetic in general, as well as feeling much lower levels of muscle soreness than the placebo group did.
Muscles only contract when signals are sent to them by the nervous system. The molecule that is responsible for carrying those signals is acetylcholine, which is synthesized from choline, so the amount of choline that you have available influences the capacity and rate of signals to the muscles. More available choline means more and faster signals. One of the reasons that muscles fatigue during exercise is the decline in choline that exercise creates. As choline diminishes, muscle performance and endurance will lessen as well. If you want to train hard in the gym, it is a good idea to keep choline levels high so that the ability of your nervous system to send signals remains optimum.
The other phospholipid in our discussion today, known as phosphatidlycholine, will help your workouts too. Some studies done with straight choline salts (choline chloride, choline citrate, choline bitartrate) versus phosphatidycholine have had interesting results. The subjects who consumed choline chloride were tested half an hour after ingestion, and they showed an 86% increase in serum choline levels. However, their levels returned to normal after about four-and-a-half hours. The group that was given phosphatidlycholine showed a 265% increase in serum choline levels that remained elevated for twelve hours. That is quite a substantial and impressive difference. In addition, it was discovered that 60% of the choline created by the choline salts was lost in the intestines due to reactions with intestinal bacteria that converted it to trimethylamine. The equivalent amount of choline that was ingested from phosphatidlycholine only lost a third as much choline due to conversion to trimethylamine.
Phosphatidylserine and phosphotidylcholine are found in a variety of foods, but it is only in small amounts. In addition, as the body attempts to manufacture them from other sources, the process it must use takes a complex series of reactions that uses up a large amount of energy. By supplementing with phosphatidylserine and phophatidylcholine, you can ensure that your body has plenty of choline available to keep the muscle contractions happening intensely and rapidly for the duration of your workouts. It will also keep cortisol in check, so after your extreme workout is complete, your muscles will have no trouble recovering fully and growing as you rest.
One other nifty fact about phosphatidylserine that wasn’t mentioned earlier is that it has shown to have a positive affect on some brain functions. Studies with elderly people and children with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) show that phosphatidylserine improves concentration, memory and mental stress. For the bodybuilder, this means an enhanced ability to concentrate and focus during training. In addition, if you can deal with mental stress better, your body will not release cortisol as a result of that stress. The effects on your brain will help you reach higher levels of brawn.
The recommended dosage of phosphatidylserine for weightlifters is between 300 and 800 milligrams per day. For phosphatidylcholine, the dosage that appeared to be effective is 0.2 gram per every kilogram of body mass. The optimum time to take them is with the meal that precedes your workout. Try not to ingest them on an empty stomach, because many subjects in phosphatidylserine/phosphatidycholine studies reported nausea when taking them without food. They also reported trouble sleeping when phosphatidylcholine was taken just before bed, and scientists believe that this is due to its affect on releasing neurotransmitters. To date there have not been any other side effects reported.
Phosphatidylserine and phosphatidylcholine can help keep you on the path to making big gains. They can help you train harder and longer while increasing your ability to recover at the same time. And during those intense training sessions, your level of focus will be more powerful than ever before to keep your mind on one thing… blasting out that next repetition with maximum force. Give phosphatidylserine and phosphatidylcholine a try… and leave overtraining in the dust.