Iron

No summary available for this substance.

Iron

Iron is a mineral that the body needs for growth and development. The body uses iron to make hemoglobin, a protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen from the lungs to all parts of the body, and myoglobin, a protein that provides oxygen to muscles. The body also needs iron to make some hormones and connective tissue.

Category
Mineral
Molecular Formula
Fe
Mechanism of Action
Iron is an essential component of hemoglobin, an erythrocyte protein that transfers oxygen from the lungs to the tissues. It is also an essential component of myoglobin, a protein that provides oxygen to muscles.
Evidence Grade
A

Other Names

  • Ferrum
  • Fe
  • Ferrous Sulfate

Primary Benefits

  • Promotes healthy red blood cell production
  • Supports optimal oxygen transportation
  • Supports immune function
  • Required for the synthesis of some hormones and connective tissues

Recommended Dosage

Adults 8-18 mg per day
Pregnant Women 27 mg per day
Breastfeeding Women 9-10 mg per day
Children 7-15 mg per day

Side Effects

  • Constipation
  • Nausea
  • Stomach cramps
  • Diarrhea
  • Dark stools

Precautions

  • Do not take more than the recommended dosage without consulting with a healthcare provider
  • People with hemochromatosis should avoid iron supplements

Interactions

  • Antacids and tetracycline antibiotics
  • Calcium supplements
  • Cholestyramine

Key References

  • https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Iron-HealthProfessional/
  • https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements-iron/art-20366392
Dr. Martin Gibala: The Science of Vigorous Exercise — From VO2 Max to Time Efficiency of HIIT
Iron 2:25:14 0
“And I think the reality of it is that 20 to 30% of menstruating women are, during their menstruation are iron deficient, and they just don't even know about it.”

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Female-Specific Exercise & Nutrition for Health, Performance & Longevity | Dr. Stacy Sims
Optimizing Women's Wellness Through Nutrition, Exercise, and Hormone Health 1:26:35 0
“do women need to supplement iron given that they lose iron during menstration it's interesting because we have a change in heepen or heidin depending on which part of the world you come from”

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Female-Specific Exercise & Nutrition for Health, Performance & Longevity | Dr. Stacy Sims
Optimizing Women's Wellness Through Nutrition, Exercise, and Hormone Health 1:54:33 0
“vitamin D3 really important especially um when we're looking at all the information that's coming out from cardiovascular muscle brain everything that goes with vitamin D also with iron so vitamin D is really important for absorbing and maintaining iron stores”

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Gordon Lithgow, Ph.D. on Protein Aggregation, Iron Overload & the Search for Longevity Compounds
Investigating mechanisms for extending healthspan and preventing age-related degeneration. 16:35 0
“So we went back and looked to iron. Basically, we had a collaborator, David Killilea, who was able to show that iron levels become elevated during normal aging in the worm.”

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Gordon Lithgow, Ph.D. on Protein Aggregation, Iron Overload & the Search for Longevity Compounds
Investigating mechanisms for extending healthspan and preventing age-related degeneration. 18:36 0
“Parkinson's is associated with iron accumulation in the mitochondria or damaging mitochondria and this is leading to death of dopaminergic neurons.”

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Gordon Lithgow, Ph.D. on Protein Aggregation, Iron Overload & the Search for Longevity Compounds
Investigating mechanisms for extending healthspan and preventing age-related degeneration. 19:05 0
“people actually have a five times increased risk of Alzheimer's disease.”

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Gordon Lithgow, Ph.D. on Protein Aggregation, Iron Overload & the Search for Longevity Compounds
Investigating mechanisms for extending healthspan and preventing age-related degeneration. 20:20 0
“people should get their iron levels measured. They shouldn't just be blindly taking an iron supplement, I mean, because that could be completely dangerous.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 1:01 0
“It was remiss of me not to bring up a pernicious element called iron.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 1:26 0
“We need iron. It's a major component of hemoglobin, which carries oxygen which we need. But the levels don't need to be as high as we once thought.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 1:37 0
“People who live a long time and have these diets that are recommended, I typically say they have lower levels of iron and lower levels of hemoglobin.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 1:51 0
“Conversely, people who have very high levels, either genetically, hemochromatosis, or take a supplement and end up with high levels of iron, might be predisposing themselves to accelerated aging.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 2:16 0
“Typically if people are taking multivitamin with high levels of iron, this could be a really bad thing. It'll accumulate in tissues.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 2:24 0
“Ferrous iron leads to the production of free radicals that damage tissues in the body and, even worse, it leads to the accumulation of these zombie cells which we call senescent cells, and those drive the aging process, in part, large part, because they leach these inflammatory molecules that cause other cells in the vicinity to become inflamed, to age, to senesce and even cause cancer.”

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Exercise, Heat, Cold & Other Stressors for Longevity | Lifespan with Dr. David Sinclair #3
The Impact of Nutrition, Exercise, and Health Monitoring on Longevity 5:10 0
“You do need to measure things. And that's why I, myself, and I recommend people measure their blood biochemistry and determine whether their iron, whether it's free iron, which is the worst type, or even the bound iron are out of whack.”

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How to Build Strength, Endurance & Flexibility at Any Age | Pavel Tsatsouline
Optimize Exercise for Health, Strength, Endurance, and Longevity Efficiently 3:00:24 0
“Fred Hatfield is a legend in the iron game he was one of the first to Squad a thousand pounds in competition and he was just a fantastic lifter and a brilliant scientist so he tried to direct a lot of the training towards disinhibition.”

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Gary Brecka: The TRUTH About Biohacking, Light Therapy, and Nutrients
Optimizing Health: Lifestyle, Nutrition, Sleep, Exercise, and Social Connections 1:12:15 0
“vitamins which is very important for these Pathways like vitamin D, iron, zinc I mean it's just it's staggering how these are so common and they're affecting so much of our biology that makes us eventually have what Robert Heeney who was an incredible vitamin D scientist called long latency deficiency diseases.”

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Dr. Nayan Patel: Unlocking Glutathione Your Body’s Super Antioxidant | TUH #057
Exploring the Vital Role of Glutathione in Health and Wellness 5:02 0
“the Glon uh and and you said right now most of the people have not heard about it because of the fact that people do not understand what it is and how to deliver that part but you talking about Middle America but even people that have very affluent we were recently at one of the award shows and literally 90% of the people these are high power CEOs have never heard of glue iron before and I was shocked to see that wait a second you have all the resources in the world yet you have no idea GL is”

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Dr. Jessica Peatross: Detoxing From Environmental Mold, Lyme Disease, and Parasites | TUH #157
Understanding Health, Nutrition, and Environmental Toxins for Holistic Wellness 45:29 0
“If you have iron deficiency anemia, they're super small, the red blood cells. I see that a lot with parasites because parasites eat iron and they don't let people absorb and assimilate properly because of the inflammation.”

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This Man Discovered How To REVERSE AGING & Make Himself 31 Years Younger (Data-Proven) @BryanJohnson
Unlocking Secrets to Health and Longevity: Lifestyle Choices Revealed 21:32 0
“using cookware that have the stainless steel or cast iron instead of non-stick is really helpful”

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The Shady Reality of the $Billion Supplement Industry | The Dr. Hyman Show
Understanding Supplement Quality, Nutrition Myths, and Modern Health Realities 15:34 0
“When you look at the amount of deficiencies, whether it's, you know, 90 plus% deficient omega-3, 80 plus insufficient, deficient in vitamin D, and some people say even more, magnesium is about 45%, zinc's about 40%. Iron, you know, we have a lot of of deficiencies.”

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Exercise & Nutrition Scientist: The Truth About Exercise On Your Period! Take These 4 Supplements!
Optimizing Women's Health and Performance Through Physiological Understanding 1:09:39 0
“so iron is responsible for allowing those heem groups to carry oxygen if we have low iron then we don't have enough oxygen circulating throughout the body or being used by the body so you feel very flat very tired you start to get really dark circles under your eyes um it's a mission to do anything so it's like a deadend fatigue”

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Exercise & Nutrition Scientist: The Truth About Exercise On Your Period! Take These 4 Supplements!
Optimizing Women's Health and Performance Through Physiological Understanding 1:10:20 0
“what foods have iron in them or iron rich so primarily red meat is where a lot of people turn to but if you are more plant-based then we look at leafy greens we look at nuts and seeds but using a lot of vitamin C with that prly adding um a little bit of olive oil on our salads uh maybe cooking in an iron skillet to improve the amount of iron that comes into the food”

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Ask Me Anything: Lowering Cholesterol and Optimizing VO2max
Optimize Cholesterol Levels and Enhance Cardiovascular Health Naturally Without Limits 42:14 0
“hey you want to improve them improve your V to Max and you will be okay and but also a negative go like with a a fasting glucose hemoglobin A1c HSP which is a mark on inflammation and white blood cells that again Mar inflammation so basically if you want to see a a correlation between V2 marks and those markers every if you are improving your view to Max there is a correlation with decreasing those markers again I'm not saying that there is a cause and effect but there is a strong correlation between them and a positively regulate correlation with HDL cholesterol testosterone and blood iron related markers”

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Ask Me Anything: Lowering Cholesterol and Optimizing VO2max
Optimize Cholesterol Levels and Enhance Cardiovascular Health Naturally Without Limits 55:51 0
“I should exercise more and indeed in the last six months or so I'm spending a lot of time in the gym pumping iron and lifting weight and I see that I build a muscle and I also seen that my grip strengths improved.”

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The Most Important Daily Habits For Health & Longevity – Dr Rhonda Patrick (4K)
Essential Omega-3 for Health, Longevity, and Disease Prevention Strategies 42:12 0
“you want to get B vitamins again fet is a B vitamin but getting getting U B vitamins zinc um also you want to get iron these are also important micronutrients you know minerals that's where you get the meat right so red meat for the iron and protein B vitamins it's got zinc um as well poultry is another option right so these are good sources of um protein and other micronutrients that you're not going to get as much from Plants”

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Dr. David Sinclair: The Biology of Slowing & Reversing Aging
Strategies to Slow Aging and Optimize Health for Longevity 1:12:39 0
“Manuel Serrano's lab has found that excess iron will increase the number of senescent cells in the body.”

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Dr. David Sinclair: The Biology of Slowing & Reversing Aging
Strategies to Slow Aging and Optimize Health for Longevity 1:14:23 0
“people who are really healthy and live the way I do and have a diet that's fairly vegetarian, but not strict, still have slightly low hemoglobin levels, slightly low iron, slightly low ferritin, but we have super amounts of energy, we're not anemic.”

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