In this insightful Q&A session from the 2023 Wellness Academy, Keith Baar, PhD, a leading expert in Molecular Exercise Physiology at UC Davis, answers audience questions about optimizing musculoskeletal health through exercise and nutrition. From collagen supplementation to balancing plant-based and animal-based proteins, Dr. Baar offers actionable advice for anyone looking to extend their active life.
About the expert: Keith Baar, PhD
Keith Baar, PhD, is a molecular exercise physiologist at UC Davis, where he leads research on the molecular mechanisms behind muscle, tendon, and ligament development. His work focuses on understanding how exercise and nutrition can enhance physical performance and recovery from injuries. He is a world leader in studying how specific proteins and nutrients, such as leucine and collagen, can optimize muscle and connective tissue repair. His research also explores the development of tissue-engineered ligaments for injury prevention and recovery.
Q&A with Professor Keith Baar, PhD
Transcript has been edited for clarity.
Q: Does collagen supplementation actually work? Isn’t it just broken down during digestion?
Dr. Baar: That’s a great question. Like everything we eat, collagen is broken down during digestion into amino acids or very small peptides. What makes dietary collagen unique is its high content of glycine and proline, two amino acids that are harder to obtain from other protein sources like dairy or plants.
When your body makes collagen, every third amino acid is glycine, and every third is proline. While we can produce glycine in small amounts, it may become conditionally essential in cases of high physical activity. For instance, if you’re exercising intensely, your body might use more glycine than is readily available, making dietary sources valuable.
Essentially, when you consume collagen, you’re providing the necessary building blocks—like bricks for a wall—that your body uses to synthesize the collagen needed for tendons, ligaments, and other connective tissues.
Q: Can vegetarians and vegans maintain tendon health without animal-based collagen?
Dr. Baar: So it doesn’t have to be that way. There are some pretty good sources of glycine in the plant world.
But we do find that if you’re not intentional, people do become a little bit low in it. And so, you know, we’re working with a company right now that’s trying to produce what they call recombinant gelatin or recombinant collagen. And the reason that they’re doing that is because the majority of sources are actually coming from the animal world.
There are a couple of decent sources. Soybean is the primary one. I think soybean’s Latin name is actually Glycine max because it is so rich in the amino acid glycine.
But if you’re not intentional about your eating as a vegetarian, and you don’t go out and find those proteins that are going to help you, that’s when you get into problems.
So a lot of our young athletes who are vegetarian because they’re eating clean, like eating a salad, they’re not necessarily intentionally bringing in things like those soy proteins that are going to be rich in glycine, and they do make themselves a little bit more prone for injury.
Q: Should collagen supplementation be a daily habit for everyone?
Dr. Baar: So, again, many things are possible. I can tell you that I do; I’m in my 50s. That doesn’t mean that I’m, you know, old, but what it means is that I’m already starting the decline of things. And so, yes, I take it daily. The other reason I take it daily is that if I exercise in the morning like I tend to do, the collagen synthesis rates in my tendons, in my cells that are activated, actually don’t peak until about 24 hours later.
So yes, what I do now will combine with the amino acids that are present now. But then, when I exercise the next day, I’m also going to benefit from what I had from that exercise I did yesterday and from the new amino acids that I’m getting today. So, what we like is a regular basis.
So if you take it every day in the morning, that’s great. In the evening, that’s great. And if you’re going to take it every day, then you do want to look for something that comes from a skin source or from a fish source that doesn’t have as much heavy metal in.
Q: You talked about really the idea of stress for the body is absorbed if done if done thoughtfully. When is when is exercise too much?
Dr. Baar: So stress is something that our bodies need in order to develop properly and in order to be maintained properly, but all stresses come together. And so the big thing that we have to do is notice when we have stress coming from outside, from the rest of our lives.
If we’re not sleeping well, if we’re traveling a lot, if we’re doing all these other things that are providing stress, then you need to also realize that now when I’m exercising at this level, even if I’ve been exercising that for years, that now, as the stresses in my life have gotten bigger, now, that relative stress of that exercise about is greater.
And so there are going to be times when our life is stressful when we decrease some of the intensity or the duration of the exercise that we do, and that’s where we can do things that are more, you know, instead of going out and doing something, maybe like a, like a big run there, maybe we’re going to do something where it’s going to be more of a yoga-based move, where I’m going to do isometric holds, where I can basically hold those positions for 30s, get that load across the tissue, decrease the overall general stress, but still give me the stress through the systems that I need in order to maintain my mobility and to keep my body working.
Q: How do plant-based proteins compare to animal-based proteins? This question keeps coming up, what’s the best source of protein, are they equivalent?
Dr. Baar: So again, it’s all depending on a bunch of different things. But the rule of thumb is that plant protein availability is lower.
So all that means is that if you are a vegetarian, instead of eating 20g of protein, you’re shooting for more like 40g of the total protein within the plant because you’re only going to be able to digest and absorb about 20g of it. So, what my colleague here that I’ve come to work with has done is direct comparisons of plant to animal protein.
And all he has to really do is double the amount of protein coming from the plant based source. And the response is the same. But again, that can become a lot of food to ingest.
So you do need to take into account that, often, the easiest thing is to take something that is either animal-based or a hydrolase, a hydrolyzed protein source, from a plant-based source. Such as pea protein.
And they are even studying potato protein where I am currently at. They’re studying all kinds of different vegetable proteins. They all work. It’s just that they tend to need more of a higher dose than you would get from the animal-based proteins.
So, the rule of thumb I give you for young people is 0.25g/kg body weight.
If that young person is a vegetarian, they’re going at 0.5g/kg body with, I said, an older person about 0.4. So now they’re getting up about 0.8. That’s a lot of protein. And so that’s when adding something like protein powder can be useful because it’s concentrated. It’s not going to be as filling. And it will allow you to get the protein you need.
For more practical advice and insights from Dr. Baar’s 2023 Wellness Academy, view his full lecture.
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