What to Take From the Rapamycin, mTOR and Autophagy Conversation with Dr Ross Pelton
•Posted on October 20 2026
Dr Ross Pelton calls himself a recovering pharmacist. He has written 12 books, and he joined me on Pushing the Limits to talk about rapamycin, mTOR and autophagy. We also covered gut health, muscle, hormones and more. This page is the practical version. It covers the ideas you can act on through everyday habits, and the questions worth taking to your own practitioner. It is general education, not medical advice.
The big idea in plain words
Dr Pelton describes mTOR as a master signal that notices when nutrients are available to a cell. It tells the cell to build and grow.[1] Autophagy is the other half. It switches on when nutrients are not available, and it lets cells break down old, damaged proteins and reuse the parts.[2][1]
His point is that most of us are eating so often that the building side is always switched on. He used a flat tyre to explain it: you cannot put the new tyre on until you take the old one off. I put it another way. If you keep bringing groceries into the kitchen and cooking dinner but never take out the rubbish, the kitchen soon becomes impossible to work in.
Ideas worth trying
- Give your body a break from food. Dr Pelton described intermittent fasting as the natural way to give autophagy its turn. His own pattern is a final meal around six or seven in the evening, then nothing until around noon or later. He is not fanatical about it and relaxes for social events.
- Do some resistance training. We both came back to this several times. Dr Pelton said aerobic work is good, but runners, cyclists and swimmers also need some form of strength work or they gradually lose muscle. He pointed to age-related muscle loss, called sarcopenia, as one of the hallmarks of ageing. He also said people respond to strength training at any age.
- Think about protein. He said we tend to eat less as we get older, yet we need more protein. His view is that the standard daily recommendations are too low. Ask your practitioner what is right for you.
- Feed your gut with variety. He said the bacteria in your colon live on dietary fibre and polyphenols, the compounds that give fruits and vegetables their colour. His message was that a diverse microbiome comes from eating a diverse range of plants, not from a capsule alone. He also said most people do not eat enough of either.
- Move every hour. His simple tip is to set a watch alarm and do a couple of minutes of squats when it goes off. This is especially useful if you sit a lot.[3][2]
- Look at what drains glutathione. He listed alcohol, smoking, stress and environmental toxins as things that use it up. He called glutathione the master antioxidant.
- Learn the language of health. Dr Pelton's first point was that if you want to be good at anything, you need to learn its vocabulary. Terms like mTOR and autophagy are a good place to start.
For endurance athletes
I came to this as a former ultra-endurance athlete, and I said it plainly: you have to rest, you have to recover, and you have to bring in natural anti-inflammatories. We also mentioned fish oil and curcumin as the sort of natural anti-inflammatory foods and supplements people often look at.
Questions to take to your own practitioner
Dr Pelton spoke about rapamycin, which is a prescription medicine.[4] He shared his own experience and the research he finds interesting. I am not going to cover how to get it or how much to take. Any decision like that belongs with your doctor, who can look at your whole picture.
He also raised several topics that deserve individual advice:
- Whether low stomach acid could be part of your digestive picture. He was critical of long-term use of acid-suppressing medicines, but do not change any medicine without talking to your doctor first.
- Gut symptoms such as bloating or gas, and whether testing for small intestinal bacterial overgrowth makes sense.
- Hormone testing, which he recommends for both women and men as they age, with proper testing and ongoing oversight.
- Gluten, which he suggested everyone keep low.
Watch or listen to the full conversation
You can watch the full episode on YouTube, or use the short link lisatamati.com/go/pelton. Pushing the Limits has 430+ episodes, and you can find them all at lisatamati.com/ptl-podcast.
References
- mTOR at the nexus of nutrition, growth, ageing and disease. (2020), PubMed 31937935
- Autophagy. (2005), PubMed 16533930
- Benefits for Type 2 Diabetes of Interrupting Prolonged Sitting With Brief Bouts of Light Walking or Simple Resistance Activities. (2016), PubMed 27208318
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