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DNP 2,4-dinitrophenolComplete info about DNP 2,4-dinitrophenolDNP was first introduced to the bodybuilding world by Dan Duchaine. In the late 90s, the body building magazine Muscle Media 2000 was offering this special deal to anyone who subscribed. If you subscribed, you got a bunch of audio cassettes containing interviews with 10 bodybuilding experts. Those cassettes included interviews with noted bodybuilding experts. One of them included an interview with Dan Duchaine, which ended with him promising to tell the bodybuilders about a new substance which would revolutionize the bodybuilding world. Fast-forward a year, and there was a question in MM2K asking him to let the cat out of the bag. What he did was tell us about DNP. Since then, we have a lot more experience with it, due to feedback from bodybuilders, and figured out the optimal doses and such from trial and error. But remember what Mr. Duchaine said about DNP: DNP is dangerous. If you screw up using it, you may go blind, or end up in the hospital on an ice bed receiving ice-water enemas as the doctors frantically try to make the temperature of your yellow and sweaty body go back down. On the positive side, very few people have died from DNP, although it remains a distinct possibility. Some DNP related fatalities have been reported (14)(23). Outside the bodybuilding world, DNP is used to make certain dyes—break open a capsule and you'll see that the distinct color you get on your hands is nearly impossible to wash off. It can also be used as a fungicide, herbicide, and insecticide. Before that, in the early part of the 1900's it was used as an explosive. Clearly, this is stuff you don't want to take lightly. DNP works by uncoupling oxidative phosphorylation, which increases the body's temperature and metabolic rate (1). Synthesis of fatty acid in adipose tissue requires cooperation of mitochondria! and cytoplasmic enzymes. Mitochondria release energy from food molecules and transform energy into useable form via the production of ATP. ATP is the primary carrier of energy within your cells, and most cells die quickly in the absence of it. ATP in turn powers your muscles. What does DNP have to do with all this? DNP depletes your muscle's ATP (4), thus requiring your mitochondria to convert more energy from food molecules, and thus create more ATP to replace what was lost. This makes your body use more energy to do anything, from walking the dog to benching 315Ibs. In addition, since cellular levels of all these metabolites depend on the efficiency of mitochondrial energy conversion, a mitochondrial proton leak via uncoupling proteins (UCPs) could modulate Fatty Acid synthesis (8). Paradoxically, DNP inhibits muscle contraction, even though it accelerates the ATPase activity of isolated myosin (13). ATPase is the enzyme that causes ATP molecules to release the energy they store, and myosin is a protein that (along with actin) is responsible for both muscular contraction and relaxation. All of this tells me that your body will need to create more energy than usual to keep up with the demands DNP is placing on it. In addition, it will have to use more of the food you take in to produce that much-needed energy, and less of that food to create and store fat. In fact, you'll start using stored fat as energy to attenuate the energy deficit DNP creates. Studies on animals shown results where a +60% increase in metabolic rate is achieved with DNP use (9), although in humans, the rate may actually be higher. My speculation is that proper DNP use in humans can net a 40-80% rise in BMR (basal metabolic rate). This is all from hypermetabolism, or the increase in metabolism, or your body's need to use more energy to perform tasks. So what happens when your body requires more energy to do today the same things it did yesterday? You lose more fat today than you did yesterday, in this case a lot more. What else? You get tired more quickly as your body struggles to convert food into energy. Your endurance will suffer. Your staying power in the last few reps of a set will vanish. Your ability to complete the same amount of sets as you did yesterday, with the same intensity and weights, will suffer. But that won't seem like much of a big deal to you at the time, because you probably won't get much of a "pump" at all from the workouts you are completing because DNP reduces the amount of available glycogen in your muscles (4)(5)(6). DNP will also increase your rate of ventilation, as your lungs try to get oxygen into your muscles (16). Your blood will be moving a bit slower than usual, as DNP will increase its viscosity (thickness). Basically, it will increase your body's need for oxygen as well as your blood viscosity (3), and it nearly doubles the rate of oxygen consumption in muscles (11). Thus, your body will have to work much harder to oxygenate your blood, and then transport it to working muscles. Cardiac output will then increase proportion to this new rate of oxygen consumption (15). If you are an athlete, you'll play like garbage on DNP because of all that stuff I just mentioned. For these reasons, I see it as very useful for a bodybuilder (who only has aesthetics to be worried about, not functional ability or performance), but not very useful for an athlete. If (and this is a big if), you are badly out of shape and fat before you have training camp for your sport's preseason, then I suppose you can try to use DNP to lose some fast weight. But in all honesty, a 20 day cycle of DNP no less than a month away from training camp is all that is worth a risk. You'll lose some weight, and only have to keep it off for a month until training camp starts. DNP is an exceptionally poor choice for use by an athlete. And remember that part earlier—DNP inhibiting muscle contraction. That'll make you weaker, also. Speaking about getting weaker, DNP will lower thyroid (T3) and thyroid stimulating hormone levels (7). Lower thyroid levels are positively correlated with lethargy (tiredness) and muscle weakness. So it's as fair to say that just as DNP makes you lose fat via several mechanisms, it will make you feel like garbage through several mechanisms. And don’t forget the yellow(ish?) sweat and body odor. Then there's this weird taste in your mouth. On the bright side, we're talking about fat loss of almost a half a kilogram per day (1Ib/day), when DNP is properly used. One of the most worrying side effects of DNP use is its ability to cause vision problems (19)(20). Realistically, you should be alright if you keep your doses and duration of use reasonable. Thankfully, DNP is not particularly hard on your heart, blood pressure, or liver. The only reason you'll experience increases in cardiac output is as a response to the increased ventilation DNP will cause while you are exerting any kind of muscular force, and even then it isn't particularly dangerous (3)(6)(11)(15). Most DNP users feel this effect only vaguely, certainly nothing compared to what would be experienced with use of ephedrine or maybe even caffeine. So we're really only dealing with the lowering of thyroid values and the possible eyesight problems. Oh, and that pesky "death" thing. So now that you know all about DNP, and how to avoid most of the negative side effects. Consultants say 2mgs/kg-5mgs/kg is an optimal dose. It is better to stay on the low end of that, but I am aware that the "Underground Standard" is 600mgs/day. That's still a reasonably safe dose, for most. References
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