Today's Protocol
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Based on habits, check-in, meals & fasting — not a generic calorie score.
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Daily Schedule
Your protocol mapped to the clock
How to read this: The green bar marks your current time. Habits above it = should be done. Habits below = coming up. The fasting window is your anchor — everything else builds around it.
Fasting Timer
Track your autophagy window in real time
Glycogen depletes
12h
Autophagy activates
16h
Peak autophagy
18–24h
Time fasting
00:00:00
Set your last meal time to begin
What's happening hour by hour
0–12 hours
Digestion → glycogen depletion
mTOR active, autophagy fully suppressed. Insulin falls progressively after hour 4. Body in storage and build mode.
12–16 hours
Ketosis begins — AMPK rises
AMPK (cellular energy sensor) activates, phosphorylates ULK1, and begins switching on autophagy gene expression. Glycogen is largely depleted; ketones rise. DNA repair enzymes start mobilising.
16–18 hours
Autophagy reaches meaningful threshold
ULK1 complex and Beclin-1/VPS34 fully engaged. Phagophores form, LC3-II lipidation rises, and cells begin sequestering damaged proteins, dysfunctional mitochondria and aggregates. This is the daily target window.
18–24 hours
Peak autophagy + immune cell renewal
Peak macroautophagy flux and lysosomal recycling. TFEB-driven gene programs active. Immune cell pruning and renewal underway. Most people break the fast before or around 24 h unless under clinical supervision.
What breaks autophagy: Any calories. Black coffee, plain water, unsweetened ginger tea = fine. Food, juice, or milk → mTOR reactivates within 30 minutes.
Exercise
Movement as medicine — the AMPK pathway
Log sets · 10×10 protocol
Track pushups, squats, rows like a client app — sets, reps, notes. Data stays on this device.
Pushups
Squats
Rows
Log workout
Min cardio
20m
Frequency
3–5×
Heart rate zone
60–70%
Fasted morning walk
Before first meal. Fasting + exercise AMPK signals arrive simultaneously — this is the single highest autophagy trigger available without medication.
10×10 pushups
Maintain and build. Post-workout mTOR in fed state goes to muscle repair — not interference. Resistance training builds immune-supporting muscle mass.
Add squats + rows
Large muscle groups generate a stronger AMPK signal. Doorframe rows and bodyweight squats take 5 minutes and add meaningful immune benefit.
Walking after meals
A 10–15 min walk after eating blunts the post-meal blood sugar spike by ~30%, keeping insulin lower throughout the day. This supports your fasting window quality.
Movement moves lymph. Your lymphatic system has no pump — every muscle contraction physically squeezes cellular waste out of your tissues. The fasted morning walk does double duty: autophagy trigger + lymphatic flush.
Supplements
Evidence-based immune and repair support
Daily — take with first meal
Vitamin D3 — 2,000–4,000 IU
Regulates 200+ genes in immune function. In BC Oct–Apr almost everyone is deficient. Take with a fatty meal — fat-soluble vitamin, absorption requires fat.
Omega-3 — 2–3g EPA+DHA
Reduces prostaglandin E2 which directly suppresses T-cell function. At 2–3g you hit a clinically meaningful anti-inflammatory dose. Take with food.
Zinc — 15–25mg
Required for T-cell development and zinc finger DNA repair enzymes. Deficiency = measurably impaired immune response. Cap at 40mg — higher doses block copper absorption.
Afternoon
Magnesium glycinate — 300–400mg
Required cofactor for DNA polymerase — the enzyme that physically repairs damaged DNA. Most people are chronically low. Glycinate form is best absorbed and reduces anxiety. Take in afternoon for sleep benefit.
Optional
EGCG — 400–800mg
Green tea extract. Activates autophagy via AMPK. Supplement doses get you ~10× the blood levels of drinking tea — still below apoptosis threshold but meaningfully in autophagy activation range.
Artemisinin: do not self-dose. Interacts with CYP liver enzymes, has a narrow therapeutic window, and requires medical oversight. It is not a standard supplement.
Food Protocol
What to eat — and what to remove
Today's protocol meal plan
Built from the protocol — not a calorie database. Log what you actually eat below.
Break fast (~12:00)
Protein + vegetables + garlic
Eggs, fish, or meat · cruciferous veg · 2 crushed garlic cloves · ginger/turmeric + black pepper
Second meal (~15:00)
Fatty fish + fermented + magnesium
Salmon/sardines 3×/week · sauerkraut/kefir/yogurt · 300–400mg magnesium glycinate
Optional
Close window by 20:00
No calories after. Ginger or green tea only. Protect the next autophagy window.
Macro targets (optional)
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Today's meals
Quick-log protocol foods or free-text
Protocol foods
Ginger + turmeric + black pepper
Both activate autophagy via Beclin-1 at food doses. Black pepper increases curcumin absorption by 2,000% — use all three together every day.
Garlic — 2–4 raw cloves
Allicin activates NK cells. Crush and wait 10 min before eating — the crushing activates the alliinase enzyme. Can cook lightly after waiting.
Cruciferous vegetables
Broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower. Sulforaphane activates Nrf2 → upregulates your own glutathione and superoxide dismutase. Lightly steam only — overcooking destroys myrosinase.
Fermented foods
Kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, plain yogurt. Seeds beneficial gut bacteria that produce butyrate — the compound that directly regulates gut immune cells.
3× per week
Fatty fish — salmon, sardines, mackerel
Actual EPA and DHA at therapeutic levels. Reduces COX-2 driven inflammation — the microenvironment tumors and abnormal cells depend on for growth and evasion.
Remove completely
Sugar, alcohol, ultra-processed food
Sugar activates mTOR within minutes → autophagy switches off. Alcohol suppresses NK cell activity within hours and kills beneficial gut bacteria. These two factors actively undo every other item on this list.
Stress
Cortisol is the silent protocol killer
NK cells suppressed
↓40%
Cortisol drop time
20m
The pattern
4–7–8
Guided 4–7–8 breathing
Ready
Daily cortisol management
Morning light (15–20 min)
Outside within 30 min of waking. This single habit sets your cortisol peak correctly — high in the morning, dropping through the day. Without it, cortisol stays elevated into the evening, suppressing DNA repair during sleep.
No screens 1h before sleep
Blue light suppresses melatonin and keeps cortisol elevated. Ginger tea, dim light, and the 4–7–8 breathing instead. Cortisol must be low for DNA repair to run during sleep.
Cold water on the face
Activates the diving reflex → vagus nerve → immediate heart rate and cortisol drop within seconds. Use during acute stress moments. 30 seconds of cold water on the face and neck works.
2× breathing daily
4–7–8 breathing morning and evening. Morning session lowers the baseline you start the day with. Evening session prepares your nervous system for repair-mode sleep.
The hard truth: Carrying health fear all day is one of the most cortisol-generating things a person can do. The protocol supports your body — but the fear itself actively works against it. Both deserve attention.
Gut Health
70% of your immune system lives here
Immune cells in gut
70%
Gut lining turnover
3–5 days
Microbiome shift
2–4 wks
Fermented foods — non-negotiable
Kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, plain yogurt, kombucha. These seed bacteria that produce short-chain fatty acids including butyrate — the compound that directly regulates IgA and regulatory T cells in your gut lining.
Prebiotic fibre — feeds the bacteria
Garlic, onion, leeks, asparagus, oats, barely ripe banana. Fermented by your gut bacteria into butyrate. This is how diet directly controls gut inflammation — the environment all abnormal cells exploit.
Gut-immune axis — why it matters
Your gut bacteria actively train your immune cells. Dysbiosis (bad microbiome balance) creates chronic low-grade systemic inflammation — the exact environment that promotes abnormal cell persistence and progression.
What destroys your microbiome
Alcohol kills beneficial bacteria within hours of drinking. Sugar feeds pathogenic bacteria and candida. Smoking measurably reduces microbial diversity within weeks. All three are on the remove list for compounding reasons.
Your gut lining fully replaces itself every 3–5 days. Start eating fermented foods today and your gut immune environment starts shifting measurably this week — not months from now.
Hydration
The lymphatic flush — no pump, water is the pump
Daily minimum
2–3L
On waking
500ml
Lymph pumps
0
Daily tracker
Glasses — 250ml each
0 / 8
0ml of 2,000ml
Daily schedule
On waking — before coffee500ml
Mid-morning500ml
With first meal500ml
Afternoon500ml
Evening (2h before sleep)250ml
Total2,250ml
Quit Smoking
The highest-leverage move in the entire protocol
BP normalises
20m
Nicotine cleared
72h
Lung cilia
2 wks
Quit timer
Time smoke-free
—
Craving right now? Tap the 🆘 button in the corner — anywhere in the app — for guided breathing and a place to log it.
Your impact
Cigarettes avoided
0
Money saved
$0
Best streak
0 days
Your baseline (before quitting)
Cravings — resisted vs slipped
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The strategy
Physical addiction ends at 72h
Nicotine fully clears in 3 days. After that the craving is entirely the habit loop — trigger, reach, ritual, relief. The chemical dependency is gone. What remains is behavioural.
Replace the ritual — ginger tea
Hot liquid, something to hold, a pause, an exhale. Occupies the exact same behavioural loop as a cigarette. Ginger also directly reduces the irritability of withdrawal via 5-HT3 receptor action.
The protocol supports quitting
Fasting stabilises blood sugar — reducing the irritability spike. Exercise releases dopamine — replacing the reward. Magnesium reduces anxiety. You are already building the chemical support structure.
The DNA damage math
Every cigarette introduces benzopyrene and nitrosamines that attach directly to DNA — the exact damage autophagy is trying to clear. You cannot run the cleanup protocol faster than smoking dirties it. Quitting is the protocol.
The strategy is built. The protocol is running. The timer above is waiting. You said a few days — this is the day you can point to.
Stats & Analytics
Your progress over time
Key metrics
Current streak
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Best streak
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Days tracked
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Completion rate
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52-week heatmap
Body measurements
Track circumference progress (same unit each time). Stored locally only.
Weekly check-in
Coach-yourself review — the feature that makes PT apps sticky, without needing a trainer.
Adherence this week (1–10)
7/10
What went well
Blockers / next focus
This week's self-coach report
Body metrics
Weight trend
Check-in averages (last 14 days)
Habit heatmap
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Monthly breakdown
Journal
Track how you feel as the protocol builds
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The Science
Core mechanisms — why this protocol works
Not medical advice. This page reflects general biology and personal research, not a diagnosis or treatment plan. It is not a substitute for care from a qualified doctor — talk to one before making changes based on anything here.
Master switch
mTOR — growth activator, autophagy suppressor
Activated by food, insulin, and sugar. When mTOR is ON, autophagy is OFF and cellular growth is ON. Turned OFF by fasting, exercise, green tea EGCG, caloric restriction, and some compounds like berberine and metformin. This is the primary switch you're toggling every time you complete the fast window.
Energy sensor
AMPK — the autophagy activator
Activated when cellular energy (ATP) is low — during fasting and exercise. AMPK directly phosphorylates and activates ULK1, the initiating kinase of autophagy. Also activated by ginger compounds (6-gingerol), EGCG, berberine, and resveratrol at food-achievable doses for autophagy support.
Cellular cleanup
Autophagy — digesting the damaged
Cells form double-membrane vesicles (autophagosomes) that engulf damaged proteins, dysfunctional organelles, and misfolded components, then fuse with lysosomes for digestion and recycling. Works at the level of individual cells — cannot clear established multicellular tumor colonies which have already disabled these pathways.
First responders
NK cells — natural killer immune surveillance
Innate immune cells that continuously patrol for abnormal cells — virally infected, pre-cancerous, and cancerous. Kill on contact via perforin and granzyme without prior sensitisation. Activity is suppressed by cortisol, alcohol, poor sleep, and smoking. Activated by garlic allicin, exercise, vitamin D, and adequate sleep.
Adaptive killers
T cells — the targeted immune response
CD8+ cytotoxic T cells kill cancer cells via perforin/granzyme and Fas–FasL pathways. Require three signals: antigen recognition (TCR + MHC I), co-stimulation (CD28), and cytokines (IL-2, IL-12). Suppressed by PD-L1 which tumors express. Require zinc, omega-3, and vitamin D to develop and function optimally.
The kill switch
Apoptosis — programmed cell death
Triggered by DNA damage beyond repair, targeted therapy, and T-cell attack. Cancer cells disable their apoptosis pathways — overexpressing Bcl-2 and underexpressing p53 — which is why established tumor colonies cannot be cleared by the natural compounds and food interventions that work at the individual cell level.
Prevention vs treatment: Food, fasting, and supplements work at the level of individual cells — preventing damage and clearing pre-cancerous changes before they consolidate. They cannot clear established tumor colonies, which have already rewritten their own rules. That distinction is load-bearing.
Autophagy mechanisms — deep dive
What autophagy actually is
Autophagy (“self-eating”) is the cell’s recycling and quality-control system. It sequesters damaged proteins, dysfunctional organelles (especially mitochondria), and protein aggregates into double-membrane vesicles (autophagosomes), then fuses them with lysosomes for degradation. The resulting amino acids, fatty acids and nucleotides are returned to the cytosol for reuse. It operates at the level of individual cells.
Three main forms
Macroautophagy — bulk or selective engulfment by autophagosomes (the pathway most responsive to fasting and AMPK).
Microautophagy — direct invagination of the lysosomal membrane.
Chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA) — one-by-one delivery of proteins carrying a KFERQ-like motif via HSC70 and LAMP2A.
Microautophagy — direct invagination of the lysosomal membrane.
Chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA) — one-by-one delivery of proteins carrying a KFERQ-like motif via HSC70 and LAMP2A.
Core sequence (macroautophagy)
1. Initiation
ULK1 complex
Nutrient/energy stress inhibits mTORC1 and activates AMPK. AMPK phosphorylates ULK1 (activating); mTORC1 normally keeps ULK1 inhibited. When mTOR drops, the ULK1–ATG13–FIP200–ATG101 complex translocates to the ER/omegasome and starts phagophore formation.
2. Nucleation
Beclin-1 / VPS34 complex
Class III PI3K (VPS34) with Beclin-1 generates PI3P on the isolation membrane. This recruits downstream effectors and expands the phagophore.
3. Elongation
ATG conjugation systems + LC3-II
Two ubiquitin-like systems (ATG12–ATG5–ATG16L1 and LC3 lipidation) expand the membrane. LC3-I is converted to membrane-bound LC3-II. Cargo adapters (p62/SQSTM1, NBR1, OPTN…) link specific damaged material to the growing autophagosome.
4. Fusion
Autolysosome formation
Completed autophagosome fuses with a lysosome (SNAREs, Rab7 and related machinery). Hydrolases then digest the contents.
5. Recycling
Building blocks returned
Amino acids, fatty acids, sugars and nucleotides are released back into the cytosol. Transcription factor TFEB simultaneously up-regulates lysosomal and autophagy genes when nutrients are low.
Decision logic the protocol uses
Nutrients high + energy high → mTORC1 ON → ULK1 inhibited → autophagy low
Nutrients low + energy low → AMPK ON, mTORC1 OFF → ULK1 active → autophagy high
Nutrients low + energy low → AMPK ON, mTORC1 OFF → ULK1 active → autophagy high
The 16 h fast is timed to cross the point where AMPK rises and mTOR falls enough for Beclin-1/ULK1 activity to become meaningful. The fasted morning walk adds a second AMPK pulse while the cell is already nutrient-restricted. Food (especially amino acids and insulin) rapidly reactivates mTOR and suppresses the pathway — which is why the eating window is deliberate.
Boundaries (important)
Autophagy clears damaged or excess material inside individual cells. It does not clear established multicellular structures that have already disabled surveillance and apoptosis pathways. The system is homeostatic — both too little and uncontrolled excess can be harmful. Human evidence linking intermittent fasting or exercise to systemic outcomes is still developing; the molecular pathway itself is extensively mapped in cell and animal models.
The compounding stack
16h fast daily → mTOR suppressed, AMPK + autophagy active
Fasted morning walk → dual AMPK signal, lymphatic flush
Morning light → cortisol rhythm reset, circadian repair window set
2–3L water → lymphatic waste clearance
Fermented foods → gut immune axis seeded and trained
D3 + Omega-3 + Zinc → NK and T cell function optimised
Magnesium → DNA polymerase cofactor, sleep quality
8h sleep → DNA repair window — peak activity
No sugar / alcohol → mTOR stays low, NK cells unimpaired
No smoking → DNA damage stops accumulating faster than cleanup
= body repair and immune surveillance at close to maximum capacity
Fasted morning walk → dual AMPK signal, lymphatic flush
Morning light → cortisol rhythm reset, circadian repair window set
2–3L water → lymphatic waste clearance
Fermented foods → gut immune axis seeded and trained
D3 + Omega-3 + Zinc → NK and T cell function optimised
Magnesium → DNA polymerase cofactor, sleep quality
8h sleep → DNA repair window — peak activity
No sugar / alcohol → mTOR stays low, NK cells unimpaired
No smoking → DNA damage stops accumulating faster than cleanup
= body repair and immune surveillance at close to maximum capacity