Memory problems got you down? Take a hike
The Arizona Daily Star - August 04, 2005One the easiest steps toward a better brain involves footsteps on the sidewalk, hiking path or treadmill. Ordinary walking and other exercise builds brainpower along with muscle power and endurance.
Boosting mental performance so that people remember better, think clearer and learn faster is called "cognitive enhancement."
It may sound like high-technology stuff that demands expensive drugs or training programs. Exercise, however, has emerged as a low-tech cognitive enhancement method. The news is filled with reports that Alzheimer's disease and other memory problems are less common among people who exercise regularly. Exercise also boosts brainpower in younger people.
The "how" and "why" lie in the results of landmark medical studies done in the late 1990s by a research team headed by Fred H. Gage of the Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif.
Until then, conventional wisdom said people are born with a life supply of brain cells and never grow new ones. That old idea started heading toward science's junk pile when the Salk Institute team found laboratory mice grow new brain cells, hinting that humans might, too. Then, in 1998, Gage's team found clear evidence that new brain cells do grow in humans, in the hippocampus, which is involved in learning and memory.
Studies with laboratory mice showed that mice kept in a stimulating environment - with toys, exercise apparatus and chances to interact with other mice - grew more new brain cells than mice raised in regular cages. They also did better on learning and memory tests that involved navigating mazes. Exercise turned out to be a key factor. Mice that got regular voluntary exercise on running wheels grew twice as many new brain cells as those in cages without any exercise device.
Other studies have since found that even low-intensity exercise, such as yoga, can improve mental performance.
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