Health Tips-9: "Exercise can make the brain strong and make it work faster!"

A recent article entitled, ‘Lobes of Steel’ by Gretchen Reynolds in the New York Times claims that physical exercise increases neurogenesis, that is, making of neurons. For example, going for morning walks can add neurons and can help to better your concentration levels and better your performance while on job. That is what the experts say!

The research work carried out by Fred H.Gage and colleagues at Salk Institute for Biological Studies, near San Diego, US, initially on mice and then human beings confirms that exercise can improve the performance of the brain by boosting memory and cognitive processing speed. Exercise can, in fact, create a stronger, faster brain.

In another study at the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign on a group of elderly sedentary people, were assigned aerobic exercise program. After six months, their brains were scanned using an M.R.I. Those who had been doing aerobic exercise showed significant growth in several areas of the brain. These results raise the hope that the human brain has the capacity not only to produce new cells but also to add new blood vessels and strengthen neural connections, allowing young neurons to integrate themselves into the wider neural network. "The current findings are the first, to our knowledge, to confirm the benefits of exercise training on brain volume in aging humans," the authors concluded.

And the benefits aren't limited to adults. A team of University of Illinois scientists have studied school-age children and found that those who have a higher level of aerobic fitness processed information more efficiently. The researchers also found that higher levels of aerobic fitness corresponded to better standardized test scores among a set of Illinois public school students.

What is it about exercise that prompts the brain to remake itself? Different scientists have pet theories. One popular hypothesis credits insulin-like growth factor 1, a protein that circulates in the blood and is produced in greater amounts in response to exercise. IGF-1 has trouble entering the brain — it stops at what's called the "blood-brain barrier" — but exercise is thought to help it to do so, possibly sparking neurogenesis.

Other researchers are looking at the role of serotonin, a hormone that influences mood. Exercise speeds the brain's production of serotonin, which could, in turn, prompt new neurons to grow. Abnormally low levels of serotonin have been associated with clinical depression, as has a strikingly shrunken hippocampus. Many antidepressant medications, like Prozac, increase the effectiveness of serotonin. Interestingly, these drugs take three to four weeks to begin working — about the same time required for new neurons to form and mature. Part of the reason these drugs are effective, then, could be that they're increasing neurogenesis. "Just as exercise does,"Gage says.