Reduce the effects of brain-aging by including walking! Read on . . .
TUES., FEB. 18, 2014: JUST-RELEASED NATURAL HEALTH STUDY: REGULAR WALKS CAN SLOW BRAIN AGING: Simple exercise such as regularly walking at a good pace can slow down the brain aging process in older persons. (Exercise was previously shown to cut the risk of cardiovascular and Alzheimer’s disease by 50 percent.) New details of a study, which was first published in 2011, were presented in Chicago at the 2014 annual conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The study involved 120 people, age 65 and older. The analysis showed that, although the brain shrinks with age, physical activity helps improve its overall functioning and, in particular, increases the volume of the hippocampus by 2 percent. This reverses cerebral aging by one to two years and boosts mental capacities. Analysis of the study results has demonstrated that even though the brain shrinks and experiences overall decline with age, this does not seem to be inevitable, and exercise was found to take advantage of the natural capacity for brain plasticity. Only a modest amount of exercise was needed to get this result, although little is known about how much is required. This study analysis was presented February 17, 2014 and has not been published or posted.