Cell phone exposure may be helpful in the fight against Alzheimer’s disease, a new study shows.

The study, involving mice, provides evidence that long-term exposure to electromagnetic waves associated with cell phone use may protect against, and even reverse, Alzheimer’s disease.

The study is published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.

“It surprised us to find that cell phone exposure, begun in early adulthood, protects the memory of mice otherwise destined to develop Alzheimer’s symptoms,” study researcher Gary Arendash, PhD, of the University of South Florida, says in a news release. “It was even more astonishing that the electromagnetic waves generated by cell phones actually reversed memory impairment in old Alzheimer’s mice.”

The researchers say they found that exposing old mice with Alzheimer’s disease to electromagnetic waves generated by cell phones reduced brain deposits of beta-amyloid. Brain plaques formed by the abnormal accumulation of beta-amyloid are hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease, which is why most treatments try to target the protein.

The study involved 96 mice, including mice genetically engineered to develop Alzheimer’s disease and normal mice. Both the Alzheimer’s mice and the normal rodents were exposed to the electromagnetic field generated by standard cell use for two one-hour periods daily for seven to nine months.

The researchers say that if cell phone exposure was begun when the Alzheimer’s mice were young adults, and before signs of memory loss became apparent, their cognitive ability was protected. And if older mice with Alzheimer’s were exposed, their memory impairment improved. What’s more, months of cell phone exposure even boosted the memories of normal mice, the researchers write.

The researchers say the memory benefits in normal mice of cell phone exposure took months to show up, suggesting a similar effect in humans might take years. However, they also caution that “care should be taken in extrapolating our results to cell phone use and [electromagnetic wave] exposure in humans.”

View more of the article here

There’s more good news on the fish front: A large study conducted in developing countries found that a diet rich in fish may lower the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia. And the more fish people ate, the less likely they were to develop the serious memory loss of dementia. The study adds to a growing body of evidence that a fish-rich diet may offer benefits for brain health.

Past research has suggested that eating fish may help to ward off dementia, but most of those studies were carried out in the United States other developed countries. Studies of people living in Italy, France and Spain who eat a traditional Mediterranean diet rich in fish as well as fruits and vegetables, for example, have shown that the diet may have brain-protective effects.

The findings are consistent with earlier reports that suggest that eating oily fish like tuna, salmon, mackerel, sardines and anchovies may help to keep the mind and memory sharp. Eating fish may also help to ease the agitation and depression of Alzheimers, other research shows.

Fish oils contain omega-3 fatty acids like EPA and DHA, which are known to be good for cardiovascular health. They also may help protect the brain against strokes and memory loss. DHA, or docosahexaenoic acid, and EPA, or eicosapentaenoic acid, are both thought to have disease-fighting properties.

In addition to fish, DHA and omega-3 dietary supplement pills are also widely available in pharmacies and health-food stores. Other foods high in these “good” fats include almonds, walnuts and many other types of nuts, as well as canola, walnut, soybean and flaxseed oils. Because many of these foods are a rich source of calories, however, it is best to eat them in place of, rather than in addition to, other foods.

See complete original article here

A large, 5-year study showed that the people in their 70s who were the most active and adhered the best to a Mediterranean-style diet were 61–67 percent less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease compared with the least active and least Mediterranean-minded of the group.

Exercise
The most active in the study group got about an hour and a half of exercise weekly. That’s just a few 30-minute walks a week — a pretty manageable commitment. Better yet, aim to walk 30 minutes every day.

Diet
People with the lowest dementia risk ate the highest amounts of fruit, veggies, legumes, and fish, but less meat and dairy products. Monounsaturated fats, like olive oil, also accounted for more of their fat intake than saturated fats. All very typical ratios in a Mediterranean-style diet that doctors and health experts alike recommend for all sorts of reasons. These nutrient-dense, healthy-fat-focused foods could help protect brains against disease and cognitive decline and help protect the body from lots of other bad things, too.

Understanding exactly how the brain encodes and stores memories is one of the central, unsolved mysteries in neuroscience. Currently the most widely accepted theory is long-term potentiation (LTP)—the lasting communication established between two neurons when they are stimulated simultaneously.

As a person processes an event, two neurons pass information through a small space called a synapse. This chemical conversation triggers an intricate cascade, inviting nearby neurons to fire and ultimately creating a network of connections with varying strengths. Afterward, this pattern of connections, or memory, remains within the network of neurons that processed the event.

Although many areas of the brain contain synapses capable of creating strong patterns of connectivity, the hippocampus is a particularly favorable spot for recording memories. This brain region plays a critical role in learning new information, forming spatial memories and storing short-term memories as long-term ones.

Memories formed with the hippo­campus are especially rich because they integrate input from several areas of the brain, and the ­hippocampus contains densely packed layers of neurons. In addition, damage to this region and nearby areas causes profound and perm­anent amnesia—an inability to store new memories or to recall old ones—and is observed in patients who have Alz­heimer’s disease.

Read rest of the article here

Learn to create new memories faster by playing Myfitbrain

As the working hours get longer and as communication scientific knowledge improves, folks are socially communicating less. We are just awfully busy to make new friends let alone construct authentically meaningful bond. At the end of the day, who needs face to face communication when you could do it in Twitter, Facebook and the numerous online talking services?

This seclusion trend is unfortunate at best because your brain, in addition to brain food, craves social interaction to function at its top. So critical is that it is on our health that a few specialist in the field believe that the amount of social interaction an individual had is one of the golden guide of health and independence in an individual’s old age.

How come social interactions so essential to a healthy brain?

Because your brain is able of neurogenesis (the procedure of developing brand new brain cells). Nevertheless neurogenesis results only when you sufficiently challenge your brain.

Well, communicating with other individual is one of the ultimate challenging task that an individual can take on. As Lawrence Katz once said, “There is a lot of evidences that another person is the ultimate in uncertain things you can encounter. So activities that have you communicating with another human beings is an awesome way of brain exercise.”

As you turn into more isolated, you are thus using less of your brain. As reported by Hebbian Learning principles, you lost what you don’t use. Thus brain cells die off and synapses breaks down as you grow older.

Unfortunately, people who are older also tend to live a more lonely life – thus starting a vicious cycle of mental decline. Sure, making new friends can be challenging and as any worthwhile relationships, you require plentiful energy to make it extraordinary.

Rest of article here.

Bad drivers may in part have their genes to blame, suggests a new study by UC Irvine neuroscientists.

People with a particular gene variant performed more than 20 percent worse on a driving test than people without it – and a follow-up test a few days later yielded similar results. About 30 percent of Americans have the variant.

“These people make more errors from the get-go, and they forget more of what they learned after time away,” says Dr. Steven Cramer, neurology associate professor and senior author of the study published recently in the journal Cerebral Cortex.

This gene variant limits the availability of a protein called brain-derived neurotrophic factor during activity. BDNF keeps memory strong by supporting communication among brain cells and keeping them functioning optimally. When a person is engaged in a particular task, BDNF is secreted in the brain area connected with that activity to help the body respond.

Previous studies have shown that in people with the variant, a smaller portion of the brain is stimulated when doing a task than in those with a normal BDNF gene. People with the variant also don’t recover as well after a stroke. Given these differences, the UCI scientists wondered: Could the variant affect an activity such as driving?

“We wanted to study motor behavior, something more complex than finger-tapping,” says Stephanie McHughen, graduate student and lead author of the study. “Driving seemed like a good choice because it has a learning curve and it’s something most people know how to do.”

The driving test was taken by 29 people – 22 without the gene variant and seven with it. They were asked to drive 15 laps on a simulator that required them to learn the nuances of a track programmed to have difficult curves and turns. Researchers recorded how well they stayed on the course over time. Four days later, the test was repeated.

Results showed that people with the variant did worse on both tests than the other participants, and they remembered less the second time. “Behavior derives from dozens and dozens of neurophysiologic events, so it’s somewhat surprising this exercise bore fruit,” Cramer says.

The gene variant isn’t always bad, though. Studies have found that people with it maintain their usual mental sharpness longer than those without it when neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s, Huntington’s and multiple sclerosis are present.

“It’s as if nature is trying to determine the best approach,” Cramer says. “If you want to learn a new skill or have had a stroke and need to regenerate brain cells, there’s evidence that having the variant is not good. But if you’ve got a disease that affects cognitive function, there’s evidence it can act in your favor. The variant brings a different balance between flexibility and stability.”

A test to determine whether someone has the gene variant is not commercially available.

“I’d be curious to know the genetics of people who get into car crashes,” Cramer says. “I wonder if the accident rate is higher for drivers with the variant.”

In addition to Cramer and McHughen, Paul Rodriguez, Laura Marchal-Crespo and Vincent Procaccio of UCI worked on the study, along with researchers from the University of Florida. The National Institutes of Health funded the study.

A new study has found that Googling can consistently stimulate brain to slow or even reverse the age-related declines that can end in dementia.

Professor of neuroscience and human behavior at University of California, Los Angeles, Gary Small, observed 24 men and women aged between 55 and 78 to reach the conclusion. Half of the people were regular users of the net, while the remaining persons were not.

It was learned that the Internet stimulated the mind greater compared to reading, Timesonline reports. Also the effects of an Internet session apparently continued for a long period after it had ended.

During the research, the brains of the participants were scanned using a technique known as functional magnetic resonance imaging, while they conducted a series of searches on the web. The purpose of which was to measure changes in blood flow around the brain to figure out which was the most and least active parts of the brain.

The participants then went home where they surfed the internet to carry out specified tasks for an hour a day at least seven times over the following fortnight, after which another brain scan was done while using the net.

The researchers learned that the impacts began immediately, with the first scan demonstrating brain activity in regions controlling language, reading, memory and vision. However, the second scan result found that the activated areas had widened to the frontal gyrus and inferior frontal gyrus, which are significant areas in working memory and decision-making. The researchers reached the conclusion that Internet searching stimulates brain cells and pathways, making them more active.

Teena Moody, a UCLA researcher who co- wrote the report with Small, said: “Searching online may be a simple form of brain exercise that might be employed to enhance cognition in older adults.” The research will be presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in Chicago.