Image source @ Visual China
Wen 丨 Academic Headlines, Author 丨 Wu Tingting, Editor 丨 Kou Jianchao
Left hand coffee right hand "happy water", work for a long time to sit down to work "Ge You lie down" of you, have you recently felt that the brain is a little bit bad? Seems like memory is also declining?
Be confident and remove the "seems".
Because the latest research has revealed that if you don't exercise for a long time, your brain may really be regressing.
Recently, a research team from Stanford Medical School found that there may be an "anti-inflammatory factor" in plasma that is beneficial to the brain, and the level of these anti-inflammatory factors will be significantly increased through exercise. If these anti-inflammatory factors are injected into mice that do not exercise, they can even improve their learning ability and memory.
In addition, they also found that patients with cognitive impairment also increased their anti-inflammatory factors after 6 months of exercise.
The research paper, titled "Exercise plasma boosts memory and dampens brain inflammation via clusterin," has been published in the top scientific journal Nature.
(Source: Nature)
The research team also mentioned in the paper that the results of this study point to a new direction for the development of treatments for similar diseases such as Alzheimer's disease.
Want to improve your memory? Just move
"Exercise is good for health" is probably a globally recognized truth, whether it is human or animal, appropriate exercise can often improve all aspects of the body, such as delaying cognitive aging and neurological degeneration. However, little is currently known about the underlying factors and mechanisms by which exercise fulfills these functions.
To figure these questions out at the molecular level, the researchers conducted a series of mouse experiments. First, they divided the male mice into experimental groups, the former placed in cages with rollers to act as a "treadmill" to promote mouse movement, and the control group mice were sedentary. Over the next 28 days, exercise mouse plasma (RP) and control mouse plasma (CP) were injected into recipient mice every 3 days to see if there was a difference in their plasma characteristics.
The results showed that the overall cell survival rate of the mice injected with RP was increased, but there was no significant change in the mice injected with CP. Compared with CP control mice, the number of total proliferating cells, neuroblasts, and viable cells in the plasma of mice receiving RP increased significantly. Notably, these features are consistent with plasma changes in the athletic mice themselves.
In addition, the researchers conducted a test on spatial learning and memory in both mice. It was found that injecting RP improved contextual learning and memory in mice, consistent with its effect on neurogenesis.
Figure | Differences between recipient mice receiving RP and receiving CP in the Morris water maze test. Mice are placed in water and compared with the time it took them to find the platform ashore (left); the time, frequency, and latency of the two groups of mice interacting with the virtual platform (right).
Exercise more, can protect the brain
Previous studies have confirmed that the improved effect of exercise on brain cognition is related to the increase in plasticity and inflammation of the hippocampus.
Therefore, the researchers hypothesized that people who exercise regularly may have such a "sports anti-inflammatory factor" in the body that can protect the brain and reduce inflammation in the hippocampus.
They first injected RP into mice with neurodegenerative disease-associated neuroinflammation, and then looked to see if it could reduce neuroinflammation, and by examining the expression of related genes, they found that RP was indeed effective in combating the neuroinflammation response of the hippocampus.
This further confirms the researchers' hypothesis.
To determine the anti-inflammatory component of RP plasma, they immunized the elimination of four of the most important differentially expressed proteins in RP: cluster protein CLU, FH protein, glycoprotein pigment epithelial-derived factor PEDF, and leukemia inhibitor receptor LIFR. All mice suffered from hippocampal inflammation, the control group mice were injected with complete RP, and the experimental group mice were divided into 4 groups, which were injected with RP plasma deficient in CLU, FH, PEDF, and LIFR, and then analyzed the hippocampus of mice by DNA sequencing methods of immune and inflammatory gene expression 8 hours later.
Eventually, the researchers identified the "anti-inflammatory factor": RP, which does not contain the CLU protein, almost lost its anti-inflammatory properties, while the other 3 proteins had little effect. After labeling different classes of CLU proteins using stains, the researchers further targeted the main anti-inflammatory role of recombinant clusterin (rCLU).
Figure | the changes in various proteins in the plasma before and after the subject's exercise, the gray triangle is before the exercise, and the blue circle is after the exercise (Source: Thesis)
To determine whether the results were useful in humans, they also conducted an experiment on 20 veterans with mild cognitive impairment with amnesia, and after 6 months of exercise, found that in patients who exercised, there was a significant increase in CLU and a significant decrease in proteins associated with inflammation in the hippocampus.
Therefore, the discovery of "anti-inflammatory factors" in this study is very promising to be applied to the human body, and even brings new hope to the treatment of patients such as Alzheimer's disease.
Run for 10 minutes and benefit from the whole body
Coincidentally, an article published late last month in The Scientific Reports, a sub-journal of Nature, also revealed the importance of exercise, with a team of researchers from the University of Tsukuba finding that we don't need much exercise every day, just 10 minutes of running, which benefits our mental health.
(Source: Scientific Reports)
Although previous studies have shown that physical exercise can improve our mood, those studies have generally used cycling as a form of exercise. The researchers hope that through this experiment, they will study the effects of running on brain regions that control mood and perform multiple functions.
Professor Hideaki Soya, corresponding author of the paper, explains: "Given the degree of control required to coordinate balance, movement and propulsion during running, it is logical that neuronal activation in the prefrontal cortex will increase, and other functions in this area will benefit from this increase in brain resources." ”
To test their hypothesis, the researchers first gave subjects a 10-minute run, then used the Stroop Color-Word Test to observe their emotional status and obtain data on changes in hemodynamic changes related to brain activity as participants performed each task. For example, to write the word red in green, participants must say the color instead of pronouncing the word. At this point, the brain must process both sets of information at the same time and suppress irrelevant information.
Figure | the results of the color word test conducted by the control group and the experimental group. Reaction time, error rate, Stroop interference status, control of two sets before and after running (Source: Paper)
The results showed that after 10 minutes of moderate-intensity running, the time of the Stroop interference effect was significantly reduced.
In addition, during the color word test task, the subject's bilateral prefrontal lobes were also significantly activated. After the run, participants also claimed to be in a better mood.
Given that many of the features of the prefrontal cortex are unique to humans, the researchers said, the study not only sheds light on the benefits of "running for ten minutes and benefiting from the whole body," but also hints at the potential for exercise to play a more far-reaching role in human evolutionary history.
After listening to so much, don't you hurry up and move?