Exercise May Ward Off Senior Moments

Wait. There was something important that Geezer wanted to write about. Oh yes. Senior moments. The Scientific American reports on a new study that links these moments of forgetfulness with rising blood sugar levels, which typically take off in our late 30s or
early 40s as our bodies become less adept at metabolizing glucose in
the bloodstream. Sciam reports that when researchers used an MRI to look at the effects of increased
blood glucose in the hippocampus of 181 subjects aged 65 or older with
no history of dementia, they found that elevated levels impaired
function of a section of the hippocampus called the dentate gyrus,
which is a “hotspot” of age-related impairment. The journal also mentions a 2007 study showing that exercise improves the
function of the dentate gyrus in both mice and humans. The newer research suggests that these positive effects may actually result from the
influence of regular exercise on the body’s ability to break down
glucose.
Read more in the Scientific American.