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Study Finds You Can Grow Brain Cells Through Exercise

Posted by yaelk on from the how-to-get-smarter dept.

phantomfive writes: Researchers have discovered that aerobic exercise may increase neurogenesis. Based on the results, rats that were put on a treadmill grew more brain cells than rats that didn't. Resistance training seemed to have no effect. This is significant, because the neuron reserve of the hippocampus can be increased, thus preconditions for learning for humans could be improved simply through aerobic exercise.

53 of 99 comments (clear)

  1. Nerve connections for muscles by peon_a-z,A-Z,0-9$_+! · · Score: 5, Informative

    Brain cells and associated nerve connections are necessary to operate muscles. If you exercise more, or perhaps even hone a skill associated with exercise (playing basketball or tennis perhaps), then you would also expect the brain to grow connections associated with these activities.

    So yes, the brain grows. Does it make a person smarter? Not necessarily, it makes a person more able to move that muscle with finer control.

    Also, this seems to be a repeat of the same study in the past, though its first occurrence on /.?:

    http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/10/study-people-who-exercise-have-larger-brains-later-in-life/264017/

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2013/10/13/how-exercise-makes-your-brain-grow/#18d2c88248c1

    1. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by advocate_one · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Brain cells and associated nerve connections are necessary to operate muscles. If you exercise more, or perhaps even hone a skill associated with exercise (playing basketball or tennis perhaps), then you would also expect the brain to grow connections associated with these activities.

      so why then doesn't this work for 'resistance' training? After all, you are exercising muscles.

      --
      Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
    2. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by buck-yar · · Score: 1

      If this were true, weightlifters would have larger brains than aerobic exercisers (since they use upper and lower, not just lower like aerobic).

    3. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by EvilAlphonso · · Score: 3, Informative

      Resistance training leads to change in the nervous system, but possibly not in the brain. Relevant research

    4. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by vtcodger · · Score: 2

      Does this mean that we're going to see our senators and representatives doing Japanese style mass exercise sessions every morning with weights? After all, if there is one thing in this divided country that most folks agree on, it is that many of our elected representatives could use a few more brain cells.

      --
      You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
    5. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by oh_my_080980980 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      RTFA: " learning temporally and/or spatially complex tasks. " It has nothing to do with simply exercising muscles.

    6. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The slashdot moderation system is horribly broken, isn't it? OP gets modded +5 Informative for posting something that's flatly wrong per the article, and a link that contradicts his own post (the first one, not going to click the forbes one). So neither the OP nor the mods read the article. It's the blind leading the blind around here.

    7. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by Shortguy881 · · Score: 1

      You are confusing neurogenesis and strengthening of neural pathways. Muscle memory is increasing the strength of connections between neurons and neurogenesis is the birth of new neurons. Strengthening neural pathways does not make your brain "grow."

      --
      Brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants.
    8. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by bluefoxlucid · · Score: 3, Informative

      In my research of nootropics, I came across Noopept.

      Noopept is considered one of the most powerful nootropics, a thousand times stronger than Piracetam. Among other things, Noopept increases BNF and BDNF in the brain. These chemicals power neurogenesis, encouraging the formation of new brain cells and greatly increasing neuroplasticity.

      What does "greatly increasing" mean?

      Scientists test rats with many apparatuses. Most of these are repetitive tools, like a pool of water with a few small, hidden platforms (you drop the rat in to drown, and it panics and seeks out the platform; then you repeat the trial, leaving or moving the platforms, reorienting the device, or whatnot, to see if the rat can recognize environment cues or apply an efficient search algorithm). One of the most useful tools is a simple T maze, in which corridors abruptly meet a wall with a choice of left or right alternate path.

      Rats navigating the T maze eventually find food at the end. In repeated trials, rats learn the topology of the maze, eventually running to the end of the T maze by the most direct path. This essentially tests rat memory.

      Rats run on a wheel for 10 minutes before and after running a T maze *consistently* learn the maze in half as many trials as a control group of rats kept lazy in cage.

      The source of this increase in learning speed? An increase in BNF and BDNF in the brain.

      Bicycling, running, jumping jacks, whatnot. These things will exercise you. The exercise temporarily increases BNF and BDNF levels measurable in human blood serum. Like the rats, the humans become significantly more intelligent.

      This study doesn't surprise me. I already knew this shit.

      --
      Support my political activism on Patreon.
    9. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by Crowd+Computing · · Score: 1

      Brain cells and associated nerve connections are necessary to operate muscles. If you exercise more, or perhaps even hone a skill associated with exercise (playing basketball or tennis perhaps), then you would also expect the brain to grow connections associated with these activities.

      So yes, the brain grows. Does it make a person smarter? Not necessarily, it makes a person more able to move that muscle with finer control.

      The summary said that resistance training had "no effect", so it's not entirely a case of exercising your nerves. More plausible is that aerobic exercise increases the amount of oxygen or at least the blood flow to the head, providing the cells there with more material or fuel for growing.

      Okay, time to read the article.

    10. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by gymell · · Score: 4, Informative

      Resistance training leads to change in the nervous system, but possibly not in the brain. Relevant research

      The studies you mention are from 1988 and 2006, respectively. A more recent study from 2015 concludes otherwise:

      This study provides the first evidence for strength training-related changes in white matter and putamen in the healthy adult brain.

    11. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by EvilAlphonso · · Score: 1

      That is even better news :)

      To be honest, resistance training has so many other benefits that I don't really need additional reasons to do it. Heavy lifting has fixed the back and shoulder pains that had plagued me for decades.

    12. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by graphius · · Score: 1

      I wonder if it has more to do with boredom and activity than aerobic exercise...

    13. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by advocate_one · · Score: 1

      temporally and/or spatially complex tasks

      that would include free weights... which again is resistance training... but a heck of a lot harder than using a weightlifting machine where the weighs are constrained to a simple fixed axis of motion...

      --
      Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
    14. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by shoor · · Score: 1

      Heavy lifting has fixed the back and shoulder pains that had plagued me for decades.

      Ditto. (Well, maybe not the decades part; I started a regimen sooner than that. Back extensions with weights were really what fixed up my back.)

      --
      In theory, theory and practice are the same; in practice they're different. (Yogi Berra & A. Einstein)
    15. Re:Nerve connections for muscles by dsmatthews9379 · · Score: 1

      Yes that is what the article says, improves learning in those task areas, not in general. The take away message here is that the brain is "plastic" and different activities can change it in beneficial ways therefore if we know what they are and factor them into our lifestyles we may have our brains maintain their level of functionality for longer than if we did not.

  2. Wait... by Etherwalk · · Score: 1

    So people who are both stupid and aerobically exercise are that dumb even *after* they're cheating?

  3. No cure for Stupid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    So people who are both stupid and aerobically exercise are that dumb even *after* they're cheating?

    There is no proven cure for Stupid, only for ignorant.

    1. Re:No cure for Stupid by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 1

      There is no proven cure for Stupid,

      Sure there is. You can even buy it at Walmart. Or you can go old school Doom, with no pesky waiting period.

  4. Well.. by neo8750 · · Score: 4, Funny

    I'm screwed then. *gets more settled in his seat*

    1. Re:Well.. by asylumx · · Score: 2

      Well, I guess this is my chance to... wait... why am I here again? What article were we talking about? Meh, guess I'll have a snickers.

  5. No, it's the hippocampus that benefits by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    > In rodents, the hippocampus has been studied extensively as part of a brain system responsible for spatial memory and navigation. Many neurons in the rat and mouse hippocampus respond as place cells: that is, they fire bursts of action potentials when the animal passes through a specific part of its environment. Hippocampal place cells interact extensively with head direction cells, whose activity acts as an inertial compass, and conjecturally with grid cells in the neighboring entorhinal cortex.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippocampus

  6. So... by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Funny

    So, they're saying I can get smarter by logging off of slashdot and going outside?

    1. Re:So... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      If you just exercised more, you would already know the answer to your question.

    2. Re:So... by fbobraga · · Score: 1

      https://xkcd.com/1295/

    3. Re:So... by Crowd+Computing · · Score: 3, Funny

      No, this is an evil ploy to make you use the mobile version of slashdot. Desktop users are doomed.

  7. Well... by EmeraldBot · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This is very interesting, but part of the article mentions that some rats were more predispositioned to benefit than others through genetics. If that applies to humans as well, that means this running will benefit only some of us with an increased hippocampus size. However, one should be getting aerobic exercise anyway, although many of us don't; the health benefits are well worth it.

    --
    "Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
    1. Re:Well... by jeffb+(2.718) · · Score: 1

      Maybe. It's possible that some rats are more predisposed to see this particular brain benefit, or it could be that some rats are more predisposed to receive benefits in general from aerobic exercise.

      We all hear the litany of reasons for aerobic exercise -- cardiovascular benefits, mental health, insulin response, and so on. The statistical association is overwhelming. But we also all know people who don't exercise and still score well on these factors, as well as people who do exercise and still fall victim to them.

      So, which is it here? Are some rats predisposed to see brain benefits, or are some predisposed to see exercise benefits in general? This being biology, I assume the answer is "yes" (both), but I wonder.

  8. ... if you're a rat. by Ihlosi · · Score: 1

    Funny how results from animal experiments end up getting generalized.

    1. Re:... if you're a rat. by Ihlosi · · Score: 1
      You volunteering for experiments where they cut your brain open after?

      Oh, they only did that after the rats had been killed.

      Then again, I'm convinced that there are less invasive ways of monitoring changes in the brain. They're just a bit more expensive.

    2. Re:... if you're a rat. by oh_my_080980980 · · Score: 1

      No it's not. Rats are used because they share a lot in common with humans. That's why studies can be generalized to humans. However, human studies need to be conducted to know if the results hold.

      Lot of ignorant people who can't be bother to read the article let alone done any simple searches.

  9. Reproduce this study. by Fragnet · · Score: 1

    I'll believe it once its been replicated by another team somewhere else. So sick of press releases.

  10. Old News from the 90s by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Several people are linking to new articles from a few years ago. This information has been known since the 90s. Running has been shown to enhance neurogenesis and learning. Interesting enough spending time with a creative group of people expressing your ideas also promotes neurogenesis. It appears the key to health and well being is exercise and good social connections.

  11. Re:This list of /.'ers need to exercise by phantomfive · · Score: 2

    I'm somewhat concerned to find I'm not on that list. You must not have read my posts!

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  12. Proof in 1980s by camperdave · · Score: 1

    I know I got lots of ideas while watching the 20 Minute Workout back in the 1980s.

    --
    When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  13. Known for years... by clickety6 · · Score: 1

    This is the reason that so many gym teachers have doctorates.

    --
    ----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
  14. Adding Endorphin receptors... by Grog6 · · Score: 1

    Jocks are Junkies too, lol.

    --
    Truth isn't Truth - Guliani
  15. Re:Alzheimers? by GrumpySteen · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There is some evidence that exercise benefits people with Alzheimer's, but the how and why is not well understood.

  16. Disappointed by PopeRatzo · · Score: 1

    Why is it always the hard stuff like exercise? Why is it never, "You can grow brain cells through drinking and watching porn"?

    Life ain't fair.

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  17. Not a complete study... by Lumpy · · Score: 1

    What about anaerobic exercise? Technically it should be the reverse as you are starving your whole system of oxygen.

    Or are they afraid of pointing out that running at 90% output or higher for extended periods of time is actually very very bad for you.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    1. Re:Not a complete study... by bluefoxlucid · · Score: 1

      "Resistance training seems to have no effect."

      --
      Support my political activism on Patreon.
  18. Rick Snyder uses this research to fend off. by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 1

    The administration of Gov Rick Snyder is under lot of fire for its lacklustre response to the crisis in Flint. The residents are still being asked to walk to the local fire station to pick their daily ration of water bottles. Today his spokesman vigorously pushed back claiming it is according to plan. He said, "The latest research shows aerobic exercises improve the brain cell count and the children with lead affected brains need to get all the exercise they can get to get back on track. This is how the administration is finding innovative ways to make Flint residents get adequate physical exercise".

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
  19. Study Finds Rat Can Grow Brain Cells Through Exer by nicoleb_x · · Score: 1

    Study Finds Rats Can Grow Brain Cells Through Exercise FTFY Unless you are a rat the study doesn't show that you can grow brain cells through exercise.

  20. Might explain by DriveDog · · Score: 1

    some things about those who do nothing but lift weights.

  21. Re:By that logic, the Japanese... by ITRambo · · Score: 3, Informative

    Japan has the highest average life expectancy on the planet at 84 years. The US is 79 years. Exercise has more than one benefit.

  22. Re:Does aerobic excercise grow other body parts to by mwehle · · Score: 1

    Most prefferably, I'd want to have a longer dick. Not that mine is small. But I still want it bigger. Like mr. trump, he wants more and more voters vote for him.

    How quickly this escalated from more brain cells to more voters for Trump. Even via a detour. All in one line.

    It's because Donald Trump is like Hitler!

    --
    Wir sind geboren, um frei zu sein - Rio Reiser
  23. Dumb thinking by OrangeTide · · Score: 1

    Some people use all available brain cells for dumb thinking. Having more brain cells doesn't make them smarter, it would expand their capabilities in stupidity.

    --
    “Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
  24. Re:Can't prove it by the athletes I've met by tehcyder · · Score: 1

    Can't prove it by the athletes I've met. Antidotal evidence suggests that the effect may be limited.

    Ah, but think how much more stupid they might have been without the athletics.

    --
    To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
  25. Steven Hawking by Ranbot · · Score: 1

    ...does not agree with the results of this study.

  26. Skeptical by joboss · · Score: 1

    Says that scientist that gym company just hired...

  27. Re:By that logic, the Japanese... by ChrisMaple · · Score: 1

    Japanese and other orientals probably have an edge over the rest of us, even without extra exercise.

    --
    Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
  28. Godwins law? by ebvwfbw · · Score: 1

    Godwins law already? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    1. Re:Godwins law? by mwehle · · Score: 1

      That was the reference behind the intended humor, yes.

      --
      Wir sind geboren, um frei zu sein - Rio Reiser