MIT Technology Review Reports:
Quick Summary
Our brains and muscles are in constant conversation with each other, sending electrochemical signals back and forth. Our lifelong brain health depends on keeping our muscles moving.
Key Points
- Myokines are protein molecules that transmit messages from the skeletal muscle to other tissues—including the brain.
- When myokines arrive at the brain, they regulate physiological and metabolic responses.
- Myokines have the ability to affect cognition, mood, and emotional behavior.
- Myokine messengers help the formation of new neurons and increased synaptic plasticity, both of which boost learning and memory.
The article states:
Even moderate exercise can increase metabolism in brain regions important for learning and memory in older adults. And the brain itself has been found to respond to exercise in strikingly physical ways. The hippocampus, a brain structure that plays a major role in learning and memory, shrinks in late adulthood; this can result in an increased risk for dementia. Exercise training has been shown to increase the size of the hippocampus, even late in life, protecting against age-related loss and improving spatial memory.