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Health See other Health Articles Title: Exercise and antioxidants: A winning combination for brain health? MedXpress: An international team of researchers representing several institutions in Japan and the US has published promising findings that may stand to benefit people living with the specter of Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases, as well as age-related cognitive decline. In their paper published in PNAS, "Leptin in hippocampus mediates benefits of mild exercise by an antioxidant on neurogenesis and memory," Yook and colleagues present results from a series of experiments—murine and in vitro—that elucidate the role of leptin in cognitive function. Leptin is a hormone that is produced in adipose tissue and in the hippocampus, the part of the brain where memory and spatial learning are processed. The relationship between exercise and improved cognitive function is well established. Likewise, certain dietary supplements, for example, docasahexaenoic acid (DHA) have also shown promise in improving cognition and in slowing or halting cognitive decline. The effect of both exercise and supplementation with an antioxidant on plasticity and cognitive function within the hippocampus has until now been largely unexplored, however. Previous research has demonstrated that leptin (LEP) in particular is a promising therapeutic target for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's. Yook and colleagues in their paper sought to answer the particular question of whether mild exercise (ME) combined with the antioxidant supplement astaxanthin (AX) might confer benefit in terms of cognitive function and neuronal plasticity; and whether or not the two interventions—AX and ME together—could have a synergistic effect beyond the additive effects of either treatment administered separately. The investigators "hypothesized that ME-enhanced hippocampal neurogenesis and memory might be further improved with dietary AX via mediation by a neurotrophic factor such as h-LEP [hippocampal leptin]." To test their hypothesis, they conducted a series of experiments on mice and in vitro using human brain cell lines. Krill, a common source of astaxanthin. Credit: Uwe Kils/Wikipedia/CC BY-SA 3.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)] Ultimately, the authors conclude "our findings advance the notion that ME combined with a dietary antioxidant such as AX, which induces endogenous h-LEP, may be an effective nonpharmacological strategy for preventing or improving cognitive function and brain health, and for slowing cognitive decline. This strategy may be particularly useful in vulnerable individuals, including the elderly." Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
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