Danielle Eldredge: Boost brainpower with exercise

If you want to work out your body, exercise. If you want to work out your brain, exercise.

That’s right. Jumping jacks, curls and squats tone your midsection and your mind.

Don’t take it from me. John Ratey, Harvard Medical School psychiatrist and author of “Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and The Brain,” says, “Exercise is the single best thing you can do for your brain in terms of mood, memory and learning.”

Here are three — often-overlooked — brain functions that are positively affected by exercise:

1. Mood: Countless studies show exercise battles depression and stress. According to Ratey, if you burn 350 calories three times a week through sweat-inducing activity, you can reduce symptoms of depression about as effectively as an antidepressant.

Additionally, when you jump on a treadmill or cross trainer for just 30 minutes, researchers from the University of California at San Francisco say, you’ll increase your levels of serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine — three brain-soothing chemicals that ease tension and stress.

Further, according to the same study, not only will exercise reduce stress, it may reverse the toll stress takes on the aging process by intervening on a cellular level. After stressed-out study participants exercised an average of 45 minutes a day over a three-day period, their cells showed fewer signs of aging than inactive study participants’ cells. In a nutshell, working out keeps you young.

2. Memory: According to a Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study, exercise boosts blood flow to the brain’s memory center. Researchers found that after only three months of exercise, participants with low fitness levels were able to increase blood flow dramatically and improve memory test scores. Better yet, the physical activity doesn’t have to be grueling. Mild activity such as a leisurely walk can help increase blood flow, fend off memory loss and keep skills like vocabulary retrieval strong.

Exercise’s memory-boosting benefit becomes even more essential as we age. The Alzheimer’s Association says one in eight baby boomers will develop Alzheimer’s. The good news: Research suggests exercise could be the antidote. Dr. Ronald Petersen, director of Mayo Clinic’s Alzheimer’s Research Center, says, “Regular physical exercise is probably the best means we have of preventing Alzheimer’s disease today, better than medications, better than intellectual activity, better than supplements and diet.”

3. Learning: Exercise enhances your capacity to learn by creating new brain cells. A recent Archives of Internal Medicine study shows exercise actually increases the level of growth factors — chemicals that help build new brain cells and brain cell bridges. In a separate study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, mice that began using a running wheel grew an average of 6,000 new brain cells per cubic millimeter in the dentate gyrus region of the hippocampus — one of the only sections of the adult brain that can grow new brain cells. Word puzzles are great, but exercise is better for keeping an adult brain engaged.

No matter how busy you are, fit in 30 minutes of exercise today. It’ll benefit your biceps and your brain.

For more health and fitness information, join the Gallatin Civic Center’s monthly newsletter by emailing Danielle.eldredge@gallatin-tn.gov.

Danielle Eldredge is marketing manager for the city of Gallatin Leisure Services. Contact her at danielle.eldredge@gallatin-tn.gov.