Younger Brain With Cardio - That's How Much You Need To Move

Exercise is associated more with body and weight than with brain health. But exercise increases circulation in the brain and clears it of waste products, among other things. Exercising can actually be critical to your brain health.

Your brain becomes more efficient and functional when you are physically active. But you may not realize it because your brain doesn't react immediately and in the same direct way that, for example, your heart and lungs do when you exert yourself.

— Exercise is good for the brain because it increases blood flow to the brain. The brain is an organ just like any other organ in the body. We know that exercise is good for the heart and lungs, so it stands to reason that it is also good for the brain. It also has a blood supply, nerves, centers, enzymes, hormones and so on that have to be produced and sent around with the blood, explains Charlotte Søderberg, who has a master's degree in sports science and psychology.She also points out that an increased blood flow effectively cleans the brain of waste products, just as it does in the body's other organs.

Exercise Improves Cognitive Functions

That exercise increases circulation to the brain is not new knowledge. We have also known for a relatively long time that the brain is like a muscle; the more you exercise, the more your brain grows. A bigger brain is better at learning new things and remembering what you have learned.

Exercise also helps maintain the brain's cognitive functions — and in turn, exercise prevents dementia. Nevertheless, exercise is still associated more with body and weight than with brain health.

— Unfortunately, we have focused on the physical benefits of exercise. Exercise was once considered an effective way to lose weight, but diet accounts for about 75 percent of weight loss. Exercise is good for the body, but if you ask me, exercise is more crucial for brain health. 

Cardiovascular Training Rejuvenates The Brain

Charlotte Søderberg recommends exercise that gets the heart rate up if you are interested in a rejuvenating effect on the brain.

— When you perform cardiovascular exercise (when you move to reach maximum heart rate) your telomeres are lengthened. Telomeres, found in every cell in the body, are the ends of DNA strands and they get shorter with age. The shorter the telomeres, the older the physique.

3 Of The Positive Effects Of Exercise On The Brain 

1. You Learn Better 

When you exercise, you produce the protein (Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor). BDNF is the brain's fertilizer for brain cells. In fact, BDNF is so good that attempts have been made to produce it in pill form, but laboratory chemistry is nothing compared to biochemistry. If you pour BDNF over brain cells in a petri dish in a lab, you can simply see the brain cells sprout. When BDNF is present in the brain, the many brain cells also get better contact with each other, which is a huge advantage when learning new things.

Do you think what you already know and can do is enough? Maybe it is. But if, for example, you start learning a new language, play the violin or fix a bicycle, you connect brain cells that may not have been connected for a long time or ever — and this allows you to better understand, for example, a new app, user manual or a knitting pattern. Being able to acquire new knowledge is also about quality of life. And about developing as a person.

2. You Remember Better 

When you exercise, your brain grows because you create new brain cells. Every day we create around 1,400 new brain cells in the hippocampus, which is the memory center of the brain. Exercise studies have shown that we can create twice as many brain cells in the hippocampus when we exercise regularly. Creating new brain cells is important because, in short, it makes you remember what you learn. Memory and learning go hand in hand.

3. You Reduce Stress

The hormone cortisol builds up in the blood when you are stressed for a long time. People with high cortisol levels have poorer memory and a slightly smaller brain because they have fewer brain cells. The lesser-known substance kynurenine is also found in the blood and is also elevated by stress. When you exercise, your muscles are exercised and they produce various new enzymes that circulate in the blood and affect kynurenine and break it down into kynurenic acid — so it can't get into the brain and damage it.