The Brain Already Benefits From Moderate Physical Activity - Neuroscience News

Summary: Moderate physical activity was linked to increased volume in brain areas associated with memory, especially in older adults.

“Our goal was to take a more detailed look at the brain and find out which regions of the brain physical activity impacts most.”.

“We were able to show that physical activity had a noticeable effect on almost all brain regions investigated.

Generally, we can say that the higher and more intense the physical activity, the larger the brain regions were, either with regard to volume or cortical thickness,” Fabienne Fox summarizes the research results.

However, the dimensions of the brain regions do not increase linearly with physical activity.

Young and somewhat athletic subjects who usually engaged in moderate to intense physical activity also had relatively high brain volumes.

To characterize the brain regions that benefited most from physical activity, the research team searched databases for genes that are particularly active in these brain areas.

This is ensured particularly well during physical activity, which could explain why these brain regions benefit from exercise,” says Ahmad Aziz.

“Association Between Accelerometer-Derived Physical Activity Measurements and Brain Structure: A Population-Based Cohort Study” by Fabienne A.

Association Between Accelerometer-Derived Physical Activity Measurements and Brain Structure: A Population-Based Cohort Study.

While there is growing evidence that physical activity promotes neuronal health, studies examining the relation between physical activity and brain morphology remain inconclusive

We therefore examined whether objectively-quantified physical activity is related to brain volume, cortical thickness and grey matter density in a large cohort study

Additionally, we assessed molecular pathways that may underlie the effects of physical activity on brain morphology

The relation of physical activity (independent variable) and brain structure (outcome) was examined with polynomial multivariable regression, while adjusting for age, sex, intracranial volume, education and smoking

Using gene expression profiles from the Allen Brain Atlas, we extracted molecular signatures associated with the effects of physical activity on brain morphology

Physical activity dose and intensity were independently associated with larger brain volumes, grey matter density and cortical thickness of several brain regions

The effects of physical activity on brain volume were most pronounced at low physical activity quantities and differed between men and women and across age

The strongest effects of physical activity were observed in motor regions and cortical regions enriched for genes involved in mitochondrial respiration

Our findings suggest that physical activity benefits brain health, with the strongest effects in motor regions and regions with a high oxidative demand