Video:
After Hours: Govt. Scientists Earning Private Royalties on the Taxpayer Dime (start @ 0:33)
People who use vitamin D supplements have lower dementia risk
University of Calgary (Canada), March 1 2023.
A large study reported in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: Diagnosis, Assessment & Disease Monitoring found a lower risk of developing dementia among men and women who consumed vitamin D supplements.
“Preventing dementia or even delaying its onset is vitally important given the growing numbers of people affected,” noted coauthor Byron Creese.
The study included 12,388 individuals whose age averaged 71 years when enrolling in the US National Alzheimer’s Coordinating Center. Participants were free of dementia upon enrollment and had at least one follow-up visit. Medication forms completed at the beginning of the study provided information on vitamin D supplementation.
During a 10-year period, 2,696 men and women developed dementia. Women were at greater risk of developing dementia than men. Supplementing with vitamin D2, vitamin D3 or calcium with vitamin D was associated with a 40% lower risk of dementia compared with no supplementation. All three types of vitamin D were associated with a reduction in the rate of dementia incidence. Vitamin D was also associated with significantly greater 5-year dementia-free survival compared with no vitamin D.
Supplementing with the vitamin was associated with greater benefits among women compared with men, people with normal cognition at the beginning of the study compared with those who had mild cognitive impairment and among noncarriers of the APOE4 gene, which increases the risk of Alzheimer disease.
“We know that vitamin D has some effects in the brain that could have implications for reducing dementia, however so far, research has yielded conflicting results,” commented lead researcher Zahinoor Ismail, MD. “Our findings give key insights into groups who might be specifically targeted for vitamin D supplementation. Overall, we found evidence to suggest that earlier supplementation might be particularly beneficial, before the onset of cognitive decline.”
Study Reveals How Sleep Removes Toxic Waste from the Brain
University of Rochester Medical Center, February 20, 2023
Although we don’t know exactly why, there is no question that sleep is crucial for brain and overall health. Without proper sleep, the chance of disease and stress increases notably. Now, researchers at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC) Center for Translational Neuromedicine have found that sleeping actually helps detoxify the brain, potentially offering clues into dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.
The study, published in the journal Science, reveals that your brain has a unique method of removing toxic waste through ‘the glymphatic system’. Even more interesting, it seems that brain cells shrink by about 60% during sleep, allowing for waste to be removed more easily.
“Sleep changes the cellular structure of the brain,” said Maiken Nedergaard, co-author of the study. “It appears to be a completely different state.”
The research looked at something called the glymphatic system of the brain. Injecting dye into the brains of mice, they watched the flow of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and found that the CSF flowed rapidly when the mice were unconscious (whether asleep or sedated) and barely moved when the mice were awake.
“We were surprised by how little flow there was into the brain when the mice were awake,” said Nedergaard. “It suggested that the space between brain cells changed greatly between conscious and unconscious states.”
Then, they measured the space between brain cells to test their theory. Using electrodes inserted into the brain, they found the space between these cells grew by 60% during sleep, allowing the CSF to flow more freely.
The research is exciting for a variety of reasons. But perhaps most interesting of all is how the CSF affects the brain. The researchers found mice injected with beta-amyloid, a protein associated with Alzheimer’s disease, were able to detox the protein while sleeping. In other words, the CSF actually cleared the brain of the toxin. .
“These results may have broad implications for multiple neurological disorders,” said Jim Koenig, Ph.D. “This means the cells regulating the glymphatic system may be new targets for treating a range of disorders.”
“This study shows that the brain has different functional states when asleep and when awake,” said Nedergaard. “In fact, the restorative nature of sleep appears to be the result of the active clearance of the by-products of neural activity that accumulate during wakefulness.”
Early-life stress can disrupt maturation of brain’s reward circuits, promoting disorders
University of California, Irvine, February 27, 2023
A new brain connection discovered by University of California, Irvine researchers can explain how early-life stress and adversity trigger disrupted operation of the brain’s reward circuit, offering a new therapeutic target for treating mental illness. Impaired function of this circuit is thought to underlie several major disorders, such as depression, substance abuse and excessive risk-taking.
In an article recently published online in Nature Communications, Dr. Tallie Z. Baram, senior author and UCI Donald Bren Professor and Distinguished Professor in the Departments of Anatomy & Neurobiology, Pediatrics, Neurology and Physiology & Biophysics, and Matt Birnie, lead author, describe the cellular changes in the brain’s circuitry caused by exposure to adversity during childhood.
“We know that early-life stress impacts the brain, but until now, we didn’t know how,” Baram said. “Our team focused on identifying potentially stress-sensitive brain pathways. We discovered a new pathway within the reward circuit that expresses a molecule called corticotropin-releasing hormone that controls our responses to stress. We found that adverse experiences cause this brain pathway to be overactive.”
“These changes to the pathway disrupt reward behaviors, reducing pleasure and motivation for fun, food and sex cues in mice,” she said. “In humans, such behavioral changes, called ‘anhedonia,’ are associated with emotional disorders. Importantly, we discovered that when we silence this pathway using modern technology, we restore the brain’s normal reward behaviors.”
The study involved two groups of male and female mice. One was exposed to adversity early in life by living for a week in cages with limited bedding and nesting material, and the other was reared in typical cages. As adults, the early adversity-experiencing male mice had little interest in sweet foods or sex cues compared to typically reared mice. In contrast, adversity-experiencing females craved rich, sweet food. Inhibiting the pathway restored normal reward behaviors in males, yet it had no effect in females.
“We believe that our findings provide breakthrough insights into the impact of early-life adversity on brain development and specifically on control of reward behaviors that underlie many emotional disorders. Our discovery of the previously unknown circuit function of the basolateral amygdala-nucleus accumbens brain pathway deepens our understanding of this complex mechanism and identifies a significant new therapeutic target,” Baram said.
Daily 11-minute brisk walk is enough to reduce risk of early death, say researchers
University of Cambridge (UK), March 1, 2023
One in ten early deaths could be prevented if everyone managed at least half the recommended level of physical activity, say a team led by researchers at the University of Cambridge.
In a study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, the researchers say that 11 minutes a day (75 minutes a week) of moderate-intensity physical activity—such as a brisk walk—would be sufficient to lower the risk of diseases such as heart disease, stroke and a number of cancers.
To explore the amount of physical activity necessary to have a beneficial impact on several chronic diseases and premature death, researchers from the Medical Research Council (MRC) Epidemiology Unit at the University of Cambridge carried out a systematic review and meta-analysis, pooling and analyzing cohort data from all of the published evidence.
In total, they looked at results reported in 196 peer-reviewed articles, covering more than 30 million participants from 94 large study cohorts, to produce the largest analysis to date of the association between physical activity levels and risk of heart disease, cancer, and early death.
The researchers found that outside of work-related physical activity, two out of three people reported activity levels below 150 min per week of moderate-intensity activity and fewer than one in ten managed more than 300 min per week.
Broadly speaking, they found that beyond 150 min per week of moderate-intensity activity, the additional benefits in terms of reduced risk of disease or early death were marginal. But even half this amount came with significant benefits: accumulating 75 min per week of moderate-intensity activity brought with it a 23% lower risk of early death.
Dr. Soren Brage from the MRC Epidemiology Unit said, “If you are someone who finds the idea of 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity a week a bit daunting, then our findings should be good news. Doing some physical activity is better than doing none. This is also a good starting position—if you find that 75 minutes a week is manageable, then you could try stepping it up gradually to the full recommended amount.”
Seventy-five minutes per week of moderate activity was also enough to reduce the risk of developing cardiovascular disease by 17% and cancer by 7%. For some specific cancers, the reduction in risk was greater—head and neck, myeloid leukemia, myeloma, and gastric cardia cancers were between 14-26% lower risk. For other cancers, such as lung, liver, endometrial, colon, and breast cancer, a 3-11% lower risk was observed.
The researchers calculated that if everyone in the studies had done the equivalent of at least 150 min per week of moderate-intensity activity, around one in six (16%) early deaths would be prevented. One in nine (11%) cases of cardiovascular disease and one in 20 (5%) cases of cancer would be prevented.
However, even if everyone managed at least 75 min per week of moderate-intensity physical activity, around one in ten (10%) early deaths would be prevented. One in twenty (5%) cases of cardiovascular disease and nearly one in thirty (3%) cases of cancer would be prevented.
Meta-analysis affirms benefit for ginseng in type 2 diabetics
Zheijian University (China), February 19 2023.
The journal Medicine published the results of a meta-analysis conducted by researchers at China’s Zhejiang University which add evidence to a beneficial effect for ginseng in men and women with impaired glucose tolerance or type 2 diabetes.
For their research, Yun-mei Yang and colleagues selected eight trials that included 195 participants treated with ginseng and an equal number of control subjects. The analysis revealed improvements in fasting glucose, post-meal insulin levels and insulin resistance, as well as a reduction in triglycerides, and total and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol among ginseng-treated subjects.
“The present meta-analysis is the first updated review to evaluate the efficacy of ginseng-related therapy in patients with type 2 diabetes or glucose intolerance,” the authors announce. “Furthermore, our results demonstrate for the first time, an improved lipid profile (triglycerides, total cholesterol, and LDL) associated with ginseng-related therapy in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus or impaired glucose tolerance. Moreover, ginseng-related therapy was more effective in terms of hemoglobin A1c and fasting glucose levels, in drug naïve participants than those taking antidiabetic medications, probably due to the masking of the effect of ginseng by antidiabetic medications.”
As possible mechanisms for ginseng, Dr Yang and colleagues suggest modulations of insulin production and secretion, glucose metabolism, glucose uptake and inflammation, and activation of the AMPK –activated protein kinase pathway. Their research suggests that ginseng may be more beneficial for patients who have not started antidiabetic drug therapies than those already being treated.
“The present results establish the benefit of ginseng supplementation in improving glucose control and insulin sensitivity in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus or impaired glucose intolerance,” they conclude.
Breast milk boosts premature babies’ brain development, suggests study
University of Edinburgh, March 1, 2023
The more breast milk premature babies are fed while in neonatal intensive care, the greater the level of brain development, a study suggests.
The cerebral cortex—the part of the brain for learning and thinking—is usually underdeveloped in premature babies, but in infants who consumed high levels of breast milk it quickly resembled those of babies born to term.
Experts say that feeding premature babies with breast milk could help reduce the developmental and learning problems associated with preterm birth.
Researchers from University scanned the brains of 212 babies who were part of the Theirworld Edinburgh Birth Cohort, a study which monitors the progress of premature babies from birth to adulthood.
The group included 135 babies who were born before 32 weeks of pregnancy and 77 who were born to term. Researchers collected information about how premature babies were fed during neonatal intensive care and brain scans for all babies were performed around 40 weeks from conception.
Brain scans revealed that babies who received higher amounts of breast milk—from their mother or a donor—had a more mature cerebral cortex compared with those who received less, similar to the scans of babies born to term.