Spark

Question 1

Plato

Answer 1

In order for man to succeed in life, God provided him with two means, education and physical activity. Not separately, one for the soul and the other for the body, but for the two together. With these two means, man can attain perfection.

Question 2

What’s even more disturbing, and what virtually no one recognizes

Answer 2

is that inactivity is killing our brains too — physically shriveling them.”

Question 3

toxic levels of stress erode the connections between the billions of nerve cells in the brain or that chronic depression shrinks certain areas of the brain.

Answer 3

And they don’t know that, conversely, exercise unleashes a cascade of neurochemicals and growth“factors that can reverse this process, physically bolstering the brain’s infrastructure. In fact, the brain responds like muscles do, growing with use, withering with inactivity. The neurons in the brain connect to one another through “leaves” on treelike branches, and exercise causes those branches to grow and bloom with new buds, thus enhancing brain function at a fundamental level.”

Question 4

Right now the front of your brain is firing signals about what you’re reading,

Answer 4

and how much of it you soak up has a lot to do with whether there is a proper balance of neurochemicals and growth factors to bind neutrons together

Question 5

Exercise has a documented, dramatic effect on these essential ingredients. It sets the stage, and when you sit down to learn something new, that stimulation strengthens the relevant connections; with practice, the circuit develops definition, as if you’re wearing down a path through a forest.

Answer 5

If you had half an hour of exercise this morning, you’re in the right frame of mind to sit still and focus on this paragraph, and your brain is far more equipped to remember it.”

Question 6

It takes guilt out of the equation when you recognize that there’s a biological basis for certain emotional issues.

Answer 6

On the other hand, you won’t be left feeling helpless when you see how you can influence that biology.”

Question 7

If you can get to the point where you’re consistently saying to yourself exercise is something you want to do, then you’re

Answer 7

charting a course to a different future — one that’s less about surviving and more about thriving.”

Question 8

the clearer it becomes that exercise provides an unparalleled stimulus, creating an environment in which the brain is ready, willing, and able to learn.

Answer 8

Aerobic activity has a dramatic effect on adaptation, regulating systems that might be“out of balance and optimizing those that are not — it’s an indispensable tool for anyone who wants to reach his or her full potential.”

Question 9

The ability to stop and consider a response, to use the experience of a wrong choice as a guide in making the next decision, relates to executive function, which is controlled by an area of the brain called the prefrontal cortex.

Answer 9

Learning from our mistakes is profoundly important in everyday life, and Hillman’s study shows that exercise — or at least the resulting fitness levels — can have a powerful impact on that fundamental skill.”

Question 10

family of proteins loosely termed factors, the most prominent of which is brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF)

Answer 10

Whereas neurotransmitters carry out signaling, neurotrophins such as BDNF build and maintain the cell circuitry — the infrastructure itself.”

Question 11

Long Term Potentiation

Answer 11

Learning requires strengthening the affinity between neurons through a dynamic mechanism called:

Question 12

When the brain is called on to take in information, the demand naturally causes activity between neurons.

Answer 12

The more activity, the stronger the attraction becomes, and the easier it is for the signal to fire and make the connection.

Question 13

repeated activation, or practice, causes the synapses themselves to swell and make stronger connections.

Answer 13

A neuron is like a tree that instead of leaves has synapses along its dendritic branches; eventually new branches sprout, providing more synapses to further solidify the connections. These changes are a form of cellular adaptation called synaptic plasticity

Question 14

BDNF is a crucial biological link between thought, emotions, and movement.”

Answer 14

BDNF also binds to receptors at the synapse, unleashing the flow of ions to increase the voltage and immediately improve the signal strength. Inside the cell, BDNF activates genes“that call for the production of more BDNF as well as serotonin and proteins that build up the synapses. BDNF directs traffic and engineers the roads as well. Overall, it “improves the function of neurons, encourages their growth, and strengthens and protects them against the natural process of cell death.

Question 15

That which we call thinking is the

Answer 15

evolutionary internalization of movement

Question 16

As our species has evolved, our physical skills have developed into abstract abilities to predict, sequence, estimate, plan, rehearse, observe ourselves, judge, correct mistakes, shift tactics, and then remember everything we did in order to survive

Answer 16

The brain circuits that our ancient ancestors used“to start a fire are the same ones we use today to learn French.

Question 17

Take the cerebellum, which coordinates motor movements and allows us to do everything from returning a tennis serve to resisting the pull of gravity. Starting with evidence that the trunk of nerve cells connecting the cerebellum to the prefrontal cortex are proportionally thicker in humans than in monkeys, it now appears that this motor center also coordinates thoughts, attention, emotions, and even social skills.

Answer 17

When we exercise, particularly if the exercise requires complex motor movement, we’re also exercising the areas of the brain involved in the full suite of cognitive functions. We’re causing the brain to fire signals along the same network of cells, which solidifies their connections.
When we learn something, a wide array of connected brain areas are called into action.

Question 18

Patterns of thinking and movement that are automatic get stored in the basal ganglia, cerebellum, and brain stem — primitive areas that until recently scientists thought related only to movement

Answer 18

Delegating fundamental knowledge and skills to these subconscious areas frees up the rest of the brain to continue adapting, a crucial arrangement

Question 19

Among those with the least cognitive decline over a four-year period, three factors turned up:

Answer 19

education, self-efficacy, and exercise. ”

Question 20

use-dependent plasticity

Answer 20

synapses rearrange themselves under the stimulation of learning.”

Question 21

The branching caused by the environmental stimulation of learning, exercise, and social contact caused the synapses to form more connections, and those connections had thicker myelin sheaths, which allowed them to fire signals more efficiently.

Answer 21

Now we know that such growth requires BDNF. This remodeling of the synapses has a huge impact on the circuits’ capacity to process information, which is profoundly good news. What it means is that you have the power to change your brain. All you have to do is lace up your running shoes.

Question 22

You Can Remake Yourself every month

Answer 22

Neurons are born as blank-slate stem cells, and they go through a development process in which they need to find something to do in order to survive. Most of them don’t. It takes about twenty-eight days for a fledgling cell to plug into a network, and, as with existing neurons, Hebb’s concept of activity-dependent learning would apply: if we don’t use the newborn neurons, we lose them.

Question 23

But in order for a cell to survive and integrate, it has to fire its axon.

Answer 23

Exercise spawns neurons, and the stimulation of environmental enrichment helps those cells survive.”

Question 24

What’s interesting is that the role of IGF-1 in the brain isn’t related to fuel management, but to learning.“During exercise, BDNF helps the brain increase the uptake of IGF-1, and it activates neurons to produce the signaling neurotransmitters, serotonin and glutamate. It then spurs the production of more BDNF receptors, beefing up connections to solidify memories.

Answer 24

In particular, BDNF seems to be important for long-term memories.
Which makes perfect sense in light of evolution. If we strip everything else away, the reason we need an ability to learn is to help us find and obtain and store food. We need fuel to learn, and we need learning to find a source of fuel — and all these messengers from the body keep this process going and keep us adapting and surviving.”

Question 25

The body was designed to be pushed, and in pushing our bodies we push our brains too.

Answer 25

Learning and memory evolved in concert with the motor functions that allowed our ancestors to track down food, so as far as our brains are concerned, if we’re not moving, there’s no real need to learn anything.”

Question 26

exercise improves learning on three levels:

Answer 26

first, it optimizes your mind-set to improve alertness, attention, and motivation; second, it prepares and encourages nerve cells to bind to one another, which is the cellular basis for logging in new information; and third, it spurs the development of new nerve cells from stem cells in the hippocampus. ”

Question 27

jogging thirty minutes just two or three times a week for twelve weeks improved executive function.

Answer 27

But it’s important to mix in some form of activity that demands coordination beyond putting one foot in front of the other. ”
“The evidence isn’t perfect, but really, your regimen has to include skill acquisition and aerobic exercise.”

The more complex the movements, the more complex the synaptic connections. ”

Question 28

circuits are created through movement, they can be recruited by other areas and used for thinking.

Answer 28

This is why learning how to play the piano makes it easier for kids to learn math. The prefrontal cortex will co-opt the mental power of the physical skills and apply it to other situations.

Question 29

Stay there too long, and we’re talking about chronic stress, which translates emotional strain into physical strain.

Answer 29

the body’s stress response can lead to full-blown mental disorders such as anxiety and depression, as well as high blood pressure, heart problems, and cancer. Chronic stress can even tear at the architecture of the brain.”

Question 30

The way you choose to cope with stress can change not only how you feel, but also how it transforms the brain. If you react passively or if there is simply no way out, stress can become damaging

Answer 30

Like most psychiatric issues, chronic stress results from the brain getting locked into the same pattern, typically one marked by pessimism, fear, and retreat. Active coping moves you out of this territory.

Question 31

Exercise controls the emotional and physical feelings of stress, and it also works at the cellular level. But how can that be, if exercise itself is a form of stress?

Answer 31

The brain activity caused by exercise generates molecular by-products that can damage cells, but under normal circumstances, repair mechanisms leave cells hardier for future challenges. Neurons get broken down and built up just like muscles — stressing them makes them more resilient. This is how exercise forces the body and mind to adapt.”

Question 32

The threat has to be fairly intense for the body to get involved, but any degree of stress activates fundamental brain systems — those that manage attention, energy, and memory.

Answer 32

If we strip away everything else, our ingrained reaction to stress is about focusing on the danger, fueling the reaction, and logging in the experience for future reference, which I think of as wisdom.”

Question 33

Amygdala’s Job

Answer 33

is to assign intensity to the incoming information, which may or may not be obviously survival related. It’s not just about fear, but any intense emotional state, including, for example, euphoria or sexual arousal. Winning the lottery or dining with a supermodel can trigger the amygdala. These events may not seem stressful, but remember, our brains don’t distinguish between “good” and “bad” demands on the system. And in an evolutionary light, good fortune and a good date are related to survival — prospering and procreating.

Question 34

cortisol isn’t simply good or bad. A little bit helps wire in memories

Answer 34

too much suppresses them; and an overload can actually erode the connections between neurons and destroy memories.

explains why constantly high levels of cortisol — due to chronic stress — make it hard to learn new material, and why people who are depressed have trouble learning. It’s not just lack of motivation, it’s because the hippocampal neurons have bolstered their glutamate machinery and shut out less“important stimuli. They’re obsessed with the stress.

Question 35

The stress response is elegantly adaptive behavior, but because it doesn’t get you very far in today’s world, there’s no outlet for all that energy buildup.

Answer 35

You have to make a conscious effort to initiate the physical component of fight or flight.”

Question 36

Resilience is the buildup of these waste-disposing enzymes, neuroprotective factors, and proteins that prevent the naturally programmed death of cells.

Answer 36

I like to think of these elements as armies that remain on duty to take on the next stress. The best way to build them up is by bringing mild stress on yourself: using the brain to learn, restricting calories, exercising, and, eating your vegetables.

Question 37

If mild stress becomes chronic, the unrelenting cascade of cortisol triggers genetic actions that begin to sever synaptic connections and cause dendrites to atrophy and cells to die

Answer 37

eventually, the hippocampus can end up physically shriveled, like a raisin.”

Question 38

At the same time, aerobic exercise increases BDNF production. Taken all together, these factors combine forces to make the brain bloom and prevent the damaging effects of chronic stress from taking hold.

Answer 38

In addition to cranking up the cellular repair mechanisms, they also keep cortisol in check and increase the levels of our regulatory neurotransmitters serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine.”

Question 39

At every level, from the microcellular to the psychological, exercise not only wards off the ill effects of chronic stress; it can also reverse them

Answer 39

if researchers exercise rats that have been chronically stressed, that activity makes the hippocampus grow back to its preshriveled state. ”

Question 40

Active Coping

Answer 40

Essentially, active coping means doing something in response to whatever danger or problem is causing anxiety rather than passively worrying about it.”

By doing something other than sitting and worrying, we reroute our thought process around the passive-response center and dilute the fear, while at the same time optimizing the brain to learn a new scenario. Everyone’s initial instinct in the face of anxiety is to avoid the situation, like a rat that freezes in its cage. But doing just the opposite, we engage in cognitive restructuring, using our bodies to cure our brains.”

Question 41

depression as an erosion of connections — in your life as well as between your brain cells.

Answer 41

Exercise reestablishes those connections.”

Question 42

exercisers are less anxious, less depressed, less neurotic, and also more socially outgoing.

Answer 42

those who exercise at least two to three times a week experience significantly less depression, anger, stress, and “cynical distrust” than those who exercise less or not at all. ”

Question 43

every fifty minutes of weekly exercise correlated to

Answer 43

a 50 percent drop in the odds of being depressed. ”

Question 44

If depression is primarily a communication breakdown, or a loss of the brain’s ability to adapt, it’s very good news for the value of exercise.

Answer 44

brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) protects neurons against cortisol in areas that control mood, including the hippocampus. It is the fertilizer that encourages neurons to connect to one another and grow, making it vital for neuroplasticity and neurogenesis.”

Question 45

Exercise immediately increases levels of dopamine, and if you stay on some sort of schedule, the brain cells in your motivation center will sprout new dopamine receptors, giving you newfound initiative.

Answer 45

You’re wearing in new neural pathways or perhaps refurbishing ones that are rusty from disuse, and it only takes a few weeks to solidify a habit. Exercise can become a self-reinforcing behavior

Question 46

HGH is the body’s master craftsman

Answer 46

burning belly fat, layering on muscle fiber, and pumping up brain volume. “Researchers believe it can reverse the loss of brain volume that naturally occurs as you age

Serious sprinting and weight training can build muscle.