Research Hit: Your Ability to Reprocess Brain Cells in Middle Age Determines Brain Health in Age
New research shows that middle age is a key inflection point in brain health
Are you saying that our brain reprocess our brain cells?
Technically not our brain cells, but there is a process known as mitophagy which cleans out and repairs damaged mitochondria (the powerhouses of our cells and home to our DNA): all metabolic process can lead to damage of mitochondria and your body has cellular processes that recycles and repairs cells. If this is not repaired a cell, brain cell here, can become dysfunctional and die.
But surely this decrease with age anyhow?
Well, yes, this does decrease with age but so far it has been assumed that this decreases in a linear fashion over time. This new research by Anna Rappe et al. of the University of Helsinki has shown that this is not linear and the dynamics are more complex than perviously assumed.
In what way?
This was in research into mouse brains, and they saw, for example that some specialised regions for movement actually increased mitophagy as the mice aged. This, I presume, could be an overcompensation mechanism.
But they also noticed, for example, in regions associated with memory that mitophagy rose and then declined rapidly.
But the key take away is that middle age seems to be a key inflection point in this study. This is when most changes take place.
So we need to stay healthy in middle age?
Well yes, but we are not sure how previously health habits affect this but certainly the one key point is that you should certainly pay attention to physical (and mental) health in middle age.
But isn’t that when many people give up exercising?
Some people also take it up in middle age but statistics do generally show activity levels decreasing with age - even though we know the massive benefits of exercise at any age.
Is exercise the only thing to do?
No, general health is critical. Below a few of my previous posts on what can directly impact mitophagy: pomegranate seeds…and coffee, for example.
These directly influence mitophagy?
Yes!
So stay healthy and fit - and whether you have or haven’t make an extra effort in middle age!
Yup, and happy to say I have, and especially so since I turned 48.
Reference
Anna Rappe, Helena A Vihinen, Fumi Suomi, et al.
Longitudinal autophagy profiling of the mammalian brain reveals sustained mitophagy throughout healthy aging.
The EMBO Journal, 2024
DOI: 10.1038/s44318-024-00241-y