This article was published in US News on 5/20/19 about what the best exercises for brain health are. There was a study done by Columbia University and the University of Miami. The studied compared two different sets of results taken 5 years apart of 876 senior citizens. The tests performed were brain scans and tests to test memory and thinking skills. The study showed that there was a greater mental decline for those people who performed low-activity exercises compared to high activity exercises. Low activity exercises can include walking and doing yoga. On the other hand, high activity exercises can include running and other cardio workouts. The results showed that there was a difference of 10 years of brain aging for those that completes high activity exercises. Researches did also take into account factors outside of exercise that can influence brain health before coming up with the 10 year aging difference. Lastly, they found that even performing daily jogs or other aerobic exercise can help spark the growth of new brain cells.

I think this article was really cool because most people (including myself) may think that you have to do mentally challenging things like puzzles or other mind strenuous activities to sharpen your brain. I think it is cool that exercise can have that affect on sharpening your brain and keeping it young. What also was interesting to me is that there was a difference on what type of exercise can influence your brain health whether it is low or high activity. The article did touch on what future next steps could be to further gather information about this topic, but I think if they could narrow down what exercises specifically could be performed to enhance brain health that would be cool. Overall, I think it was interesting to read and how they did they study was fascinating to me. This is relatable to our class because it talks about different intensity exercises and we know from class that these intensity differences can affect a lot of different biological factors in our body. Lastly, it is significant to us today because as we age and as people’s life expectancies start to increase it is helpful to have this information of how to keep our minds sharp as we get older.

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2019-05-20/the-best-exercises-for-brain-health