Because of excess weight, the brain ages faster
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
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The youth of the brain depends on weight - this was stated by British experts. Observations of volunteers (with normal and obesity) showed that obesity of brain tissue looks older on average by 10 years.
With age, the brain "desiccation" occurs, but in full people this process proceeds somewhat faster than in lean ones. Now scientists can not say exactly, overweight causes accelerated aging of the brain and, accordingly, a violation of cognitive abilities, or vice versa, any processes in the brain that cause aging cause obesity.
At Cambridge University, Professor Lisa Ronan and her colleagues studied the brain of more than 500 people from 20 to 87 years old and found out that there is a correlation between the weight of a person and the speed of aging of the brain. Studying the state of participants in the experiment, scientists paid attention to the state of metabolism, diet, as well as everything that could affect the weight or development of diabetes.
With the help of MRI, specialists found out not only the amount of white matter, but also the thickness of the cerebral cortex in volunteers. As it turned out, the structure of fat and thin people has differences that are especially different after 40 years.
At full people in a brain active processes of aging and reduction in volume start to occur after 40 years, and already in 10 years it looks also as the brain of the thin person in 60 years looks.
The curious fact was that the changes affected a predominantly white substance, so the IQ and cognitive abilities of fat and lean people were practically the same.
According to Professor Ronan, it is very important now to understand the causes and results of the accelerated processes of brain aging in fat people, since in recent years the number of fat people and the average life span have been increasing rapidly on the earth.
By the way, similar studies were conducted recently by American specialists who found out that the brain of fat people works differently, in comparison with the thinner peers. According to scientists, in full people the brain sends signals to the body about getting more pleasure from sweet or harmful food and the reason for this can be a disturbed metabolism.
At the University of Washington, experts have found that growing up, a person loves less sweet because of changes in the area of the brain responsible for the rewards. The development of the "joy hormone" is associated with external stimuli - food, various activities, etc. But with obesity, the brain begins to work differently. In an experiment in which 44 people participated, 20 of whom had normal weight, the rest were obese, it was found that complete people lacked a connection between sweet food and a hormone of joy. Participants in the study were to drink a drink with a different amount of sugar and pass a magnetic resonance imaging. After analyzing the data, it was found that with excess weight, insulin resistance manifests itself, which affects the eating habits.
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