Jog Your Memory: Running Builds Brain Cells

Take up the running habit and you'll find yourself better able, literally and figuratively, to think fast.

The Guardian reports of a fresh new medical study that expands our understanding of the benefits of aerobic exercise. While it's been clearly understood how and why it's so incredibly beneficial for our cardiovascular health, the brain-boosting ability of a good, sustained workout have been widely observed but not terribly well understood. This study, performed by neuroscientists at Cambridge University, brings into focus the mechanisms that relate a daily jog with improved cognitive function.

Senior study author Timothy Bussey tells the Guardian that physical exercise itself stimulates the growth of new brain cells, particularly in the regions of the brain most closely tied to memory formation and recall. As a result of this effect, even a mere few days into a running regimen tends to result in improved recall, an ability that serves as a foundational basis for so much of what our brains do.

The study team suggests that the brain-building result stems from a combination of factors that include increased blood and oxygen delivery to the brain as well as the fact that exercise decreases the levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which is known to inhibit the growth of brain cells.

Photo courtesy of Patrick Gruban, via Wikimedia Commons