How exercise not only help general health but also brain function (more smart)

How exercise not only help general health but also brain function (more smart)

What is a best exercise?

The best type of exercise to strengthen your heart is aerobic exercise, the type of activity that involves continuous motion such as walking, bicycling, jogging, aerobics, and swimming.

They involve activity that requires your heart and lungs to work harder to supply your cells with more oxygen. This increased workload improves the condition of your heart and lungs, improving your overall conditioning and endurance.

The other type of exercise, anaerobic, can be healthy but does little for your heart. Weight lifting, for example, results in strong muscles but doesn't challenge your heart and lungs in a sustained fashion.

Want to feel better, have more energy and perhaps even live longer? Look no further than exercise. The health benefits of regular exercise and physical activity are hard to ignore. And the benefits of exercise are yours for the taking, regardless of your age, sex or physical ability. Need more convincing to exercise? Check out these six ways exercise can improve your life.

No. 1: Exercise controls weight

Exercise can help prevent excess weight gain or help maintain weight loss. When you engage in physical activity, you burn calories. The more intense the activity, the more calories you burn. You don't need to set aside large chunks of time for exercise to reap weight-loss benefits. If you can't do an actual workout, get more active throughout the day in simple ways — by taking the stairs instead of the elevator or revving up your household chores.

No. 2: Exercise combats health conditions and diseases

Worried about heart disease? Hoping to prevent high blood pressure? No matter what your current weight, being active boosts high-density lipoprotein (HDL), or "good," cholesterol and decreases unhealthy triglycerides. This one-two punch keeps your blood flowing smoothly, which decreases your risk of cardiovascular diseases. In fact, regular physical activity can help you prevent or manage a wide range of health problems and concerns, including stroke, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, depression, certain types of cancer, arthritis and falls.

No. 3: Exercise improves mood

Need an emotional lift? Or need to blow off some steam after a stressful day? A workout at the gym or a brisk 30-minute walk can help. Physical activity stimulates various brain chemicals that may leave you feeling happier and more relaxed. You may also feel better about your appearance and yourself when you exercise regularly, which can boost your confidence and improve your self-esteem.

No. 4: Exercise boosts energy

Winded by grocery shopping or household chores? Regular physical activity can improve your muscle strength and boost your endurance. Exercise and physical activity deliver oxygen and nutrients to your tissues and help your cardiovascular system work more efficiently. And when your heart and lungs work more efficiently, you have more energy to go about your daily chores.

No. 5: Exercise promotes better sleep

Struggling to fall asleep? Or to stay asleep? Regular physical activity can help you fall asleep faster and deepen your sleep. Just don't exercise too close to bedtime, or you may be too energized to fall asleep.

No. 6: Exercise puts the spark back into your sex life

Do you feel too tired or too out of shape to enjoy physical intimacy? Regular physical activity can leave you feeling energized and looking better, which may have a positive effect on your sex life. But there's more to it than that. Regular physical activity can lead to enhanced arousal for women. And men who exercise regularly are less likely to have problems with erectile dysfunction than are men who don't exercise.

New Research- Exercise Benefits Brain in Middle Age

Gym-style exercise may improve not only general health in middle age, but also brain function, according to new research presented at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress that is taking place in Toronto from 27 to 31 October. The study, conducted by the Montreal Heart Institute (MHI), with the University of Montreal, and the Montreal Geriatric University Institute, found that cognitive ability improved significantly in a group of six middle-aged people with increased cardiovascular risk who followed a four-month program of high intensity interval training combined with resistance training.

High Intensity Interval Training

High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) or High Intensity Training (HIT), is a form of exercise where you do a number of shorts bursts of intense and effortful activity alternating with short, less effortful work, such as a series of 30-second sprints with 30 seconds of walking or jogging in between. It is not a new idea, but has come to prominence in recent years as more researchers have looked into and measured its health benefits. It came under the media spotlight in the UK in February 2012, when medical journalist Michael Mosley appeared in a TV program, where he tried a form of high intensity interval training and was pleasantly surprised by the results.

There are various forms of HIIT, depending on the intensity and duration of the effortful bursts, and fitness goals.

The Study

In this study the HIIT training the participants underwent alternated between short periods of low and high intensity aerobic exercise on stationary bicycles. For four months, they had twice-weekly sessions of high intensity interval training combined with twice-weekly resistance training. One of the researchers, Anil Nigam, chief of clinical care at MHI and also of the University of Montreal, says in a statement they worked with six middle-aged people who followed this program. All six participants were overweight (their BMI was between 28 and 31) and had one or more cardiovascular risk factors. BMI is short for Body Mass Index, a measure of obesity that equals a person's weight in kilos divided by the square of their height in meters (BMI over 30 is considered obese, 25 to 30 is overweight).

Nigam explains the range of physical and mental measurements the participants underwent, Our participants underwent a battery of cognitive, biological and physiological tests before the program began in order to determine their cognitive functions, body composition, cardiovascular risk, brain oxygenation during exercise and maximal aerobic capacity.

The cognitive tests covered a range of memory and thinking exercises, such as remembering pairs of numbers and symbols.  

Brain Oxygen

Using very sensitive instruments, the researchers also looked at how the participants' brains used oxygen while they exercised or did the mental tests. The instruments, which rely on near-infra red spectroscopy (NIRS), can detect minute changes in the volume and oxygenation of blood in the brain. "Cognitive function, VO2max and brain oxygenation during exercise testing revealed that the participants' cognitive functions had greatly improved thanks to the exercise," says Nigam. VO2max is a measure of the body's ability to take in, transport, and use oxygen during physical exertion. It also affects the body's ability to provide the brain with oxygen, which in turn impacts cognitive function.  At the end of the program, the participants also had smaller waists and less fat mass around the trunk of the body. “We also found that their VO2max, insulin sensitivity had increased significantly, in tandem with their score on the cognitive tests and the oxygenation signals in the brain during exercise," says Nigam.

The study, which was funded by the ÉPIC Centre and Montreal Heart Institute Foundations, appears to support other recent research on the effect of exercise on the brain. Earlier this month, scientists at the University of Edinburgh reported that exercise may protect aging brains better than mental or leisure pursuits.

(Source- Canadian Cardiovascular Congress)