Do you frequently get stressed out at work? That's not good for a number of reasons. Not only is it unpleasant, but it can bother your dentate gyrus. Unless you are a brain surgeon, you probably haven't heard about this piece of anatomy. It's a part of our brain, located in the hippocampus, which is somewhere beneath all the grey matter. Exactly where doesn't matter.
But when you get stressed, your dentate gyrus doesn't feel so good. It stops doing what only one other area of the brain seems capable of doing -- creating new brain cells. This would be no big deal, except that researchers think the dentate gyrus uses those new cells to allow us to link old memories to new situations. Maybe for a 20-year-old that's not so important, but when you hit middle age or older, you want to be able to reshuffle what you've already learned and put it in a new context. Some people call this ability to gain new insight from old information wisdom.
In the book, The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain, by Barbara Strauch, the author interviews Fred Gage, a scientist who has conducted ground-breaking brain research. Describing changes in the dentate gyrus, Gage states: "The new brain cells help us integrate the new with the old. Without them we would never want anything to change because anything new would be too complicated."
Considering how fast everything is changing, the ability to cope with change and even thrive in a changing environment is extremely important. For anyone who doesn't relish the idea of having a feeble mind, Gage's research holds out a bit of hope. Rats that lived in stimulating environments and humans who exercised increased activity in their dentate gyrus.
Although crossword puzzles, Sudoku, and playing chess make for good mental workouts, the research indicates that physical activity may do more good for your aging brain. Physical exercise apparently helps keep the brain young. A young brain means an agile mind. By getting out of your seat and doing a little physical exercise each day, you may lose a little weight, but just as importantly, you may grow a few more brain cells.
