Umm, on the surface, this is a disturbing study. However, 746 people is not a very large sample, and the brain is a massively complicated organ. statesman.com | Study: Alzheimer's first strike is part of the brain that regulates daydreaming.
The part of your brain used to daydream is the first to be attacked by Alzheimer's, a new study has found.
A team of scientists from Washington University and the University of Pittsburgh used five imaging techniques to map the brains of 746 people. The researchers found that parts of the brain involved in daydreaming, musing, mulling and reliving memories in young people were the first places where neuron-damaging plaques are deposited in people on the brink of dementia.
The data could mean that thought wears down more active regions of the brain, leaving them vulnerable to attack from Alzheimer's.
The finding, published today in the Journal of Neuroscience, seems to run counter to the popular keep-your-brain-active theory for staving off the degenerative brain disease.
“How to reconcile the present findings that may suggest 'use it and lose it' with the 'use it or lose it' theory, I just don't know,” said Randy L. Buckner, the research team's leader.
Hmmm, this is just the most 'free-flowing' area of the brain, makes a certain sense that it would be vulnerable. Things that are rote, eating, breathing, etc., are not affected by Alzheimer's. Of course, I did not follow my early inclination and become a brain specialist, so don't quote me. I do know that I am, and always have been, a day-dreamer. One does not grow up in the Ontario forests without being able to create alternative realities.
Ru-oh.
Tags: Alzheimer's
