Physical decline caused by slow decay of brain's myelin

[shuumai]

Originally Posted by BradMM

From your link:

"Use of Niacin for cholesterol should always be physician supervised."

I'm CERTAIN you did this, riiiiiiight????

Sure, it would be good to consult with a doctor. Just don't expect your specific doctor to have all the answers you need. Generally, yeah, they will help keep you alive. heh

[haschu33]

I just found this Thread and like to comment.

There are a lot of studies around on about anything and the relation of about anything to everything, particularly with neurology - which is very good.
But, be very carefull with conclusions!

I do not agree with this 'lesson':

Originally Posted by BradMM

...
So, the lesson is, if you're under 40, FOCUS on what you want to be good/great at, such as swimming, and find ways to engage in deep practice such as TI techniques.

If you're OVER 40, you're going to have to work even harder to get there... ...!!!

Since about a good week I've got my TI DVD and practice. I am now doing Zen switches and notice that new movement patterns build up very fast (I have never done any freestyle swimming before - because I never learned it).

I work at an IT company (Not a spelling error, it doesn't mean TI, means Information Technology ), I constantly have to learn, and I like to learn. Very much, actually. I get bored if I do the same thing for a longer time without learning something new. I don't see any signs that I get difficulties in learning or become slower (most of the guys around me are younger than me).

I just read an article of a german professor about learning versus age, and he states, that there is no scientific evidence that there is a 'learning-curve' through the age. The point in learning is, he said, that you need a reason for learning what you learn. Otherwise you simply won't do it.


I'd like to mention the famous 'nuns' study.
Psychological test were made with highly aged nuns. After they passed away, an autopsy of their brains was done to check for signs of degeneration.
The result was: In the psychological tests the nuns showed no signs of brain degeneration at all.
The postmortem analyzed brains showed a high degree of degeneration that you find with Alzheimer-disease.

So, the lesson is: don't jump to guns too early. What a brain study result means, seem to depend on a number of factors and cannot always be translated one-to-one.
And learn what you want to learn. Your brain can do it, as any brain can do it. They call it 'neuro-plasticity'. The brain changes if you use it.

Enjoy it.


My age is 55, by the way.
Lot of things in my mind, that I'd like to learn...

P.S. I am not sure, that it is a good idea to get too much into a very specific brain-diet. I bet the recommendations will change quite fast, as science goes along.
Although, lot's of fast-food will probably not help. Not our brains and not us.

One more P.S.
I think the only way to make us unable to learn is to develop a conviction that we cannot learn.
Mind is very powerful, it seems. One more reason to be careful with conclusions.

[BradMM]

Originally Posted by haschu33

There are a lot of studies around on about anything and the relation of about anything to everything, particularly with neurology - which is very good.
But, be very carefull with conclusions!

I do not agree with this 'lesson':

On the contrary, it is you who are presenting one study as evidence with no citation or source provided. I was referring to a book that was researched by the author and with many references... as a follow up to previous posts by our host.

I am also 55, (re)learning my organic chemistry, furthering my knowledge of plant physiology, etc. to enhance the college classes that I teach. I haven't noticed any problems with my learning abilities but I also have years of experience to build on. I think I'll stick with my strategy of continuing to "exercise" my brain to keep it as fit as I reasonably can, just as I do with my body. I KNOW from first hand experience that my body can't do the things it used to do so I exercise it regularly to slow down the decline and maintain as much as I can.

[haschu33]

Hi Brad,

I ddidn't really want to open a bottle here (or a battle ) - but -

The book you are referencing to, at least from those quotes that you gave shows that there is a myelin breakdown progress.
Those quotes do not show that it is a research on how the learning ability decreases when you get older.

From your quotes:

Originally Posted by BradMM

...
"Studies have shown us that as we age, myelin breakdown and repair is continually occurring over the brain's entire 'neural network,'" said Bartzokis, who is also a member of UCLA's Ahmanson–Lovelace Brain Mapping Center and the UCLA Laboratory of Neuro Imaging. "But in older age, we begin losing the repair battle. That means the average performance of the networks gradually declines with age at an accelerating rate."[/i]

Significantly, the research suggests that the myelin breakdown process should also reduce all other brain functions for which performance speed is dependent on higher AP frequencies, including memory; it also supports the suggestion that myelin breakdown is a biological process of aging underlying the erosion of physical skills and cognitive decline, including the onset of such age-driven disorders as Alzheimer's disease.

Means, the study did not take a number of people of different ages and checked their ability to learn. The significance lies in the myelin breakdown process, not in the conclusion.
As long as the conclusion is not proven it is exactly that what was said: "The research suggests... ." Which might of cause be a british way of saying that the authors are convinced that this is the case. But that is not enough. This far no evidence of declining learning abilities, sorry.

I didn't find the original source of the nuns research, just references to it. I read about it years ago.
My wife is a physiotherapist who is highly specialists on people with craniocerebral injuries. It is quite amazing what injured brains can learn and are able to cope with - if put in situations where the brain can learn again.

My personal conclusion with all that I know about neurological research is the following: it is not so easy to draw direct conclusions from what a brain analysis shows and how the being is like. And human beings seem to be a lot more than just brain capabilities.
Unproven, yes. But hard to prove the opposite.

[CoachBobM]

Originally Posted by BradMM

From your link:

"Use of Niacin for cholesterol should always be physician supervised."

I'm CERTAIN you did this, riiiiiiight????

The reasons it should be physician supervised are:

1) There is a possibility that niacin could, at the therapeutic doses typically used for cholesterol control (1500-3000mg per day), affect liver function. So it is important to have a blood test after you start taking it to verify that it is not doing this. (The same risk also exists if you use statin drugs.)

2) It is also important to know that the dose of niacin you are using is achieving the desired result. And this can only be done by having a blood test in which total cholesterol, HDL, LDL, and tryglycerides are measured.

Be aware, if you experience a niacin flush, that:

1) The flush will be minimized if you take your niacin immediately after meals.

2) You can also minimize it by drinking a glass of water after taking it.

3) The flush gradually subsides after you've been taking it at a given dose for several days.

4) The flush is not considered harmful. In fact, some have even suggested that it may have a beneficial effect, since the capillary dilation that causes it may allow "cleaning" of the capillaries.

If you are going to take niacin at the therapeutic dose level, I would recommend building up to it gradually.

I believe that the best way to take niacin is in divided doses twice a day. Be aware, too, that niacin is another name for nicotinic acid. It is an acid, and that is one of the reasons it is good to take it with meals. I use a form that is buffered with magnesium (which works out well, since studies have shown that many people don't get as much magnesium in their diet as they should).

A word of caution:
For many years, the word "drug" meant "something that you take on a temporary basis to treat a disease, and which you stop taking once the disease is cured." But then drugs were developed that people take on an ongoing basis to treat chronic diseases like diabetes, hypertension, etc. And now we have drugs that people take on an ongoing basis to treat risk factors for disease, like high cholesterol.

This has created a whole new type of drug safety concern to which I am not sure organizations like the U.S. Food and Drug Administration have fully adjusted. Their testing procedures were developed to insure the safety of drugs that people were going to use on a temporary basis. But drugs can also have side effects that only become evident if you take them on a regular basis for a long time. If the drugs are being used to treat diseases, then you have to weigh the possibility of such side long-term effects against the effects of the diseases they are treating. But in cases where they are being used to treat risk factors rather than diseases, this balance becomes even trickier.

Human beings have been consuming niacin (albeit not in those doses) for as long as the human race has been around. And humans have been taking niacin in theraputic doses longer than they have been taking any other cholesterol drug. No one can tell you, on the basis of any studies, what happens if you take statin drugs regularly for 50 years, because the drugs haven't been around that long. So I think there is reason to have a bit more confidence in the safety of using of niacin as a cholesterol therapy.

[shuumai]

Originally Posted by CoachBobM

The same risk also exists if you use statin drugs.

I don't know if I mentioned theses things before, but statin drugs can damage muscles while niacin does not. Also, niacin flush can be reduced by low-dose taking aspirin with it, so I've read.

[shuumai]

This is interesting and I had to find some place to post it.

"The influence of Hericium erinaceus extract on myelination process in vitro: The process of myelination in the presence of the extract began earlier as compared to controls and was characterised by a higher rate."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12675022

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hericium_erinaceus