Brain Fact Friday on "Building a Faster, Stronger, Resilient Brain, by Understanding Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF)"

Welcome back to the Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning Podcast, for our third Brain Fact Friday and episode #114. This week's Brain Fact Friday, you will learn:✔︎ What is BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor) and what are it's benefits to the brain.✔︎ What we should all understand about BDNF with Alzheimer's Disease, Parkinson's Disease and how our brains learn.✔︎ Exercise, Nutrition and BDNF: What's the Connection?✔︎ Why Putting the Body Under Stress is a Good Thing.✔︎ Sleep, Stress and the BDNF Factor.See past episodes here https://lnkd.in/grfaE7y   This week, we recorded 2 ground-breaking interviews with 3 decades of leadership expertise with Denise J Cooper on her book, Remarkable Leadership Lessons[i], and Dr. John Ratey,[ii] an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and an internationally recognized expert in Neuropsychiatry. Stay tuned for these interviews coming next week, but for today, here’s Brain Fact Friday. Did you know that trace brain-derived neurotrophic factor or BDNF[iii]  that Dr. Ratey says is like “Miracle-Gro (or fertilizer) for the Brain” is “the important link that explains why simple exercise can have such a profound effect on cognition and well-being[iv] and that “eating foods with folate, vitamin B12, and omega-3 fats increases BDNF in the brain, just as exercise does?” Dr. Ratey and I dive deep into his 2 books Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain[v], and Go Wild: Eat Fat, Run Free, Be Social and Follow Evolution’s Other Rules for Total Health and Well-Being on our interview coming next week where he explains the importance of BDNF as it relates to diet and exercise (which are 2 of the top 5 health staples we have been focused on the podcast since last year). His book does dive deep into sleep as a health staple, but that’s another story.  We will take a closer look at sleep in a later episode. But First, What is BDNF? Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF)[vi] is a protein that’s found in the brain and other parts of the body “involved in plastic changes related to learning and memory [vii] and higher-level cognitive abilities. This signaling protein is the reason why you can sit at your desk with a heightened sense of focus and concentration, after you exercise. Dr. Ratey taught me that “movement places demands on the brain, just as it does on muscle, and so the brain releases BDNF which triggers the growth of cells to meet the increased mental demands of movement”[viii] and the whole brain benefits from this movement. THE BENEFITS OF BDNF BDNF helps with learning, memory, or other higher-level thinking. It grows new neurons and synapses in the brain while also supporting the survival of existing neurons. It increases neurogenesis and can help to heal our brain after a traumatic brain injury.[ix] WHAT WE SHOULD KNOW AND UNDERSTAND ABOUT BDNF? BDNF is reduced in the brain of someone who has developed Alzheimer’s Disease[x] and Parkinson’s Disease[xi] and explains why someone with Alzheimer’s has their memory weakened. BDNF is involved in how long it takes us to learn something[xii]. A child’s rate of learning is higher than an adult, because of their highly plastic brain. This explains why learning a second language is much easier when you are younger, versus trying to learn a new language as an adult. HERE ARE SOME TIPS TO INCREASE BDNF TO BUILD A FASTER, BETTER, STRONGER BRAIN, WHILE IMPROVING RESILIENCE AND RESISTANCE TO STRESS. Exercise and Nutrition releases BDNF: Dr. Ratey, in his book Go Wild explains that researchers were looking at ways to prevent the aging brain and found that “seniors who exercised developed significantly larger hippocampal volumes (the part of the brain responsible for memory processing) improving their memory.”[xiii]  They found that exercise also “prevented a loss of grey matter overall (which is common in aging) and improved brain function.” (Page 107). Since we are all aging, i