“A healthy soul in a healthy body”, says an ancient expression. People have long held the view that there is a connection between mental health and physical health. Now Israeli and German researchers have investigated what the right diet and weight loss can mean for the health of the little greys. The study has recently been published in the renowned journal eLife. Doctor Tor Strand is an expert in nutrition and is a professor at the Center for International Health. Photo: Sverre Christian Jarild / VKM – I think this is incredibly interesting, says doctor Tor Strand. He is a professor at the University of Bergen and a doctor at Innlandet Hospital. – The researchers have elegantly managed to measure that diet and a lighter body have a clear effect on the brain, says Strand. Not extreme obesity The researchers examined a group of 102 people in Israel, all of whom were overweight and had a lot of fat in their blood. 93 of them were men, and all had passed thirty. The average age was just over 51 years. The group that was examined had a body mass index, BMI of around 30 on average. This is right on the border between what is considered overweight and what is considered obesity. To give an image, a 180 cm man with a BMI of 30 would weigh approximately 97 kilos. A woman 165 cm would weigh around 82 kilos. Dr. Gidon Levakov from Israel has received international attention because of his research. Photo: Privat Gidon Levakov is the lead author of the research report from Ben-Gurion University in Israel. – We selected people who were overweight, precisely because we wanted to investigate how a clear change in lifestyle would turn out, says Levakov in an e-mail to news. Mediterranean diet for one and a half years For 18 months, the group had to live on healthy food, which was largely based on a typical Mediterranean diet. It meant a lot of vegetables and walnuts, and that fish and chicken replaced meat from sheep and cows. A typical food dish in the countries around the Mediterranean. Photo: Pixabay The men ate 1500-1800 kilocalories (kcal) every day, while the women’s intake was 1200-1400 kcal. All participants also received a free membership to a health studio and a course program that encouraged physical activity. However, the participants had no requirement that they had to train during the period. After the 18 months were over, the group had not lost very much weight. On average, they had lost 2.3 kilos. This means that the vast majority of people in the group were still overweight or obese when the diet ended. But for their brains, the months of healthy eating had a startling effect. Took pictures of the brain Before the 102 participants were put on the diet, their brains had been scanned in an MRI machine. At the same time, it was also measured how much fat the participants had in their livers. – The detailed images from the scans were used to assess the functional connections between different areas of the brain, says researcher Gidon Levakov. An MRI machine provides detailed images of the body’s interior. Photo: MPI of Psychiatry / Illustration photo This is how the researchers got a clear measure of how far the aging of the brain had progressed in the people in the group, before they changed their diet. After one and a half years of a healthy diet, new MRI images were taken of the brains of the 102. The results were clear. The brains of the participants had been through a rejuvenation cure. Younger brain and healthier body On average, the brains of the participants were almost 9 months younger than what would have been expected if they had not changed their diet. The reduction in expected aging was achieved with only a one percent decrease in body weight. The fat values in the liver had also decreased markedly. A lot of fat in the liver is one of the risk factors for developing Alzheimer’s. According to the researchers, a healthy diet can have a noticeable effect on the brain over time, even if the reduction in body weight is not that great. Photo: Colourbox The amount of the dangerous fat that lies deep inside the body in the abdominal region had also decreased. This fat is known to have a connection with heart disease and the development of type 2 diabetes. Research has previously shown that this type of diabetes can increase the risk of dementia. Professor Tor Strand is excited that researchers in Israel have found a method that can provide a measure of the connection between diet and brain aging. – With the brain images, and the knowledge of expected ageing, they can fairly objectively show how important a healthy diet is for taking care of the brain, says Strand. This is what MRI images of the brain can look like. Photo: Getty Images / iStock Hope for more research Gidon Levakov believes it would have been interesting to do more research on diet and brain health in the normal population, and not just in the group who are overweight and obese. There were also very few women in the study, and he thinks more research should be done to gain a better understanding of both sexes. – How much “younger” can a brain actually become with a healthy diet over a longer period? – It’s a good question, but since this is one of the first studies to demonstrate the beneficial effect of changing lifestyle on brain age, it is currently difficult to say anything concrete about the long-term effects, says Levakov. Levakov believes that research into the interaction between the gastrointestinal system and the brain will provide several important answers in the coming years. He believes that this can provide a new understanding of both behaviour, emotions and mental processes in humans.
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New research from Israel – news Trøndelag
