Aging and Brain Research

We all know how it feels after a bad night’s sleep — foggy brain, drifting focus, maybe even a short fuse. But new research shows what’s really happening inside your head during those moments: your brain may literally be trying to wash itself clean. While you sleep, a clear liquid called cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) flows rhythmically through your brain, washing away the waste that builds up during the day. This nightly rinse also helps rebalance neurotransmitters - the brain’s chemical messengers that regulate mood, focus, and emotion.  When you don’t get enough rest, your brain tries to compensate. Researchers at MIT recently found that during lapses in attention caused by sleep deprivation, waves of CSF flow out of the brain - almost as if your brain is sneaking in mini “cleansing naps.” But there’s a catch: these cleansing waves come at the cost of momentary attention failure. In other words, when you zone out after a sleepless night, your brain may literally be scrubbing itself -...

Memory decline is common in aging and significantly worsens quality of life, but there are few, if any, effective interventions to improve episodic memory recall in older adults. And there are no effective interventions specifically targeting autobiographical episodic memory. A smartphone app called HippoCamera allows users to create memory cues of specific events that they personally value and hope to remember. These cues consist of a short verbal description and a short video recording of the event. The approach was shown to be effective tool for improving the recall of episodic memories in older adults. Seniors were able to improve their ability to recall episodic memories, increase the differentiation of hippocampal activity, and better remember the personal past. These findings suggest that using mobile phone technologies to record and replay episodic memories may be a feasible, low- cost, and effective way to improve memory recall in older adults (Adapted from SpinnerChef:...