By: Alvaro Fernandez
Next Tuesday, November 3rd: I’ll be presenting the SharpBrains Guide to a business/ entrepreneurial audience at the San Francisco Chapter of the Association for Corporate Growth (you can register online).
Description: While most of us have heard the phrase “use it or lose it,” very few understand what “it” means, or how to properly “use it” in order to improve brain function and fitness. This talk will provide an overview of the most recent research, guidelines and resources to “Use It and Improve It”, summarizing the main findings and topics from the new book The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness. We will debunk 10 common brain fitness myths; discuss how the brain works and the 4 pillars of brain maintenance; explain the difference between mental exercise and mental activity and identify practical ways to integrate this research into our work and lives for maximum brain health and performance.
To order book: Here. (has been among Amazon.com’s Top 10 Preventive Medicine books basically since publication!)
Over the last few weeks I have given a couple of 
AARP-sponsored talks, both in English and in Spanish (this was my first Spanish presentation on a topic I mostly discuss in English, so I did get some extra brain points by trying to translate “neuroplasticity” and “hippocampus” on the fly), and had a great couple of meetings with AARP staff to explore collaborations. AARP can obviously play a major role in how rationally this whole category of “brain fitness” evolves.
Here you have a couple of my favorite recent media interviews:
4-minute Video interview on the Gilbert Guide:
Book Reveals Secrets Once Only Known to Scientists
30-minute radio interview on WMBR (MIT campus radio station):
Paradigm Shifts: Brain Fitness (mine is the second interview, starts around the middle)
Finally, a growing number of bloggers are reviewing the book. This is what they say:
You can order The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness here.
By: Alvaro Fernandez
Title: The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness – Practical Advice to Keep Your Brain Sharp 
- Two community-based book talks hosted by New York Public Library and supported by the Einstein Aging Study at Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
Description: A fit brain? Can you exercise your brain and become mentally fit? 
Can you continue to learn and increase your brain’s capacity at any age? Alvaro Fernandez, CEO and Co-Founder of SharpBrains, says Yes!, and in this program he will show you how. Based on research compiled from leading scientists in fields of Neuroscience, Gerontology, and Cognitive Science, and presented in his book “The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness”, Alvaro Fernandez will provide ways to maintain and improve your cognitive health.
He will:
- Debunk 10 Myths of Brain Fitness
- Examine the 4 Pillars of Brain Maintenance
- Discuss the difference between Mental Exercise and Mental Activity
- Evaluate Brain Training Software
- Explore emerging trends
Book and Bio: Alvaro Fernandez, CEO and Co-Founder of SharpBrains, teaches “Science of Brain Health and Brain Fitness” at UC-Berkeley and San Francisco State University. He is the co-author of The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness.
When and where:
> September 23rd, 10am, New York Public Library, Bronx Library Center. 310 East Kingsbridge Road. (718)Â 579-4244. More information here.
> September 25rd, 1pm, New York Public Library, Stephen Schwarzman Building Auditorium. Fifth Avenue at 42nd Street. 917-ASK-NYPL (917-275-6975). More information here.
By: Dr. David Rabiner
I wanted to alert you to a very interesting finding published in a recent issue of Science, one of the world’s leading scientific journals.
The study was led by Dr. Torkel Klingberg and his colleagues from the Karolinska Institute 
in Sweden. The goal was to learn whether Working Memory Training is associated with changes in brain biochemistry, thus suggesting a mechanism by which training may lead to enhanced working memory capacity and a reduction in attention problems. Thus, although Working Memory Training has previously shown promising results as a treatment for working memory and attention difficulties, this was a basic science study rather than a treatment study.
The major finding was that increased working memory capacity following training was associated with changes in brain biochemistry. Specifically, the researchers found changes in the density and binding potential of cortical D1 dopamine receptors in brain regions that are activated during working memory tasks.
Results from this study suggest a biological basis for the improvement in working memory capacity and reductions i Read the rest of this entry »
By: Alvaro Fernandez
Study Questions Effectiveness Of $80 Million Per Year ‘Brain Exercise Products Industry for Elderly (Science Daily)
- “There is much research on the benefits of cognitive rehabilitation strategies among elderly who already experience mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or Alzheimer’s disease, as well as on the positive impact of physical exercise. The researchers, however, wanted to evaluate current research that would focus on the impact of cognitive interventions in the healthy elderly population.”
- “…they concluded that there was no evidence indicating that structured cognitive intervention programs had an impact on the progression of dementia in the healthy elderly population”
Comment:Â we have not reviewed the analysis yet, so cannot comment in depth. However, just from the press release, we see a few potential problems in how the study was framed, reducing its practical value: Read the rest of this entry »
By: Alvaro Fernandez
Cognitive Training Can Alter Biochemistry Of The Brain (Science Daily)
- “Researchers at the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet have shown for the first time that the active training of the working memory brings about visible changes in the number of dopamine receptors in the human brain.”
- “”Brain biochemistry doesn’t just underpin our mental activity; our mental activity and thinking process can also affect the biochemistry,” says Professor Torkel Klingberg, who led the study.”
- “Changes in the number of dopamine receptors in a person doesn’t give us the key to poor memory,” says Professor Lars Farde, one of the researchers who took part in the study. “We also have to ask if the differences could have been caused by a lack of memory training or other environmental factors. Maybe we’ll be able to find new, more effective treatments that combine medication and cognitive training, in which case we’re in extremely interesting territory.”
Comment:Â couldn’t agree more with “Maybe we’ll be able to find new, more effective treatments that combine medication and cognitive training, in which case we’re in extremely interesting territory.” This study adds a very important angle to the growing literature on working memory training, showing a more fundamental, structural impact, that once thought (such as the well-known effect that “cells that fire together wire together”). The computerized cognitive program used in the study was Cogmed working memory training.
More on Torkel Klingberg’s research:
- Article written by Torkel Klingberg on The Overflowing Brain & Information Overload
- His recent book, which was The SharpBrains Most Important Book of 2008: The Overflowing Brain: Information Overload and the Limits of Working Memory
- 2006 Interview with Dr. Klingberg: Working Memory Training and RoboMemo: Interview with Dr. Torkel Klingberg
By: Dr. Simon Evans
As the Brain Fitness industry continues to gain momentum, and people explore all the incredible brain-training tools being developed, we hope that enthusiasts don’t take their eye off the importance of the physical health of the brain and all the systems it communicates with. The brain is unique in that it houses our cognitive and emotional capacities in the form of the mind. It is a ‘cognitive’ organ that hungers for stimulation from new experiences and challenges. Many brain fitness programs strive to satisfy this need. Yet the brain is also a physical organ that plays by many of the same rules as the heart, lungs, liver and kidneys. To stay healthy and perform optimally it requires quality nutrition, physical activity and optimal sleep. The brain, especially, relies on a healthy vascular system to efficiently deliver oxygen and key nutrients and remove waste. In fact, the brain uses approximately 20% of the oxygen we breathe to satisfy its high-energy demands. Given that the brain only weighs about 2% of the body, we can consider it an energy hog and we must cater to its needs very carefully.
Nutrients play key roles in brain function. Several have shown efficacy in clinical trials treating cases of mood disorders, cognitive decline and of course benefiting the physical health of the brain. Nutrients are both the raw materials employed in creating new neural connections and Read the rest of this entry »
By: Dr. Bill Klemm
After about age 50, most people begin to experience a decline in memory capability. Why is that? One obvious answer is that the small arteries of the brain begin to clog up, often as a result of a lifetime of eating the wrong things and a lack of exercise. If that lifetime has been stressful, many neurons may have been killed by stress hormones. Given the
most recent scientific literature, reviewed in my book Thank You, Brain, For All You Remember. What You Forgot Was My Fault, dead neurons can’t be replaced, except in the hippocampus, which is fortunate for memory because the hippocampus is essential for making certain kinds of memories permanent. Another cause is incipient Alzheimer’s disease; autopsies show that many people have the lesions of the disease but have never shown symptoms, presumably because a lifetime of exceptional mental activity has built up a “cognitive reserve.”
So is there anything you can do about it besides exercise like crazy, eat healthy foods that you don’t like all that much, pop your statin pills, and take up yoga?
Yes. In short: focus, focus, focus.
Changing thinking styles can help. Research shows that Read the rest of this entry »
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