SharpBrains

A dreaded diagnosis, that dimmed and dooming dilemma. Feared, sometimes fought, too often forgotten. It is the grayest, ghastliest elephant in the room: dementia.

What is dementia? I, like many others who dedicate their professional efforts to its study and treatment, have no good answer. I believe we are lost in our lexicon, trying to define a brain state so vexing and elusive it drives us out of our minds.

I hope we can do better, and I am not alone. In a sensitive and forward-looking editorial entitled Dementia: A Word to be Forgotten, Drs. Trachtenberg and Trojanowski of the University of Pennsylvania argue that alternate terms are more appropriate for research, clinical, and everyday settings. From scientific and biological perspectives, dementia is unspecific and subjective. Within the walls of the physician’s office, delivering the diagnosis of dementia can erect unintended walls around patients and families; vulnerable individuals, assuming that the "cruel connotations in the lay language" actually apply to them, are unnecessarily isolated. Continue Reading »

Here you have the twice-a-month newsletter with our most popular blog posts. Please remember that you can subscribe to receive this Newsletter by email, simply by submitting your email at the top of this page.

News and Events

Brain Health Promotion by the American Society on Aging: You may be interested in the excellent agenda the American Society on Aging has put together for health professionals, from September 2-5th in San Francisco, devoting a full day to Brain Health. Alvaro will participate in 3 of the sessions, including giving a keynote on the Future of Brain Health.

Can Google Kill Neurons and Rewire Your Whole Brain?: The Atlantic Monthly published an article titled Is Google Making Us Stupid, which basically blamed Google for literally rewiring our brains into more stupid brains (not being able to pay attention, read deep books...). We are not very impressed by the superficial treatment given to this very important topic.

Mobile Brain Training, Scientific Learning, and More News: Overview of cognitive health and fitness news, including recent research on how physical exercise can help diagnosed Alzheimer's patients, the new Mac version of Posit Science's auditory processing training program, and more.

Market Analysis

Top 10 Brain Health Predictions: In an emerging market, like brain health and training, it is difficult to make precise projections. Here we point out a number of trends that executives, consumers, public policy makers, and the media should watch closely in the coming years. Your feedback is very welcome...we will give a complimentary copy of our market report to the person who provides the most insightful additional prediction by August 10th.

Cognitive Health Pioneers: Thank You! The quality and variety of our client list brings up the cross-sector demand for quality information in the emerging brain fitness/ cognitive health category. And it helps us prioritize efforts and coverage of market and research news and trends.

Research Analysis

Encephalon blog carnival: Brain & Mind Research: We hosted Encephalon´s 50th edition, where you will find a selection of superb blog posts on all things Brain and Mind. Examples? you may enjoy Facebook Ate My Psychiatrist or perhaps the Compulsive Collecting of Toy Bullets and Televisions.

Attention Deficits At Work: Dr. Pascale Michelon provides an in-depth overview of a recent study by Ron de Graaf and colleagues,  in which they found that an average of 3.5% of workers (in ten countries) meet the criteria for adult ADHD, In the US, the percentage increased to 4.5%. This has clear effects on productivity.

Education and Learning

Learning & the Brain: Resources for Educators: Educator Laurie Bartels reviews her favorite brain resources for teaching and learning: books, conferences, and websites.

Brain Teasers

Top 25 Brain and Mind Haikus. Yours?: Readers have contributed a good number of haikus on brain-related topics. You can follow the link to check out our Favorite 7, and many other fun ones...which ones do you like the most?

Interesting recent news:

For more on these news, and commentary: Continue Reading »

Several recent news (including video of our recent panel discussion):

1) Study Finds Improved Cognitive Health among Older Americans (Journal of the Alzheimer's Association)

- "Societal investment in building and maintaining cognitive reserve through formal education in childhood and continued cognitive stimulation during work and leisure in adulthood may help limit the burden of dementia among the growing number of older adults worldwide".

- "Cognitive impairment dropped from 12.2 percent in 1993 to 8.7 percent in 2002 among people 70 and older." 

Continue Reading »

Today we are fortunate to interview Dr. Jerri Edwards, an Associate Professor at University of South Florida's School of Aging Studies and Co-Investigator of the influencial ACTIVE study. Dr. Edwards was trained by Dr. Karlene K. Ball, and her research is aimed toward discovering how cognitive abilities can be maintained and even enhanced with advancing age.

Main focus of research

Alvaro Fernandez: Please explain to our readers your main research areas

Jerri Edwards: I am particularly interested in how cognitive interventions may help older adults to avoid or at least delay functional difficulties and thereby maintain their independence longer. Much of my work has focused on the functional ability of driving including assessing driving fitness among older adults and remediation of cognitive decline that results in driving difficulties.

Some research questions that interest me include, how can we maintain healthier lives longer? How can training improve cognitive abilities, both to improve those abilities and also to slow-down, or delay, cognitive decline? The specific cognitive ability that I have studied the most is processing speed, which is one of the cognitive skills that decline early on as we age.

ACTIVE results

Can you explain what cognitive processing speed is, and why it is relevant to our daily lives?

Processing speed is mental quickness. Just like a computer with a 486 processor can do a lot of the same things as a computer with a Pentium 4 processor, but it takes much longer, our minds tend to slow down with age as compared to when we were younger. We can do the same tasks, but it takes more time. Quick speed of processing is important for Continue Reading »

A roundup of several excellent articles this week:

Keeping Your Brain Fit (US News and World Report)

- "In a study of more than 2,800 people ages 65 or older, Harvard researchers found that those with at least five social ties—church groups, social groups, regular visits, or phone calls with family and friends—were less likely to suffer cognitive decline than those with no social ties."

- "The working hypothesis is that it has something to do with stress management," says Marilyn Albert, a neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins and codirector of the Alzheimer's research center there. In animal studies, a prolonged elevation in stress hormones damages the hippocampus. Social engagement appears to boost people's sense of control, which affects their stress level. Creative arts seem to be a highly promising way to increase social engagement. George Washington University's Cohen has found that elderly people who joined choirs also stepped up their other activities during a 12-month period, while a nonsinging control group dropped out of some activities. The singers also reported fewer health problems, while the control group reported an increase."

We Never Forget Anything (Anymore) (Prevention Magazine)

- "Processing new information when we're anxious is tough; the stress itself is a distraction. Fernandez taught Laurie this relaxation trick: Continue Reading »

I hope you are having a joyful holiday season, and wish you a Happy and Prosperous 2008. The Brain Fitness field has made a great deal of progress in 2007, and we are looking forward the New Year.

Here you are have the Monthly Digest of our Most Popular Blog Posts. You can consider it your monthly Brain Fitness/ Exercise Newsletter.

Let me first of all introduce you to our new "Author Speaks Series", where we will give leading scientists and experts a forum to present their new brain-related books. We are honored to kickstart the series with Larry McCleary, former acting Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Denver Children's Hospital. You can read Here his article on how to keep a brain-friendly lifestyle. This series will complement our ongoing Neuroscience Interview Series.

Brain Fitness in the News

Brain Fitness @ PBS: PBS featured a fantastic special program on neuroplasticity and brain fitness during the month of December. Before you ask: as of today, the DVD of the program is still not available in PBS online shop. We expect to see it there in 2-3 weeks. We will keep you informed.

The Huffington Post started featuring a column written by me: you may enjoy taking a look at Alvaro Fernandez - Living on The Huffington Post.

Jogging our Brains for Brain Vitality, Healthy Aging-and Intelligence!: a roundup of several great recent articles on memory, aging, IQ and cognitive abilities such as self-control.

Health & Wellness

Brain Training: No Magic Bullet, Yet Useful Tool. Interview with Elizabeth Zelinski: Dr. Zelinski, leading researcher of the IMPACT study, shares fascinating insights. For example: "...cognitive enhancement requires the engagement in a variety of activities, those activities must be novel, adaptive and challenging-which is why computer-based programs can be helpful. But even at a more basic level, what matters is being engaged with life, continually exposed to stimulating activities, always trying to get out of our comfort zones, doing our best at whatever we are doing. A major typical misconception is that there is only one general intelligence to care about. In reality, we have many different cognitive abilities, such as attention, memory, language, reasoning, and more, so it makes sense to have different programs designed to train and improve each of them."

How to Evaluate and Choose a Brain Fitness Program: To help you navigate the growing number of computer-based programs and games, we published this 10-Question Checklist, based on dozens of interviews with scientists, experts and consumers.

Travel and Engagement as Good Brain Exercise: As we've seen, novelty, variety and challenge are the key guidelines for "brain exercise" that help build new neural connections, force one to be mindful and pay attention, improve abilities such as pattern-recognition, and generally contribute to lifelong brain health. In this post we feature the brain building / mind expanding experience of a SharpBrains friend working in Namibia.

Alzheimer's Prevention and Diagnostic Tests: analysis of several recent articles on emerging research behind Alzheimer's diagnostic and prevention.

Corporate Wellness and Training

Cognitive Reserve and Intellectually Demanding Jobs: a recent study shows how "Intellectually demanding work was associated with greater benefit to cognitive performance in later life independent of related factors like education and intelligence."

Cognitive Health and Baby Boomers- 6 Points to Keep in Mind: based upon an excellent McKinsey report titled Serving Aging Baby Boomers, we discuss a variety a news articles, including interesting numbers, some bad news, and some good news.

Lifelong Learning Is Changing My Brain: Andreas, the neuroscience PhD student who spent last summer working with SharpBrains, writes some reflections on his experience and on how scientists and business professionals can learn from each other.

Brain Teasers

Traveler IQ Game: Check out this stimulating online game...

Events

Learning & The Brain Conference, February 5-7 2008, San Francisco: Sign up now for this great conference for educators who want to learn about the latest brain research findings and implications. I will be speaking at the conference giving an overview of innovative cognitive training programs. The organizers are offering a Special Discount for SharpBrains readers until January 25th 2008, so click here if interested.

If we don't talk beforehand...Happy New Year!

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You can also enjoy our previous editions of our Brain Fitness Newsletter:

- November Edition

- October Edition

- September Edition

- August Edition

- July Edition

Roundup of several insightful articles and recent research:

Fish Oil May Help Prevent Alzheimer's (Washington Post)

- "The omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil might play an important role in preventing Alzheimer's disease, according to a research team at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)."

- "Publishing in the Dec. 26 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, the scientists demonstrated that the omega-3 fatty acid docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) increases the production of LR11, a protein that is found at reduced levels in Alzheimer's patients. LR11 is known to destroy the protein that forms the plaques associated with the disease, the researchers explained." 

- "Alzheimer's is a debilitating neurodegenerative disease that causes memory loss, dementia, personality change and ultimately death. The Alzheimer's Association estimates that 5.1 million Americans are currently afflicted with the disease. The association predicts that may increase to between 11 million and 16 million people by 2050."

 'Finding Alzheimer’s Before a Mind Fails' (New York Times)

- "Ms. Kerley is part of an ambitious new scientific effort to find ways to detect Alzheimer’s disease at the earliest possible moment. Although the disease may seem like a calamity that strikes suddenly in old age, scientists now think it begins long before the mind fails."

- "Many scientists believe the best hope of progress, maybe the only hope, lies in Continue Reading »

Quick: say the color in which each word in this graphic is displayed (don't just read the word!):

Here you have a round-up of some great recent articles on memory, aging, and cognitive abilities such as self-control:

1) How to Boost Your Willpower (New York Times).

- "The video watchers were later given a concentration test in which they were asked to identify the color in which words were displayed. (Note: now you see why we started with that brain exercise...) The word “red,” for instance, might appear in blue ink. The video watchers who had stifled their responses did the worst on the test, suggesting that their self-control had already been depleted by the film challenge."  

- "Finally, some research suggests that people struggling with self-control should start small. A few studies show that people who were instructed for two weeks to make small changes like improving their posture or brushing their teeth with their opposite hand improved their scores on laboratory tests of self-control. The data aren’t conclusive, but they do suggest that the quest for self-improvement should start small. A vow to stop swearing, to make the bed every day or to give up just one food may be a way to strengthen your self-control, giving you more willpower reserves for bigger challenges later."

Comment: learning, building abilities, are processes that require practice and growing levels of difficulty. Like training our muscles in the gym. So the advice to start small and progressively do more makes sense. Many times the enemy of learning is the stress and anxiety we provoke by trying to do too many things at the same time...

 

2) Jogging Your Memory (Newsweek) Thanks Chris for alerting us!

- "No one should expect miracles soon, if at all. But the deeper scientists peer into the workings of memory, the better they understand Continue Reading »

The Neurotechnology Industry Organization (NIO) just announced the top ten emerging areas of neuroscience that will "impact the future of treatments for brain and nervous system": Top 10 Neuroscience Trends in 2007.

It provides superb food for thought. And some of them will sound familiar to readers of this blog:

* 6. Normal brain aging gets more attention: More research and development is being focused on thinking impairments that only partially limit independence and quality of life for senior citizens, adults and school aged children. Neurosoftware will penetrate nursing homes and schools, as brain fitness software becomes new first-line treatment strategy.
* 8. Prevention evidence grows: You are what you eat; smoking is as bad as we thought; and new studies reveal the effects of environmental substances on Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and others.
* 9. Emotional disorders research advances:  New research continues to link neurogenesis to treatment of depression.  A better understanding of PTSD should lead to new treatment regimes.

Want to read probably the best overview of the neurosoftware/ brain fitness software market? Check this article, fresh from the oven: Thank Boomers for Buffing Up Brain Market.

To clarify the numbers mentioned: we project $225m in the US alone (growing from $70m in 2003), broken-down as follows: $80m for the Consumer segment, $60m in K12 Education, $50m in Clinical applications, and $35m in the Corporate segment. The Consumer segment, with a healthy aging value proposition, is the most recent one but the most rapidly growing.