White Matter and Marijuana

Did you know that the age at which a brain is exposed regularly to marijuana may result in different effects to white matter? Typically, marijuana use begins during adolescence and early adulthood. This is a particularly dangerous age because the brain is still developing and cannabis receptors are still abundant in white-matter pathways. Researchers at Oxford University found impaired axonal pathways in the hippocampus and portions of the bridges (e.g., corpus callosum, commissure) that connect the two hemispheres in the brain of regular cannabis users. The amount of impairment to these brain areas was directly associated with the age at which the individual began regular use of marijuana. Study results suggest that long-term cannabis use is hazardous particularly to white matter in the developing brain of adolescents and young adults. Delaying the age at which regular use begins may minimize the severity of microstructural impairment. White matter alteration has been linked with several health concerns including cognitive impairment; vulnerability to psychosis, depression, and anxiety disorders; and clinical outcomes in schizophrenia.

Brain Stress and Hurricane Sandy

No surprise, millions of people are facing rather daunting tasks of rebuilding in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. Such catastrophic events not only destroy lives and property, but also can precipitate a natural wave of stress along with sadness, anger, and fear that must be addressed. In the belief that each person can access a state of ease at times of great stress and emotional turbulence, the Institute of Heart Math has prepared a free e-book that requires no login to download. Entitled The State of Ease™ e-Booklet, it contains tools to help you create less stressful perceptions and attitudes along with more coherent alignment between your heart, mind, and emotions. Here is the link to copy and paste in your browser. http://www.heartmath.org/free-services/free/state-of-ease.html?mtcCampaign=21914&mtcEmail=3369507

All About Energy

How's your brain energy today? In life you always give something up to get something. Whittled down to the bottom line, you always give up energy. It's the basic medium of exchange. You pay¾not with money, or talent, or high-tech commodities¾with energy. How do you use your available energy? Are you expending it in energy intensive or energy efficient ways? PET Scan studies have shown that the brain expends differing amounts of energy depending on the type of activity you are engaged in and whether or not it matches what your brain does energy efficiently. Become more aware of how you are expending your energy. Learn to compare your relative energy levels at the end of different types of activities. Figure out which ones drain your energy versus those that do not. Aim for a 51% match of your life's activities with your brain’s innate energy advantage. Sandwich the energy-exhausting activities in between. If you get serious about this and as your awareness increases, you may discover that there are some energy-exhausting activities you can stop doing altogether.

Is Your EC Working?

Did you know that the entorhinal cortex (EC) is one of the first brain areas to be affected in Alzheimer’s Disease? This little organ functions as a hub in a widespread brain network for memory and navigation and is the main interface between the hippocampus and the neocortex. This EC-hippocampus system plays a key role in autobiographical/declarative/episodic memories and in particular spatial memories including memory formation, consolidation, and optimization in sleep. The EC also plays a role in spatial directional activity. Studies of humans playing video games found path cells in the EC, the activity of which indicated whether the person was taking a clockwise or counterclockwise path. Such EC direction-path cells show this directional activity regardless of the location in which people experience themselves. This differs from place cells in the hippocampus that are activated by specific locations.

Stress-related Distraction

David Devilbiss, a scientist and lead author on a study published in the journal PLOS Computational Biology, there are dangers of stress-related distraction. “The literature tells us that stress plays a role in more than half of all workplace accidents, and a lot of people have to work under what we would consider a great deal of stress,” Devilbiss said. “Air traffic controllers need to concentrate and focus with a lot riding on their actions. People in the military have to carry out these thought processes in conditions that would be very distracting, and now we know that this distraction is happening at the level of individual cells in the brain.” Recent studies have demonstrated that rather than suppressing activity, stress modifies the nature of neuron activity. “Treatments that keep neurons on their self-stimulating task while shutting out distractions may help protect working memory.”

Resentment Cost

Did you know that unresolved resentment is dangerous and can take a huge toll on your health? Internationally renowned cardiologist, Herbert Benson said, "There's something called the physiology of forgiveness. Being unable to forgive other people's faults is harmful to one's health." Multiple studies have linked the inability or unwillingness to forgive with health hazards such as increased blood pressure, cardio-vascular disease, and immune suppression. A Duke University Medical Center study showed a decrease in back pain and depression, and lower levels of chronic pain in people who learned to forgive.

Are you a proficient reader? Researchers at Stanford University have found that proficient reading requires efficient communication between brain areas that involve vision, hearing, and language. These areas are distributed throughout the brain so the development of reading ability relates to growth in the brain’s white-matter tracts, bundles of myelinated nerve fibers that connect these distant regions of the brain. The growth of these white-matter tracts is governed by pruning (the elimination of extraneous nerve fibers and neuronal connections); and myelination (the coating of nerve fibers with myelin, a fatty, insulating tissue that increases the speed of transmission). Both processes are influenced by experience: underused nerve fibers are pruned while others are myelinated--so they occur at different rates and times in different people. Bottom line? Read to children; listen to them read. Read aloud to yourself. Keep those nerve fibers stimulated!