This Week In Brain News
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While reading this week’s health news, we’ve singled out three brain-related articles to feature here:
Bad breath now, bad brain later?
Researchers found links between oral microbiome populations, and changes in brain function with aging. The short version is indeed “bad breath now = bad brain later”, but more specifically:
- People who had large numbers of the bacteria groups Neisseria and Haemophilus had better memory, attention and ability to do complex tasks
- People who had higher levels of Porphyromonas had more memory problems later
- People with a lot of Prevotella tended to predict poorer brain health and was more common in people who carry the Alzheimer’s Disease risk gene, APOE4.
If you’ve never heard of half of those, don’t worry: mostly your oral microbiome can take care of itself, provide you consistently do the things that create a “good” oral microbiome. So, see our “related” link below:
Read in full: Mouth bacteria may hold insight into your future brain function
Related: Improve Your Oral Microbiome
Weeding out a major cause of cognitive decline
Cannabis may be great for relaxation, but regular use is not great for mental sharpness, and recent use (even if not regular, and even if currently sober) shows a similar dip in cognitive abilities, especially working memory. In other words, cannabis use for relaxation should be at most an occasional thing, rather than an everyday thing.
While the results of the study are probably not shocking, something that we found interesting was their classification system:
❝Heavy users are considered young adults who’ve used cannabis more than 1000 times over their lifetime. Whereas, using 10 to 999 times was considered a moderate user, and fewer than 10 times was considered a non-user.❞
Which—while being descriptive rather than prescriptive in nature—suggests that, to be on the healthy end of the bell curve, an occasional cannabis-user might want to consider “if you have 999 uses before you hit the “heavy user” category, project those 999 uses against your life expectancy, and moderate your use accordingly”. In other words, a person just now starting use, who expects to live another 40 years, would calculate: 999/40 = 24.9 uses per year, so call it 2 per month. A person who only expects to live another 20 years, would do the same math and arrive at 4 per month.
Disclaimer: the above is intended as an interesting reframe, and a way of looking at long-term cannabis use while being mindful of the risks. It is not intended as advice. This health-conscious writer personally has no intention of using at all, unless perhaps in some bad future scenario in which I have bad chronic pain, I might consider that pain relief effects may be worth the downsides. Or I might not; I hope not to be in the situation to find out!
Read in full: Largest study ever done on cannabis and brain function finds impact on working memory
Related: Cannabis Myths vs Reality
Mind-reading technology improves again
We’ve come quite a way from simple 1/0 reads, and basic cursor control! Now, researchers have created a brain decode that can translate a person’s thoughts into continuous text, without requiring the person to focus on words—in other words, it verbalizes the ideas directly. Most recently, the latest upgrade means that while previously, the device had to be trained on an individual brain for many hours, now the training/calibration process takes only an hour:
Read in full: Improved brain decoder holds promise for communication in people with aphasia
Related: Are Brain Chips Safe?
Take care!
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What’s Really Keeping You Awake? The Brain’s Role in Sleepless Nights
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Dr. Tracey Marks, psychiatrist, explains:
All in your head (which is the least helpful place for it to be when trying to sleep)
Why You Can’t Sleep: sleeplessness often stems from a conflict between your brain’s sleep drive (powered by adenosine and melatonin) and wake drive (powered by orexin and serotonin), which are normally balanced by your circadian rhythm.
About that tech: blue light gets a bad reputation, and indeed it suppresses melatonin, but this is quickly resolved once you turn it off. However, being accustomed to constant notifications triggers dopamine, keeping your brain in a heightened state of alertness, even if you’ve now put your phone aside, if you’re still expecting notifications.
About your worries: worrying at night activates the brain’s stress response (HPA axis), releasing cortisol and adrenaline that override sleep signals—especially when you miss your natural sleep window and are trying to sleep at a slightly different time than you normally do.
This can then become a self-perpetuating cycle, because after poor sleep, your brain can start associating your bed with stress, reinforcing insomnia through classical conditioning.
Some advices that Dr. Marks gives include:
- Follow natural sleep rhythms where possible, rather than trying to force something different.
- Use paradoxical intention (stop trying so hard to sleep).
- Practise calming techniques like box breathing (4 seconds breathing in, 4 seconds holding, 4 seconds breathing out, 4 seconds holding)
Chronic insomnia (3+ nights/week for 3+ months) with significant daytime effects may require treatment like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I), so that’s a thing to bear in mind too.
In short: sleep isn’t just about being tired—it’s about working with your brain’s systems, not against them.
For more on all of this, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
How to Fall Asleep Faster: CBT-I Treatment For Insomnia
Take care!
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Kidney Beans vs Red Lentils – Which is Healthier?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Our Verdict
When comparing kidney beans to red lentils, we picked the lentils.
Why?
Both are excellent! But…
In terms of macros, kidney beans have more carbs, while the lentils have more fiber and protein; an easy first-round win for lentils.
In the category of vitamins, kidney beans have more vitamin K (appropriately enough), while lentils have more of vitamins B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B7, B9, C, and E, winning this round too.
Looking at minerals, kidney beans have more calcium and magnesium, while lentils have more copper, iron, manganese, phosphorus, selenium, and zinc, winning their third round in a row.
Adding up the sections makes for a clear overall win for red lentils, but by all means do enjoy either or both, as diversity is best!
Want to learn more?
You might like:
What Do The Different Kinds Of Fiber Do? 30 Foods That Rank Highest
Enjoy!
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The First Survivors of Alzheimer’s – by Dr. Dale Bredesen
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
We previously reviewed this author’s “The End of Alzheimer’s”, which pertains to the very protocol whose (successful!) results this book examines.
It has generally been considered that Alzheimer’s is a case of “once you have it, it’s downhill until the end”. Of course, such was also true historically of many things that are now easily treatable, and there is no pressing reason to believe that Alzheimer’s should have any special immunity to the onwards march of science.
As such, the first part of the book is given over to 7 personal accounts, in which the titular first survivors of Alzheimer’s tell their own stories, one per chapter. After that, we get to part two, which is more about the science, on the small and large scale—so, practical advice directly applicable by individuals, and epidemiological considerations of more use to healthcare providers.
The style is, of course, varied—due to kicking off with seven (deeply!) personal accounts. To give an idea of tone, the first paragraphs of the first story are about the writer’s erstwhile plan to kill herself. The other six stories are also very human. And then, once we get into the second part of the book, it’s not quite so hard-science has The End of Alzheimer’s, but it’s also written with the sort of detachment that you might expect from a scientist writing about neurology and inflammation and metabolism and gene expression and so forth.
Bottom line: if you just want the clinical aspect, then you want “The End of Alzheimer’s”. If you just want practical advice, then you want the same author’s “The Ageless Brain”. But if you want both of those things plus a strong human element that makes it all very real, then this one’s the book for you.
Click here to check out The First Survivors of Alzheimer’s, and value the richness of life!
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3 Things Everyone Over 50 Must Do Daily for Healthy Feet
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Will Harlow, the over-50s specialist physio, wants you to be on a good footing:
Daily steps in the right direction
The three daily exercises recommended in the video are:
Exercise 1: Towel Scrunch
The towel scrunch exercise strengthens the flexor muscles in the feet, improving balance and improving contact with the ground. To do this exercise, sit on a chair with a towel placed on the floor beneath your toes while keeping your heels on the ground. Use only your toes to pull the towel toward your heel, scrunching it up as much as possible. This movement strengthens the arch of the foot and can help alleviate symptoms of flat feet. For best results, practice this exercise for 2–3 minutes once or twice daily. Once you’ve got the hand of doing it sitting, do it while standing.
Exercise 2: Big Toe Extension
Big toe extension is an essential exercise for maintaining foot mobility and improving walking kinesthetics by preventing stiffness in the big toe. To do this exercise, keep your foot flat on the floor and try to lift only your big toe while keeping the four other toes firmly pressed down. To be clear, we mean under its own power; not using your hands to help. Many people find this difficult initially, but it’s due to a loss of neural connection rather than muscle strength, so with practice, the ability to isolate the movement improves quite quickly. Perform 10 repetitions in a row, three times per day, for optimal benefits. Once you’ve got the hand of doing it sitting, do it while standing.
Exercise 3: Calf Stretch
The calf stretch is an important exercise for maintaining foot health by preventing tight calves, which can contribute to issues like plantar fasciitis and Morton’s neuroma. To do this stretch, place your hands against a wall for support and extend one leg straight behind you while keeping your other heel firmly on the floor. The front knee should be bent while the back leg remains straight, creating a stretch in the calf. Hold this position for 30 seconds (building up to that, if necessary). Since the effectiveness of stretching comes from frequency rather than duration, this stretch should be performed three to four times per day for the best results.
For more on each of these, plus visual demonstrations, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
Steps For Keeping Your Feet A Healthy Foundation ← this one’s about general habits, not exercises
Take care!
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Struggle To Deep Squat? It’s Probably This One Fixable Thing Holding You Back
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Deep squat, Asian squat, Slav squat, resting squat… Whatever we want to call it, many in the West struggle with it.
Nevertheless, this struggle is entirely circumstantial, very fixable, and definitely not some kind of immutable law of the universe:
A strong foundation
A proper deep squat relies on four main factors:
- Ankle dorsiflexion allows the toes to pull toward the shin.
- Hip flexion and external rotation bring the thighs close to the torso while slightly rotating outward.
- Knee flexion ensures the thighs and calves make contact.
- Maintaining the center of mass over the midfoot is essential for balance.
Correspondingly, the reason for struggling can be a case of…
- Limited ankle mobility, which prevents the knees from moving forward, shifting weight backward.
- Tight glutes and weak hip flexors making it hard to bring the torso close to the thighs, often causing people to fall backward.
- Quad tightness can also restrict depth if the thighs cannot meet the calves.
- Proportionally longer femurs than average can cause extra difficulty as the pelvis shifts further back, requiring more knee travel for balance.
However, we said “one thing”, not “four things”, so what’s the deal?
For most people, we are told in this video, ankle mobility is the biggest limiting factor in achieving a deep squat. Thus, she recommends working on that, and (at the end of this video) links to another video with specifically ankle exercises.
For all of this plus visual demonstrations, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like:
The Secret To Better Squats: Foot, Knee, & Ankle Mobility
Take care!
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The Science of Nutrition – by Rhiannon Lambert
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
While there are a lot of conflicting dietary approaches out there, the science itself is actually fairly cohesive in most regards. This book does a lot of what we do here at 10almonds, and presents the science in a clear fashion without having any particular agenda to push.
The author is a nutritionist (BSc, MSc, RNutr) and therefore provides an up-to-date evidence-based approach for eating.
As a result, the only part of this book that brings it down in this reviewer’s opinion is the section on Intermittent Fasting. Being not strictly about nutrition, she has less expertise on that topic, and it shows.
The information is largely presented in double-page spreads each answering a particular question. Because of this, and the fact there are colorful graphic representations of information too, we do recommend the print version over Kindle*.
Bottom line: if you like the notion of real science being presented in a clear and simple fashion (we like to think our subscribers do!), then you’ll surely enjoy this book.
Click here to check out the Science of Nutrition, and get a clear overview!
*Writer’s note: I realize I’ve two days in a row recommended this (yesterday because there are checkboxes to check, worksheets to complete, etc), but it’s not a new trend; just how it happened to be with these two books. I love my Kindle dearly, but sometimes print has the edge for one reason or another!
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