Clocks Exercise and Cognition: A new approach

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It is popularly held that the way to a long life is through regular exercise, good sleeping habits and a healthy diet. Indeed, regular exercise is beneficial for the brain and body and can stimulate the production of new brain cells and improve our problem solving abilities. A key to having good sleeping and dietary habits is to make sure that we maintain regular bed-times and meal times. Daily regularity in sleeping and feeding arises because our body clock, which tells us when to awaken and when to eat, is synchronized to the 24h changes in daylight. Unfortunately, this synchronization can go wrong in individuals with weak body clocks, resulting in disruptions in sleep, wake, eating and impaired problem solving abilities. Recently, we found a new effect of exercise: scheduling voluntary exercise for 6 hours at a particular time of day restored daily patterns in sleeping, waking, and drinking in mice with weakened body clocks. This suggests that recovery of clock function in these animals is possible, but we do not know if different schedules of this exercise have different restorative effects on daily rhythms. We will test this by limiting the amount of time that mice can spend exercising. We predict that these animals will benefits less when compared to other mice that have free access to exercise. Unfortunately, we do not know if scheduled exercise also stimulates the brain and improves learning and memory in mice with weakened body clocks. We also do not know whether aged animals would benefit from this schedule of exercise. Aged mice, like ageing humans, have deteriorating body clocks and, consequently, they have disrupted daily patterns of sleep and rest, eating and reduced learning and memory capabilities. It is possible that regular exercise may also strengthen the body clock and restore daily patterns of sleeping, waking, and eating in aged mice. It is also possible that regular exercise will stimulate the ageing brain to produce new cells and improve problem solving capabilities. Through this research project, we will establish new ways of restoring brain and body rhythms to promote good health and longevity.