New Research Links a Ketogenic Diet to Improved Brain Health
The researchers have identified a potential mechanism for the benefits in aged male mice on ketogenic or keto diets.
The researchers hypothesized that switching male mice’s diets from a control to a ketogenic one would enhance the signaling across synapses in the brain.
A proof-of-concept study conducted earlier shown that feeding male mice a cyclic ketogenic diet reversed memory deterioration associated with normal aging and decreased their chance of death in midlife. John Newman, MD, PhD, one of the paper’s authors, published it.
“After reading two seminal papers published in 2017 that showed its beneficial roles in the overall health of aged mice, including brain performance, we decided to study the effect of the ketogenic diet,” Christian Gonza lez-Billault, professor at the Universidad de Chile, and director of the Geoscience Center for Brain Health and Metabolism (GERO), told Medical News Today.
To further explore the previous findings, the researchers maintained 19 male mice, aged 20–23 m
onths, which is considered a “old age” in mice, either on a control diet or a ketogenic diet, cycling with the control diet every other week.
The findings showed that in older animals, the ketogenic diet was linked to reduced blood sugar, enhanced memory, and enhanced motor function. The researchers also demonstrated that the hippocampal area of aged mice’s brains had more plasticity.
“We focus our attention on aged mice because previous work showed that the effect of the diet in young animals was milder and, in some cases, did not show significant differences with a control diet. These previous antecedents suggest that one of the beneficial roles of the diet would be maintaining resilience in aged mice, improving their physiological functions as they age,” said Gonza lez-Billault.
A ketogenic diet is an excellent fit for foods like fish and shellfish. While salmon has very little carbohydrates, it is high in important minerals including B vitamins and omega-3. Lobster and shrimp are also excellent keto foods.
People who follow the ketogenic diet often eat meat and poultry because of its high fat content and low carb content.