Need A Brainpower Boost Salute The Sun

Need A Brainpower Boost Salute The Sun Photo by yogicphotos via Flickr. According to a recent study, a mere 20 minutes of Hatha Yoga practice  significantly  improved participants (a group of female undergraduate students) speed and accuracy of recall on memory tests, providing them with a heightened ability to retain information and maintain focus. A common sequence of poses in Hatha Yoga is the Sun Salutation, and consists of various, flowing poses that incorporate partial inversions that direct blood flow to the brain.  This sequence is excellent to perform during those mornings when you need to get your blood flowing without having to leave your apartment or dorm. The video below will guide you through the sun salutation movements: Traditional Sun Salutation Also, for all you manly men out there, youll never have to question your masculinity while doing yoga again, thanks to the rise of Broga. Hare Pose Photo courtesy of lovemyyoga.com The hare pose, also known as  Sanangasana,  is another inverted yoga pose with brain-boosting benefits. Its known to provide maximum extension of the spine, increasing elasticity and increasing the flow of fresh, oxygen-rich blood to the brain, and can be done following the sun salutation. Feathered Peacock Pose (Pincha Mayurasana) Photo by David Martinez via  The Yoga Journal The Feathered Peacock Pose is essentially one of the ultimate inversion poses, with advanced versions not requiring the use of a wall. However, since most of us probably arent advanced yogis, it would be best to use a wall to rest your feet on while you hold the pose. In addition to drawing blood flow down to the brain, you are also drawing it down to your lungs and working your upper body. Tai Chi Photo by Joel Santos Photography via Flickr. Tai Chi, an ancient Chinese martial art that focuses on slow, meditative movements, has been shown in a study conducted by the University of South Florida to increase brain volume and improve mental activity, and may even delay the onset of Alzheimers disease. In the tai chi group, we saw brain growth of one-half of 1 percent over eight months, said James Mortimer, lead researcher and USF professor of epidemiology and biostatistics  in an interview. Like yoga, tai chi is a low impact and continuously-flowing exercise requiring heightened mental awareness. Many scientists speculate that this mental engagement may be the reason for their significant impact on the brain. High-Intensity Interval Training Photo courtesy of swide.com Commonly referred to as HIIT,  this type of training is high-impact and involves alternating bouts of high-intensity exercise followed by a rest period, which is repeated for a short duration, typically 20 to 30 minutes, or even as little as 8 to 10 depending on how hard youre working.  An example would be similar to a Tabata workout (a form of HIIT), where you would perform 20 seconds of all-out intense exercise, followed by 10 seconds of rest, repeated for eight rounds. High-intensity exercise triggers the release of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a neurotrophic factor that plays an important role in the survival of neurons and synapse plasticity.  In a study involving high-intensity exercise and BDNF, researchers found that,  vocabulary learning was 20 percent faster after intense physical exercise as compared to the other two conditions. This condition also elicited the strongest increases in BDNF and catecholamine levels. The other two conditions within the study were low-impact running and rest, which essentially portrays high-intensity exercise as superior to low-intensity exercise in terms of cognitive improvement and learning performance. However, you may be wondering how this is possible due to the positive studies cited above mentioning the benefits of low-impact exercises on brain power and memory, which are seemingly contradictory; the bottom line is, while high-intensity exercise releases BDNF, low-intensity exercise like weight training releases an insulin like growth factor, which promotes neural survival in ways high-intensity exercise doesnt. Brain health seems to be more of a balancing act than a cut-and-dry system, which is why it is recommended to include a mixture of the previous exercises in order to reap optimal brain-boosting effects (just as long as this mixture doesnt constitute attempting to consume coffee while performing the Feathered Peacock Pose).