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Obesity May Age Your Brain
肥胖可能會讓大腦老化
原文網址：http://www.webmd.com/diet/obesity/news/20160809/obesity-may-age-brain#1
原文作者：Kathleen Doheny
Being overweight or obese in middle age shrinks your brain, aging it by as much as 10 years, according to a new study.
根據一項新研究的結果， 中年超重或肥胖會讓大腦萎縮，
People who are overweight or obese during middle age have brains with much less white matter than people of the same age at a healthy weight, says study researcher Lisa Ronan, PhD, at the University of Cambridge in the U.K.
該項研究的研究者、英國劍橋大學博士Lisa Ronan說：中年超重或肥胖者， 相比健康體重的同齡人， 大腦的白質少得多。
White matter tissue helps the brain’s different areas communicate with each other. Loss of it has been linked with declines in thinking skills.
白質組織説明大腦不同區域彼此聯繫。 已有研究表明， 白質損失跟思維能力下降有關。
However, in this study, the researchers did not see a difference in thinking skills between healthy weight and overweight people, despite the white matter differences seen on scans of the brain -- a finding that Ronan says surprised her.
不過， 在該項研究中， 儘管在大腦掃描時看到，
Other studies have found a link between obesity and a decline in thinking skills, as well as getting Alzheimer’s disease at an earlier age. Although Ronan didn’t see the same link in her study, experts say losing white matter is not good.
其他研究已發現， 肥胖跟思維能力下降和較早年齡患老年癡呆症有關。 儘管Ronan沒有在其研究中看到同樣的聯繫， 但專家們說， 損失白質不是好事。
''The white matter of the brain is thought to be the first to go with dementia," says Mike Henne, PhD, a spokesman for the American Federation for Aging Research. Loss of white matter is generally associated with “foggy-mindedness," he says.
美國老化研究聯合會的發言人MikeHenne博士說：“我們認為， 患癡呆症後， 大腦的白質是最先受損的”。 他說：白質損失通常伴隨著“大腦迷糊”。
White matter declines with age, usually beginning in the late 30s, so holding on to as much as you can is desirable.
通常， 在年近40歲時， 白質就會開始隨著年老而衰退， 因此， 人們都希望能盡力保住更多的白質。
"If you lose white matter, the [brain's] neurons are not as capable of communicating with each other," says Henne, assistant professor of cell biology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.
德克薩斯大學西南醫學中心的細胞生物學助理教授Henne說：“如果白質喪失， [大腦的]神經元彼此之間聯繫的能力就不如以前了。 ”
The Link Between Obesity and White Matter Decline
肥胖與白質衰退的關聯
The U.K. researchers took brain scans of people about 40 years old to measure the impact of weight on brain structure and the amount of white matter. Of the 473 men and women evaluated, 246 were healthy weight, 150 overweight, and 77 obese. The men and women took a standard test similar to an IQ test to measure their thinking skills.
英國的研究者對年約40的人進行大腦掃描， 以此來衡量體重對大腦結構和白質數量的影響。 473名男女接受的評測， 其中246人有健康體重， 150人超重， 77人肥胖。 這些男女接受了類似於智商測試的標準測試， 來評估他們的思維能力。
Researchers do not understand exactly how extra weight may affect the brain’s white matter or what having less of it in middle age may mean, Ronan says.
Ronan：研究者還不完全清楚超重何以會影響大腦白質，
Some experts believe that white matter cells may become more sensitive to inflammation in middle age. "One possibility, and the researchers talk about that [in the report], is that when you are obese your fat cells are producing more inflammatory agents and your white matter is more sensitive to it," Henne says. "That is a leading theory in the field."
某些專家認為， 白質細胞可能在中年時對炎症更敏感。 Henne說：“研究者在該[報告中]談到， 有一種可能是， 肥胖時， 脂肪細胞產生更多的炎症因數， 白質對它們更敏感。 這是該領域中領先的理論。 ”
Ronan says a limitation of the study is that she evaluated people at only one point in time.
Ronan說：該研究的局限性是， 她只在一個時間點上對人做出評估。
While the new study did not link being overweight with an earlier onset of thinking problems and dementia, it brings much needed research attention to an area often neglected by researchers, Henne says.
Henne：儘管該新研究沒有將超重跟較早出現思維問題與癡呆聯繫起來， 但它為一個常遭研究者忽視的領域帶來了急缺的研究關注。
The study’s researchers said more researchers will need to study the brains of people over longer periods of time to help them better understand how weight impacts brain health. But the study supports the idea that too much weight “confers a significant risk” to thinking skills.
該研究的研究者說， 需要更多研究者來長期研究人們的大腦， 以幫助他們更好地理解體重如何影響大腦健康。 但該研究支持如下想法：體重太高對思維能力“造成嚴重風險”。