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November 3, 2022Source: Público.es, LAURA G. DE RIVERA @LAURAGDERIVERA
Meditating increases connections between neurons and, above all, between different regions of the brain. It develops the default neural network, the one that allows us to take refuge from stress and be creative. Additionally, several studies suggest that it extends life.
The brain is not a static organ like Hamlet's skull. Rather, it bustles with activity and change 24 hours a day. That is precisely what its plasticity consists of, or the ability of neurons to rewire themselves and create new connections.
«They are constantly connecting with each other. They do this by creating extensions, which are called axons, to link together. When they find another neuron, they make a temporary connection and test its usefulness. If it is useful, it will be maintained over time," explains David Bueno, neurobiologist and geneticist at the University of Barcelona.
The key to a healthy and vibrant brain is in this plasticity, which is the enemy of stress and, curiously, is not enhanced by doing, but quite the opposite. «When we are absorbed or in conscious rest, that is when there are more active neurons, because the brain is not forced to do anything specific and takes the opportunity to regenerate, recycle and consolidate what we have learned. That's why we have great ideas, sometimes, when we're not doing anything, when we're resting," says Bueno.
The cerebral cortex grows
In this sense, meditation, with all its techniques and modalities, has proven to be a useful tool to achieve that haven of calm in which our neurons can take a break to organize themselves. So much so that, in the last two decades, several scientific studies have focused on understanding the mechanisms by which it acts and what physical effects it produces in the brain.
We know, for example, that the thickness of the cerebral cortex increases in the area of the default neural network, as noted in a recent study published in Scientific Reports, carried out with 14 university students, who trained in mindfulness techniques for 40 years. days.
Along the same lines, another investigation concluded last year that, after a couple of months of practicing meditation for ten minutes, five times a week, the brain patterns of the participants changed for the better. Specifically, it enhanced the connectivity between the two states of consciousness of the brain: the default neural network – active when we are not doing anything special or focused on the outside world – and the dorsal attention network – active when we have our attention focused. Around us-.
“Students found it easier to go from one state to another, from daydreaming to concentrating on something. It also improved their ability to maintain attention when they wanted to,” the authors point out.
Antidote to extend life
We also know that meditating decreases the secretion of cortisol, a stress hormone involved in inflammatory responses and, when chronic, responsible for worse performance in the executive functions of the brain. It is one of the conclusions of another work, this time from the Max Planck Institute for Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig (Germany), which found that, after meditating for three months, 30 minutes, six days a week, the levels of participants' cortisol dropped by 51%.
More impressive, perhaps, is that it lengthens our telomeres, those ends of the chromosomes, whose length is related to the time and quality we have left of life.
The first to study it was Elizabeth Blackburn, a biochemist who won the Nobel Prize in 2009 for her studies on telomerase, the enzyme that forms telomeres and has the ability to reverse telomere shortening.
After discovering that chronic stress could decrease the production of this enzyme – and, therefore, shorten our telomeres and, with them, our life – Blackburn set out to analyze if there was any way to reverse these effects. And he found meditation. In one of his pioneering experiments, participants' telomerase levels had increased by 30% after taking a three-month Buddhist retreat.
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Other research has focused on analyzing how these structural changes in our thinking machine help treat diseases such as depression, anxiety, irritable bowel syndrome, fibromyalgia, psoriasis or post-traumatic stress syndrome.
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