Live in a big city?

Your brain wants to know how long you can hold your breath

In a ten-year-long study, involving more than 1300 patients, doctors documented the havoc that air pollution wreaks on the brain. Their 2020 report suggests that particulate matter in the air is especially hard on the hippocampus (the brain area responsible for memory function). The doctors reported significantly more deterioration of the hippocampi of people with long term exposure to air pollution. Also, the white matter of their brains was more likely to atrophy (waste away). One bright spot in the study was that participants whose diet was high in omega-3 rich fish, such as Mackerel or Salmon, avoided much of the pollution related brain damage.

In another 2020 study performed at Emory and Harvard, scientists reported a strong association between pollution and Parkinson’s disease. The researchers studied more than 63 million Americans (all 65 years or older) over the course of sixteen years. The doctors measured the amount of fine particulate matter in the air that the volunteers breathed and recorded how many of the cohort were diagnosed with either Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s disease. The doctors discovered that the amount of air pollution was directly correlated with the number of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s patients.

Environmental toxins have been strongly associated with brain damage in the Inuit people from Nunavik (Northern Quebec, Canada). A team of American and Canadian scientists, in their 2021 publication, reported that the Inuit tribe lived in a pristine environment for generations. Unfortunately, some of these people were exposed to a high level of mercury, lead and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). The researchers reported that these native peoples suffered psychological abnormalities far in excess of those whose environment was not contaminated. Functional MRI scans of the affected Inuit revealed abnormalities in the cingulate gyrus (part of the brain that serves as a bridge between the limbic system and neocortex, with roles in emotion, reward and decision making) and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (an area of the brain responsible for decision making and attentional control, which encompasses processes such as task shifting, divided attention capability, preparation for action).

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