Superagers’ Brains Have One Special Ability, Study Finds

For this study, researchers focused on neurogenesis which, according to Orly Lazarov, PhD, professor and director of the Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Dementia Training Program at the University of Illinois Chicago and lead author of this study, is the formation of new neurons from neural stem cells.

“Understanding this process helps us elucidate brain function and develop therapeutic strategies that support cognition and prevent dementia,” Lazarov told Medical News Today. “This is a unique phenomena in the brain that allows important flexibility needed in learning and memory in particular.”

During this study, Lazarov and her team analyzed brain samples from five different groups:

1. healthy young adults
2. healthy older adults
3. adults with a mild or early dementia diagnosis
4. adults with an Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis
5. SuperAgers.

At the study’s conclusion, scientists found first, that hippocampal neurogenesis — the creation of new neurons in the hippocampus of the brain — happens in healthy human adults.

Second, researchers discovered that SuperAgers tended to make more new neurons when compared to other adult groups.

“[This finding] may suggest that one of the ways (SuperAgers’) brains function so well and exhibit strong cognition is due to the availability of more neurogenesis,” Lazarov explained.

“I should point out that it wasn’t just the number, it was mainly the unique molecular profile of these cells that suggested that the SuperAgers’ brain has ‘resilience’ molecular signals that support neurogenesis,” she continued.

“If we are able to functionally validate the role of the molecular networks we observed in the different cohorts and particularly in the SuperAgers, we would attempt to develop a therapeutic approach for the enhancement of neurogenesis and the support of cognitive function,” she added.

MNT had the opportunity to speak with Megan Glenn, PsyD, clinical neuropsychologist in the Center for Memory and Healthy Aging at the Hackensack Meridian Neuroscience Institute at Jersey Shore University Medical Center in New Jersey, about this study, who commented her first reaction to its findings was excitement.

“For a long time, the adult brain was seen as relatively fixed,” Glenn explained.

“This study is a breath of fresh air, providing strong biological evidence for what we hope to be true: that the brain has a capacity for renewal. The discovery of a unique ‘resilience signature’ in the brains of SuperAgers is incredibly hopeful. It suggests there are natural, protective mechanisms that we can learn from and potentially harness to help our patients maintain their cognitive health.”

– Megan Glenn, PsyD

She also said that this research is critical because it helps validate the lifestyle-based advice doctors give their patients every day.

“For years, we have recommended activities like exercise and lifelong learning to support brain health,” Glenn detailed.

“This study provides a potential biological explanation for why those things work. It suggests these activities aren’t just keeping the brain ‘busy,’ but may be directly influencing the biological machinery that promotes the growth of new neurons and builds resilience against decline. It shifts the focus from what is lost during aging to what can be preserved and even strengthened,” she explained.

MNT also spoke with Dung Trinh, MD, internist at the MemorialCare Medical Group and chief medical officer of Healthy Brain Clinic in Irvine, CA, about this research, who said his first reaction was that this is one of the more compelling human datasets tying “brain resilience” to the hippocampus’s ability to maintain a growth-and-repair program with age — and it does that using modern tools that reduce some of the confusion that’s fueled the neurogenesis debate.

“At the same time, I’d emphasize one important caveat for the public: this is post-mortem, cross-sectional biology,” Trinh continued. “It’s powerful for identifying signatures of resilience and disease, but it doesn’t prove that increasing neurogenesis alone will prevent Alzheimer’s.”

Trinh said it’s important for researchers to examine how neurons may grow as we age because the hippocampus is central to forming and retrieving memories, and it’s also one of the brain regions most vulnerable in aging and Alzheimer’s.

“If we understand how the brain maintains — or loses — its ‘renewal capacity,’ we can identify early biological shifts that happen before symptoms [and] separate pathology from resilience — why some people stay sharp despite age-related changes,” he told us. “This matters clinically because prevention and early intervention are where we have the best chance to bend the curve.”

We asked Glenn and Trinh for their top tips on how readers can try to naturally encourage neurogenesis in their brains, including:

• Consistent aerobic exercise: “Activities like brisk walking, swimming, or cycling are known to boost factors that act like fertilizer for brain cells,” Glenn said.
• Follow a brain-healthy diet: “A diet rich in antioxidants and anti-inflammatory compounds, like the Mediterranean diet, helps create a healthier environment for your brain cells to thrive,” Glenn suggested.
• Keep Learning and Stay Socially Engaged: “Novel learning and rich environments are strongly linked to plasticity; in real life, that means new skills, languages, music, volunteering, clubs — anything that forces the brain to adapt,” Trinh said.
• Protect your sleep: “Chronic sleep deprivation is associated with reductions in hippocampal plasticity and neurogenesis in animal and mechanistic literature — sleep is when a lot of the brain’s repair and memory consolidation happens,” Trinh explained.

“We can’t prescribe ‘more neurogenesis’ directly, but the habits that support hippocampal health, plasticity, and growth-factor signaling line up with what we recommend for healthy aging anyway,” he concluded.