Acute Physical Exercise
Conditions
Keywords
fMRI, BDNF, endocannabinoid, physical exercise
Brief summary
An increasing amount of studies show the beneficial effect of regular exercise on cognitive and brain functions and especially in the memory domain. Yet little is known of what happens within an acute bout of exercise and whether it would also yield cognitive effects. The literature clearly shows that molecules such as brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and endocannabinoids (mainly anandamide, AEA) are heavily involved in neural plasticity mechanisms and increase when we exercise hinting at possible mechanisms underlying memory improvement after exercise. This protocol assesses the effects of acute exercise on associative and motor sequence memory, their underlying neural activations (measured using fMRI) and blood biomarkers (BDNF and AEA). A related aim is to assess the effect of exercise intensity, therefore three exercising conditions (rest, moderate intensity and high intensity) were included. Finally, a 3-month delayed retest visit is also realized to assess effects of acute exercise on long-term memory consolidation.
Interventions
OTHERmoderate intensity physical exercise
OTHERhigh intensity physical exercise
OTHERrest
Sponsors
University Hospital, Geneva
University of Geneva, Switzerland
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
CROSSOVER
Primary purpose
OTHER
Masking
NONE
Intervention model description
This is a within-subject study, all participants perform all conditions in cross-over randomized order.
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
MALE
Age
18 Years to 38 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
* Male * Right-handed, * Exercising regularly (at least twice per week). * VO2max comprised between 40ml/kg/min and 65ml/kg/min.
Exclusion criteria
\- Psychiatric and neurological history
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| cognitive measures - performance | Till the end of the study for each participant, i.e.3 months (long time retest) | we measure performance during cognitive tasks. Performance is measured as percentage of correct trials, with higher percentages corresponding to better performance - measured in percentages. |
| cognitive measures - reaction times | Till the end of the study for each participant, i.e.3 months (long time retest) | we measure reaction times during cognitive tasks. For reaction times, lower measures correspond to faster response times and therefore to better outcome - measured in milliseconds. |
| BDNF levels | up to 1 hour | we measure BDNF levels before and after physical exercise and rest, measured in ng/mL of serum. |
| endocannabinoid levels | up to 1 hour | we measure endocannabinoid levels before and after physical exercise and rest, measured in ng/mL of plasma. |
| brain activations | up to 1 hour | we measure brain activations using fMRI during cognitive tasks |
Outcome results
None listed