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Health

We may finally know how cognitive reserve protects against Alzheimer's

Why does mental effort lead to a more resilient brain that can withstand dementia and decline? We are now discovering the mechanisms behind this cognitive reserve, opening up new ways to boost it

By Anthea Rowan

18 October 2023

91av. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Brett Ryder

IF I never thought about dementia before, I thought of little else after the condition manifested in my mother. The odd thing was that dementia – Alzheimer’s disease, in her case – didn’t occur to me until she asked, out of the blue, when we had first met.

My failure to recognise the extent of her cognitive decline was born partly of denial, but also because she was doubtless compensating for her galloping brain damage, taking cerebral detours around the potholes dug by her condition. After all, she had done this before. Following a stroke four years previously, she had lost the…

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