Remember this: Exercise helps brain

Exercise your body to keep your brain in shape.

Researchers have already determined that working out helps bolster the memory, and now they know why. Exercise apparently targets part of the brain where memory loss begins.

For the first time, Columbia University Medical Center researchers used MRI imaging technology to show the growth of neurons in the dentate gyrus, a region within the hippocampus, after working out.

This is the first human study to show the phenomenon. In the past, scientists have used mice to show that exercise improves the growth of neurons in the dentate gyrus.

The study appears in the early online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Parents' survival bodes well for your heart

Longevity is all in the family.

If Mom and Dad survive to 85 or beyond, their kids may have a lower risk for heart disease in middle age. Boston University School of Medicine researchers looked at 1,697 members of the Framingham Heart Study, a large, multigenerational study of risk factors for heart and other chronic diseases that began in 1948.

In the group of offspring, 11 percent had both parents survive to age 85 or older, 47 percent had one parent who lived to that age and 42 percent had two parents who died before age 85.

Researchers say the percentage of individuals with optimal or normal blood pressure and good cholesterol was highest in those with both parents surviving to 85 years or older. They also say the relationship between obesity and death was less clear, although fewer obese people had both parents survive.

The study appears in the March Archives of Internal Medicine.

Aerobic workouts fight inflammation

Need yet another reason to work out?

Columbia University Medical Center researchers have pinpointed the biology behind exercise's effect on heart disease. They took blood samples from 46 healthy young adults ages 20 to 45 before and after participating in moderate or high-intensity aerobic exercise over three months.

They then infected the blood with bacteria and found that the level of inflammatory response was much lower after aerobic training in both the moderate and high-intensity groups. Researchers say that less inflammation reduces the buildup of plaque in the arteries that causes heart disease.

The findings were presented at the American Psychosomatic Society's Annual Meeting in Budapest, Hungary.

Dangers of cigarettes greater for black kids

Race plays a role in the impact of cigarette smoke on kids.

Researchers at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center looked at 220 children with asthma, half of whom were black and all of whom were exposed to at least five cigarettes a day.

Blood and hair samples were screened three times over a year for levels of cotinine, a nicotine byproduct. Scientists say they were surprised to find that black children spent less time exposed to smoke but had a third more cotinine in their blood and four times more in their hair than white children.

The study appears in the March issue of CHEST, the peer-reviewed journal of the American College of Chest Physicians.

Mental health issues are huge for soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Researchers at the University of California and San Francisco VA Medical Center looked at data from 103,788 veterans seen from 2001 to 2005. About half were under 30, a

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