How to Feel Young

At least if You're a Mouse...Gobble Prozac and Skip the Cookies.

Prozac Extinguishes Anxiety by Rejuvenating the Brain

Once adult lab mice learn to associate a particular stimulus—a sound, a flash of light—with the pain of an electric shock, they don't easily forget it, even when researchers stop the shocks. But a new study in the December 23 issue of Science shows that the antidepressant Prozac (fluoxetine) gives mice the youthful brain plasticity they need to learn that a once-threatening stimulus is now benign. The research may help explain why a combination of therapy and antidepressants is more effective at treating depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) than either drugs or therapy alone. Antidepressants may prime the adult brain to rewire faulty circuits during therapy...

In Castrén's study, adult mice that took fluoxetine while they went through extinction training behaved much like young mice—they lost their fear much faster than mice that were not taking the drug, and their anxiety did not return. In contrast, mice that were given fluoxetine but never went through extinction training remained anxious.

 Eating less keeps the brain young

Overeating may cause brain aging while eating less turns on a molecule that helps the brain stay young.

A team of Italian researchers at the Catholic University of Sacred Heart in Rome have discovered that this molecule, called CREB1, is triggered by "caloric restriction" (low caloric diet) in the brain of mice. They found that CREB1 activates many genes linked to longevity and to the proper functioning of the brain.

So, since I don't actually want to have to starve to live forever, how 'bout you drug companies find a way to stimulate CREB1 production?