2023-07-15 12:38:16
Vigorous exercise helps keep Parkinson’s at bay, slowing its course. This is the discovery of the neuroscientists of the Catholic University, Rome campus, and of the Agostino Gemelli Irccs University Hospital Foundation, who have also understood the biological mechanisms underlying the beneficial effect of sport. The research results, published in ‘Science Advances’, could pave the way for new non-pharmacological approaches against this neurological pathology. In addition to Cattolica and Gemelli, various research institutes participated: San Raffaele Telematic University of Rome, Cnr, Tigem, University of Milan, Irccs San Raffaele Rome.
The research – thanks to funding from the Fresco Parkinson Institute to New York University School of Medicine and The Marlene and Paolo Fresco Institute for Parkinson’s and Movement Disorders, the Ministry of Health and Miur – has identified a new mechanism responsible for the positive effects of exercise physicist on brain plasticity. “The novelty of our study – underlines Paolo Calabresi, corresponding author of the study, professor of Neurology at the Catholic University and director of the UOC Neurology at Gemelli – lies in having discovered a mechanism never observed before, through which physical exercise carried out in early stages of the disease induces beneficial effects on voluntary movement control, which may persist over time even after training is stopped”.
“The discovery suggests that intensive physical activity carried out on a regular basis is able to induce functional and structural changes in neurons – he explains – and allows to counteract the effects of events that cause neuronal toxicity. This new identified mechanism can allow to identify new therapeutic targets and functional markers, to be taken into consideration to develop non-pharmacological treatments to be adopted in combination with pharmacological therapies currently in use”.
The study, whose main authors were the researchers from the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery of the Cattolica Gioia Marino and Federica Campanelli – used various techniques to measure a neuroprotective effect of physical exercise on motor behavior and visuo-spatial cognition. The main effect, observed in response to daily treadmill training for four weeks, was a reduction in the spread of pathological alpha-synuclein aggregates, which in Parkinson’s disease leads to the gradual and progressive degeneration of nerve cells in certain areas brain (the substantia nigra pars compacta and the striatum – the so-called nigrostriatal pathway), responsible for movement control.
The neuroprotective effect of motor activity is associated with the survival of the neurons – emerges from the study – which release the neurotransmitter dopamine and with the ability of the neurons of the striatum to continue performing their function, aspects otherwise compromised by the disease. Motor control and visuo-spatial learning, functions dependent on nigrostriatal activity, are also intact in animals subjected to intense training. Neuroscientists have also discovered that BDNF (brain neurotrophic factor), which increases with exercise, interacts with the glutamate receptor Nmda, allowing neurons in the striatum to respond effectively to stimuli, with long-lasting effects. even beyond the interruption of exercise.
“Our research group – says Calabresi – is involved in a clinical study to verify whether physical exercise can slow the progression of Parkinson’s disease in early stage patients and to identify new markers capable of following the course of the disease. Considered that Parkinson’s disease is characterized by an important neuroinflammatory and neuroimmune component, which plays a key role in the early stages of the disease, the research will continue thanks to the decisive contribution of animal models, which will also allow us to investigate the involvement of gli cells , cell populations that support the activity of neurons, as well as being implicated in the immune response. This will allow us to identify the molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying the observed beneficial effects.”
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