This Is Your Brain on Climate Change
Extreme heat caused by climate change can exacerbate a variety of neurological ailments, from Alzheimer’s disease to migraines to epilepsy, new research shows
CLIMATEWIRE | A broad range of brain conditions, from migraines to strokes, are made worse by extreme heat, new research shows.
The most direct impact of high temperatures is that they can mess with the brain’s wiring. But extreme heat creates a variety of other problems, too, for those diagnosed with epilepsy, schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other diseases, according to a May study from 24 researchers published in The Lancet Neurology journal.
The human brain does best when outside temperatures are between 68 to 79 degrees Fahrenheit, said Sanjay Sisodiya, the lead author of the study and a neurologist at University College London. It’s where “we feel thermally comfortable without having to do additional things.”
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But if the “temperature’s taken out of that range,” he added, then the way the body’s components interact “can be disrupted.”
A scientist not affiliated with The Lancet Neurology study made a similar observation.
While the brain’s temperature “is really well regulated,” excessive outside temperatures distort some of the brain’s support network — especially for those of advanced age, said George Perry, a biology professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio.
“At high temperatures you have less oxygen being transported and [altering] metabolic processes to end up stressing a lot of different systems that keep the brain functioning normally,” he said.
Perry was one of the first scientists to speculate about the…
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