New research has come out showing in quite amazing detail how regular exercise causes changes at the molecular level in brain tissue, and how these changes can help your ability to cope with stressful situations. In the study mice that were given a treadmill to run on for 6 weeks showed significant changes in brain tissue compared to a group of mice who just sat re-watching Season 3 of Game of Thrones (my God, how good was it!).

A couple of quotes form the study:

“Running produced a large increase in the number of new neurons in the hippocampus — a brain region shown to regulate anxiety — of the mice with the treadmills. ”

When exposed to a stressor, “the brains of active and sedentary mice behaved differently almost as soon as the stressor occurred, an analysis showed. The lack of these genes in the neurons of active mice suggested that their brain cells did not immediately leap into an excited state in response to the stressor.”

Just 6 weeks of regular exercise was all it took to make some pretty huge changes…