London, Feb 20: If you want a smarter brain and a shapelier profile, fasting on alternate days might not be such a bad idea after all.
 Fasting has been seen in mice experiments to help brain cells promote generation of new cells and make them more stress proof.
 In fact, it is the calorie restricted diet which improved the function of brain synapses in mice experiments. Synapses are the junctions between brain cells which promote generation of new cells and make them more stress proof.
 The calorie resdtricted diet, also tested on humans, appears to protect the heart, circulatory system and brain against age-related degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's.
 US National Institutes for Ageing (NIA) researchers said results on fasting were based on giving animals the bare minimum of calories required to keep them alive, the Daily Mail reports.
 "Dietery energy restriction extends lifespan and protects the brain and cardiovascular system against age-related disease," said Mark Mattson, who heads the NIA's neurosciences lab and is professor of neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore.
 Scientists found that depriving healthy cells of the food they need sends them into a survival mode, making them highly resistant to stress and damage caused from chemotherapy. IANS

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