Exercise is healthy. It’s good for your muscles, heart and mind. Researchers in the U. Kansas Alzheimer and Memory Program suggest that being physically fit could also hold back the advancement of Alzheimer’s disease.

According to the Alzheimer’s Association, Alzheimer’s disease destroys brain cells, causing memory loss and problems with thinking and behavior. The disease gets worse over time, and it is fatal.

Program research assistant Robyn Honea of the U. Kansas Medical Center of Kansas City, Kan., said when someone develops Alzheimer’s disease, their brain shrinks in key areas, like the hippocampus, which is responsible for learning and short-term memory in the brain. A 2008 study by the Alzheimer Memory Program looked at individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and their brain mass. Those who had higher cardiorespiratory fitness, which means that their bodies were more efficient at transporting oxygen to their muscles during prolonged exercise, show less shrinkage on the brain scan than those who had lower cardiorespiratory fitness.

Now researchers are eager to begin two six-month studies; one of people 65 and older with no memory loss, and another with people 55 and older with Alzheimer’s disease. The patients will undergo brain scans after exercising. This study will expand on the earlier research to see how exactly exercise affects the brain, and how it modifies the disease process. Jeff Burns, the director of the Alzheimer and Memory Program, said it would take nearly two years to sign up all the needed participants.

“Exercise may be a treatment, or it may just slow the process,” Burns said. “There is certainly a connection between lifestyle factors and the brain.”

Alzheimer’s drugs just treat the symptoms of the disease, Burns said, but exercise actually affects the disease’s rate of progression.

KU researchers have already tested animals to see the effects of exercising on the brain. As with the 2008 study, they found that animals with Alzheimer’s disease and high levels of fitness had less shrinkage in the brain. Honea said exercise, particularly running and walking, causes new cell growth and new connections in the brain. Honea said the hippocampus is one of the only parts of the brain that can undergo new growth.

Leah Levy, a senior from Chicago, watched a close family friend’s grandmother suffer from Alzheimer’s disease. She watched the family mourn for their grandmother because when they went to see her, she didn’t know who they were.

“It’s like losing someone before they’re gone,” Levy said.

The study could have huge implications for the fastest growing age group in America, and for the families around them. According to the Alzheimer’s Association, one in 10 people over the age of 65 are affected by Alzheimer’s disease and nearly half of people over the age of 85 have Alzheimer’s disease. It is the seventh leading cause of death in the United States.

“What we’re doing is feasible and it’s exciting,” Honea said.