WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Earlier this year, research conducted by Oxford University scholars found that sugar-rich diet could potentially lead to cognitive decline.
The study involved 40,000 people, whose brain scans were analyzed to find out what aggravates dementia.
'What makes this study special is that we examined the unique contribution of each modifiable risk factor by looking at all of them together to assess the resulting degeneration of this particular brain 'weak spot',' co-author Professor Anderson Winkler, at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, said earlier, as per the Mirror.
'It is with this kind of comprehensive, holistic approach - and once we had taken into account the effects of age and sex - that three emerged as the most harmful: diabetes, air pollution, and alcohol.'
Diabetes turned out to be one of the most dangerous factors that contribute to cognitive decline. Other factors include sleep deprivation and environmental pollution.
Professor Gwenaelle Douaud, who led the research, said, 'We know that a constellation of brain regions degenerates earlier in aging, and in this new study we have shown that these specific parts of the brain are most vulnerable to diabetes, traffic-related air pollution - increasingly a major player in dementia - and alcohol, of all the common risk factors for dementia.'
Douaud continued, 'We have found that several variations in the genome influence this brain network, and they are implicated in cardiovascular deaths, schizophrenia, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, as well as with the two antigens of a little-known blood group, the elusive XG antigen system, which was an entirely new and unexpected finding.'
However, the researchers assured that all these factors leading to dementia are modifiable, hinting that appropriate and timely lifestyle changes could save the person from experiencing cognitive decline.
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