如何清理你的大脑

Boosting the brain’s system for flushing out toxins could help protect your brain health – and possibly even prevent Alzheimer’s, discovers Michael Marshall WHEN you fall asleep, your brain doesn’t just switch off. As the cognitive lights go out, housekeeping begins. Along the outer walls of blood vessels, microscopic currents flow, sweeping away waste that would otherwise cause harm. This is the glymphatic system, a network of channels that helps the brain clear unwanted proteins and by-products of cellular metabolism. It may explain one of life’s most familiar pleasures: feeling refreshed after a good night’s sleep. Yet we only learned of its existence in 2012, and ever since, researchers have been scrambling to figure out exactly how it works. …