The Curious Case of Art Kramer – Professor Dicusses Age and Memory at Elon University

by Kevin Clang

George Bernard Shaw once said that youth is wasted on the young.  According to Art Kramer, that might not be the only thing.  The professor of psychology at the University of Illinois believes that memory may also be something that the young may not be taking advantage of.

Art Kramer comes to Elon University

Kramer stopped by Elon University for the Science Department’s “Voices in Discovery” lecture series to give a talk titled “The Aging Mind and Brain: Use It or Lose It.”  The lecture, which was originally scheduled to be held at McCrary Theater, took place Monday night in Moseley Center room 215.

The Efforts of the Young

Despite the falling snow, which caused the cancellation of all the day’s classes, hundreds of students and faculty squeezed into the meeting room for Kramer’s talk.  Once chairs in the room ran out, students lined the walls and even sat on the floor to hear the lecture.

“Many changes, some not positive, happen (to the brain) through aging,” said Kramer, who throughout the night compared scans of the brains from seventy-year olds to those from eighteen-year olds.  “You guys are at the peak of your fluid intelligence,” Kramer explained, referring to the many students.

“Fluid intelligence” refers to how quickly a person can learn new information or how to perform a new task, and it reaches it’s peak sometime during college.  Conversely when one gets older, their “crystallized knowledge,” anything they would use everyday in a job or hobby, becomes more concrete.

Improving Your Memory

Kramer addressed the effectiveness of new video games such as Ninendo’s “Brain Age,” which claimes to increase one’s memory.  Do they actually work?  Kramer says no.  For this million dollar industry, Kramer says that “there is little science to back up these claims.”

One thing that does work, however, is education.  “Educating yourself is the most important thing you can do to help prevent a brain disease,” stressed Kramer.  He explained how in an enriched environment, the brain can learn tasks more quickly.  Good nutrition, social interaction, and other positive lifestyle choices also help.

With education, “the brain can maintain cognition at high levels of pathology and function well with diseases.”  Diseases such as Alzheimer’sand other forms of dementia ravage the minds of those who don’t take care of their brains.

Old Dogs, New Tricks

Kramer says that statistically there is a high risk for age-associated brain diseases for those with no education and bad nutrition.  Kramer stated that 50 percent of people over 85 who do not read have Altzheimer’s disease.  That number is reduced by 44 percent when reading is factored in.

Even though “Brain Age” showed little improvement, strategy based video games such as “Rise of Nations” or “SimCity” may help one retain memory.  Kramer says that some patients over 70 showed “some improvement” after playing the games for sixteen hours over the course of a month.  “It is very promising data, but very early data,” stressed Kramer.

Games such as these are famous for their micromanaging systems.  Kramer used this example as proof that “you can teach old people new things,” and added that some patients “got quite good” and even enjoyed playing the games.

Scientists use MRI machines to test the effectiveness of these and many other strategies to change brain structure and increase memory.  With each experiment, they employ a “control” group who is not administered the variable as well as a group that is.

Nancy Knowlton Discusses Coral Reefs and Climate Change at Elon University

by Kevin Clang

It is no secret that climate change is affecting every part of the world, from the North Pole to the Amazon Rainforest.  According to Nancy Knowlton, one of the species it has had a large effect on is right under our noses. Underwater, actually.  Though they are often ignored by humans, Knowlton thinks that coral reefs can actually serve as warning signs for climate change danger in the future.

Nancy Knowlton Speaks to Students

Knowlton, a renowned expert on coral reefs and the Sant Chair for Marine Sciences at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, visited Elon University on Wednesday, February 18, as part of the Voices of Discovery lecture series to speak to students and faculty about the impact of climate change on the planet’s reef systems.

“Coral reefs in the Caribbean have experienced an 80% decline in the past 30 years,” said Knowlton.  The main reasons for this degradation include disease, bleaching, and predators.  Most of these can be linked back to humans.  “Humans put carbon dioxide, nutrients, toxics, sediments, and aliens into the water, and take out any coral longer or taller than five centimeters.”

None of this was a worry when Knowlton began researching reefs in 1975.  In just a few years, habitats went from coral domination to being dominated by seaweed.  Thanks to the extra carbon dioxide in the water introduced by humans, temperature went up by one degree Celsius.  Because of this sea urchins, which act as “lawnmowers,” removing seaweed and other unwanted predators off of coral, began to die off.

Should this trend continue, the temperature of the ocean could rise by as much as six degrees Celsius by 2100, a fact that would be devastating to coral reefs.  Carbon dioxide makes water more acidic, and worst of all it is very persistent.  Once introduced, carbon dioxide can remain in the atmosphere for hundreds of years.

Knowlton views this issue as a global problem.  “Reefs aren’t disposable,” she says, adding as an example that to an island such as Hawaii, coral reefs are worth $18 billion annually.  Knowlton went as far to say that coral reefs are the rain forests of the sea, in that they can be home to thousands of different species.  “Coral creates structure that everything else depends on.”

Unfortunately, we may have already caused too much damage to save them. Unless humans significantly change their approach to underwater species in the next few years, our effects may be irreversible, and more species of coral could become extinct. Knowlton lists long-term cryopreservation as a possible solution. “Awareness is not enough,” says Knowlton, “we need to act.”