The cellular and molecular mechanism of an environmental therapy to prevent the cognitive decline in aging

The hippocampus-dependent cognitive decline in aged mice was improved by enriched environmental training. In the hippocampus of these trained-aged mice, there were significant changes in the expression level of about twenty kinds of protein including basic fibroblast growth factor(bFGF). When bFGF was continuously infused into the hippocampus of aged mice, the cognitive decline was suppressed. These results suggest that the activation of bFGF signal in the hippocampus via the enriched environmental training prevents the decline of learning and memory in normal aging.