Treadmill exercise alleviates impairment of cognitive function by enhancing hippocampal neuroplasticity in the high-fat diet-induced obese mice

Physical exercise is one of the most effective methods for managing obesity, and exercise exerts positive effects on various brain functions. Excessive weight gain is known to be related to the impairment of cog-nitive function. High-fat diet-induced obesity impairs hippocampal neu-roplasticity, which impedes cognitive function, such as learning ability and memory function. In this study, we investigated the effect of tread-mill exercise on impairment of cognitive function in relation with hippo-campal neuroplasticity using high-fat diet-induced obese mice. After obesity was induced by a 20-week high-fat (60%) diet, treadmill exer-cise was performed for 12 weeks. In the present results, cognitive func-tion was impaired in the high-fat diet-induced obese mice. Brain-de-rived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and tyrosin kinase B (TrkB) expression and cell proliferation were decreased in the high-fat diet-induced obese mice. Treadmill exercise improved cognitive function through enhanc-ing neuroplasticity, including increased expression of BDNF and TrkB and enhanced cell proliferation. The present results suggest that tread-mill exercise enhances hippocampal neuroplasticity, and then potential-ly plays a protective role against obesity-induced cognitive impairment.