{"id":235971,"date":"2026-04-27T06:08:56","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T11:08:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/04\/hydraulic-brain-body-motion-linked-to-fluid-movement-in-the-brain"},"modified":"2026-04-27T06:08:56","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T11:08:56","slug":"hydraulic-brain-body-motion-linked-to-fluid-movement-in-the-brain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/04\/hydraulic-brain-body-motion-linked-to-fluid-movement-in-the-brain","title":{"rendered":"Hydraulic brain: Body motion linked to fluid movement in the brain"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

The brain is more mechanically connected to the body than previously appreciated, scientists report in Nature Neuroscience<\/i><\/a>. Through a study using mice and simulations, the team found a potential biological mechanism underlying why exercise is thought to benefit brain health<\/a>: abdominal contractions compress blood vessels connected to the spinal cord and the brain, enabling the organ to gently move within the skull. This swaying facilitates the surrounding cerebrospinal fluid to flow over the brain, potentially washing away neural waste that could cause problems for brain function.<\/p>\n

According to Patrick Drew, professor of engineering science and mechanics, of neurosurgery, of biology and of biomedical engineering at Penn State, the work builds on previous studies detailing how sleep<\/a> and neuron loss<\/a> can influence how and when cerebrospinal fluid flushes through the brain.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur research explains how just moving around might serve as an important physiological mechanism promoting brain health,\u201d said Drew, corresponding author on the paper. \u201cIn this study, we found that when the abdominal muscles contract, they push blood from the abdomen into the spinal cord, just like in a hydraulic system, applying pressure to the brain and making it move.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The brain is more mechanically connected to the body than previously appreciated, scientists report in Nature Neuroscience. Through a study using mice and simulations, the team found a potential biological mechanism underlying why exercise is thought to benefit brain health: abdominal contractions compress blood vessels connected to the spinal cord and the brain, enabling the [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,38,1495,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-235971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-engineering","category-health","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235971\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}