How many people here are 40 years old or older? You&#39re afraid to admit it now.在座的有多少人已经四十多岁了？你不想承认了吗？This initial step into the disease, this presence of amyloid plaques accumulating, can already be found in your brains.老年痴呆症的起步，淀粉样斑块的累积，也许已经在你的大脑初步产生。The only way we could be sure of this would b

What about sleep? In slow-wave deep sleep, our glial cells rinse cerebral spinal fluid throughout our brains,关于睡眠呢？在慢波深度睡眠时，我们的神经胶质细胞冲洗着我们大脑中的脑脊液，clearing away metabolic waste that accumulated in our synapses while we were awake.清除掉当我们清醒时积累在突触的代谢废物。Deep sleep is like a power cleanse for the brain.深度

How can this be? We think it&#39s because these nuns had a high level of cognitive reserve,这是怎么回事呢？我们认为这是因为这些修女拥有高级的认知储备，which is a way of saying that they had more functional synapses.意味着她们有功能更强的突触。People who have more years of formal education, who have a high degree of literacy,接受正式教育的时间越长的人，拥有较强

Let&#39s begin by looking at what we currently understand about the neuroscience of Alzheimer&#39s.让我们先看看目前神经学上对老年痴呆的了解。Here&#39s a picture of two neurons connecting.这是一张两个神经元连接的图。The point of connection, this space circled in red, is called the synapse.连接的部位，也就是红色圈出的这块，叫做突触。The synapse is where neu

So what happens when amyloid plaques accumulate to this tipping point?所以当淀粉样斑块积累到临界点后会发生什么？Our microglia janitor cells become hyper-activated, releasing chemicals that cause inflammation and cellular damage.我们的小神经胶质细胞变得过度活跃，释放出导致炎症和细胞损伤的化学物质。We think they might actually start clearing away the synap

Even before scientists sort this out, this information is actually really good news for us,即使科学家还尚未解决问题，这一好消息确实振奋人心，because it turns out that the way we live can influence the accumulation of amyloid plaques.因为这证明了我们的生活方式可以影响淀粉样斑块的积累。And so there are things we can do to keep us from reaching that ti

How many people here would like to live to be at least 80 years old? Yeah.在座有多少人希望能活到八十岁以上？好。I think we all have this hopeful expectation of living into old age.我想我们每个人都渴望能够长寿。Let&#39s project out into the future, to your future &quotyou&#39s,&quot and let&#39s imagine that we&#39re all 85.让我们穿越到未来，

Let&#39s imagine that your amyloid plaques have reached that tipping point.假设你的淀粉样斑块已经达到临界点。Your scale arm has crashed to the floor.你天平的一端已坠地。You&#39ve tripped the cascade, setting fire to the forest, causing inflammation, tangles, and cell death.你触发了连锁反应，引发了森林火灾，导致了炎症、神经纤维缠结以及细胞凋亡。You should be sym

Ted英语演讲：挑战病魔：阿兰娜 莎客:我如何准备老年痴呆的到来