But WHY Do I Run?

By Meghan Pearson

But WHY Do I Run?


(As you can see, I always take it seriously…)

Running has always been a part of my life. I began by running around with my neighbors, then played soccer, then ran cross-country, and now, since I am a glutton for punishment, I run marathons. And before you ask, yes, I actually enjoy doing it. Luckily for me, recent science shows I am actually doing interesting things to my brain while I am running.

For the next month, Inner City Science and Faces of STEM will be reporting about exercise and science and the science of exercise. We are going to look at it from a lot of different perspectives, so stay tuned!


Exercise has long been known to have important health effects. We have all been told that it is an important part of life if we want to live long and prosper (ha!), but the why is a little harder to put into words. I am going to start with some basic studies that looked at what effect exercise had on the aging mind.

As we age, our bodies start to fail on us. It’s a slow process, but we have all probably seen or felt it. Maybe the metabolism slows, maybe the brain can’t remember things, or maybe there is the sudden urge to yell at kids to get off the lawn. The last one is a silly example, but you get the idea. Aging stinks. But research is actually starting to pour in that by exercising, we can slow (and sometimes reverse) some of the effects on aging.

Methods and Materials:

As stated above, there is much research in this topic; however, it should be noted as human testing is still very frowned on, most of these studies are done on mice and rats. Why is this still relative? Well, it turns out we are pretty similar to rats and mice (evolution is cool!)

Many scientists are interested in how to best preserve their brain power. In one such study, they began by comparing the learning abilities and new nerve cell growth of mice from four different groups: sedentary young mice, sedentary old mice, exercising young mice, and exercising old mice. They provided the third and fourth groups (the exercisers) with a wheel and monitored their use.


This is where it gets cool. They then compared how the mice performed on different a specific maze learning test, and it turns out, the mice that exercised did better! But it gets even better. While there was a difference in the performance between the young and old mice, the old mice performed outperformed their sedentary old mice peers, and in some regards, performed similarly to the young mice of the sedentary group. The mice were able to learn more effectively when they exercised. In fact, when the researchers looked at the brains of the mice, they found that the old mice that exercised had increased their neurogenesis. This is the scientific word for they were once again creating new dendrites: nerve cells! The old mice were not able to make as many new cells as their young peers, but the old mice that exercised showed more new growth than the sedentary old mice. They were reversing some of the effects of aging. It should also be noted that the old mice were all kept sedentary until they were 19 months old (remember, the life span of mice is only about two years…). These researchers believe that beginning to exercise sooner may have lessened the effects of aging even more.


So what does this mean for us? Well, it is pretty good motivation to get out the door and go exercise, but it also means that there are some pretty good indicators that exercising could help us feel young for longer. Human application of these studies is never perfect, but it is usually close. The sooner a person starts exercising, the sooner they can begin to have these benefits. So go outside, go to the park, chase your kids around. Give your brain a few extra dendrites so you can feel better for longer!

If you would like to read one of the papers about this topic, I encourage you to read Exercise Enhances Learning and Hippocampal Neurogensis in Aged Mice by Henriette van Praag et al.


A Lifetime of Curiosity

by Robert (Bud) Talbot, PhD

Dr. Talbot’s STEM of choice is Science with a focus on physics education. He now works for The University of Colorado Denver, as an assistant professor of science education in the School of Education and Human Development. Dr. Talbot helps to recruit and train new secondary school science teachers, and does research on teaching and learning science at the university level. In his spare time, outside of work, Dr. Talbot loves to run, work with technology (especially amateur radio!), engage in citizen science projects, and do sciency things with his 6 year old twin daughters. If there was one thing he wished he had known before college about STEM, it would be “how being scientifically literate shapes the way you do anything and everything in the world!”

He studied for many years to get where he is, first at Indiana University for degrees in Geology and science education (BS and MS), then at the University of Colorado Boulder for a PhD in science education, researching how to develop tests and surveys to be used in science teaching and learning.


My bio is above, but that is not who I am. Here’s the truth about me: I’m a geek and I’ve always been a geek. I love geeky things like technology, computing, and amateur radio. But I also love to be active. I’m totally obsessed with running and I love to dig deep into all of the data related to my running: GPS tracks, heart rate, power output, pace- lots of numbers! All of this geekery was instilled in me early on. I was lucky enough to grow up in a family where we spent a lot of time outdoors, camping, hiking, taking crazy roadtrips. Did I mention maps? I LOVE maps. They are everywhere in my house. Anyway, back to my childhood. My mom told me that I once went to the public library at the age of 6 and asked for a book on “splitting atoms.” Of course I don’t recall that, but I bet it was a cool book. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was well on my way to being a science teacher.

Materials and Methods

Degrees can only tell you so much about a person’s STEM career, here’s my actual journey: I thought I wanted to be an accountant when I started college. My brother in law was an accountant and I really looked up to him. But the classes turned out to be really boring! Then I discovered Geology. What fun! Maps, rocks, lots of camping and hiking. That was the best. So now I was on my way to being a geologist. Well, I ended up taking a few years off from school before finishing (long story…) during which time I realized that my true passion was trying to help others see how cool science was. I was always asking questions and getting others to geek out with me. So it seemed natural that I should be a teacher!

I went back to school and became a high school physics and Earth science teacher. It was a great experience, and I was fortunate enough to learn a lot and build lasting relationships with many of my students. I know that my work made a difference. After seven years of teaching, I yearned for more learning and to work with teachers, so I went to graduate school in Boulder. It was there that I learned about research on teaching and learning, which prepared me for the job I now have as a professor.


Right now, I am focusing on undergraduate science education at my job as an assistant professor. We help other professors to think about better ways to teach biology, chemistry, and physics at the university, and investigate the impacts of innovative teaching on how students learn. Our main focus is to help students in these courses succeed and become prepared to pursue their future goals. Our work is making a difference!


I love science education, and especially physics, and here’s why: it really helps me to see how important it is to have a scientific worldview. I can apply scientific reasoning to any aspect of my life. Not only is that fun, it is useful. Many of the skills and dispositions that we use as scientists (like curiosity, research methods, and writing ability) are useful in all aspects of life. And my interest in physics and Earth sciences lets me do lots of fun things in my spare time, like amateur radio (my callsign is W0RMT), and participating in citizen science projects (check out CoCoRaHS, mPING, CWOP, SETI@home, and LHC@home).

Science is everywhere, and it’s fun and useful. It leads to a lifetime of curiosity!