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Let's imagine that your amyloid plaques have reached that tipping point.
假設你的淀粉樣斑塊已經達到臨界點。
Your scale arm has crashed to the floor.
你天平的一端已墜地。
You've tripped the cascade, setting fire to the forest, causing inflammation, tangles, and cell death.
你觸發了連鎖反應，引發了森林火災，導致了炎癥、神經纖維纏結以及細胞凋亡。
You should be symptomatic for Alzheimer's.
你表現出老年癡呆的癥狀。
You should be having trouble finding words and keys and remembering what I said at the beginning of this talk. But you might not be.
你在措辭和找鑰匙時會碰到麻煩，并且回想不起我一開始講的內容。也許你不會這樣。
There's one more thing you can do to protect yourself from experiencing the symptoms of Alzheimer's,
另外還有一件事可以幫助你免于老年癡呆的癥狀，
even if you have the full-blown disease pathology ablaze in your brain.
哪怕你的大腦已病入膏肓。
It has to do with neural plasticity and cognitive reserve.
它需解決神經可塑性和認知儲備問題。
Remember, the experience of having Alzheimer's is ultimately a result of losing synapses.
記住，老年癡呆癥的發作是突觸損失的最終后果。
The average brain has over a hundred trillion synapses, which is fantastic; we've got a lot to work with.
一般大腦有超過萬億的突觸，這很不可思議，我們有這么龐大的數量。
And this isn't a static number. We gain and lose synapses all the time, through a process called neural plasticity.
而這一數字不是一成不變。我們在一個叫做神經可塑性的過程之中，不斷生成和消耗著突觸。
Every time we learn something new, we are creating and strengthening new neural connections, new synapses.
每當我們習得新東西，我們建立并強化新的神經連接，新的突觸產生了。
In the Nun Study, 678 nuns, all over the age of 75 when the study began, were followed for more than two decades.
在Nun研究中，研究開始時，678位修女全都年過七十五歲，進行了二十多年的研究。
They were regularly given physical checkups and cognitive tests, and when they died, their brains were all donated for autopsy.
她們會定期接受身體檢查和認知測試，如果不幸去世，她們的大腦都捐獻出去用于驗尸。
In some of these brains, scientists discovered something surprising.
科學家們在一些大腦中發現了一些神奇的東西。
Despite the presence of plaques and tangles and brain shrinkage -- what appeared to be unquestionable Alzheimer's
盡管樣斑塊、神經纖維纏結和大腦的萎縮，這些現象似乎是老年癡呆癥無疑，
the nuns who had belonged to these brains showed no signs of having the disease while they were alive.
然而這些大腦的主人，那些修女卻沒有在生前表現出患有老年癡呆的癥狀。
