TL;DR;ifScienceBoresYou
Your brain consumes 20% of your body's energy. If you burn 2,000 calories a day, your brain alone uses 400 calories. I'm always constantly exercising my brain looking for new knowledge on anything and everything that deals with health, and sometimes fitness, specifically brain fitness (cognitive performance). I don't just follow one thing, I take the most important parts of everything I learn and assimilate it to my mind.
The body is just the extension of the mind anyways, from the inside out (most importantly the inside). The brain itself can consume a combination of ketone bodies and glucose, but can't completely function on ketones alone. The brain itself uses glucose as a primary energy source, however, oxidative stress from over utilization of glucose is what causes neurodegeneration and cognitive decline.
Here's a study that shows hows a keto diet decreases the death rates of brain neurons by slowing down oxidative stress due to dysfunctional glycolysis."Neurodegeneration after oxidative stress limits the recovery of tissue response and appears to be caused by impaired glycolysis. If indeed there is a defect in glucose metabolism it might be beneficial to supplement energy metabolism with an alternate substrate."
Simply saying, if your brain is overstimulated with glucose and is messed up because of such, then you can preserve precious brain cells by switching to ketone bodies as an alternate fuel for your brain.Some people can overstimulate their brain with glucose, which then something goes wrong and glycolysis malfunctions and brain neurons starts dying. Ketosis has been known to preserve brain cells for a long time by regulating the rate of glycolysis in the brain.
"Based on our experiments and evidence in the literature, we have developed the hypothesis that ketones are effective against pathology associated with altered glucose metabolism, the rationale being that ketosis helps to regulate glucose metabolism." Simply saying, if your brain glucose metabolism is all jacked up because you eat too much glucose, switching to ketosis will control, NOT STOP, but control, glucose metabolic rate in your brain. Even under ketosis, your body will still find some way to make glucose and use it.
This misconception that you'll stop using glucose completely under ketosis is completely false. Like I said, your body is a survival machine. If it doesn't get glucose from carbs, it'll simply synthesize its own from amino acids and fat. And yes, you can survive eating only protein and fat and absolutely zero carbs. You just have to eat enough protein to keep the amino acid pool filled and fat to keep ketone bodies flowing for an alternate form of energy. Your body can create glucose without eating carbs. Isn't it amazing?
"KETONES SUPPRESS BRAIN GLUCOSE CONSUMPTION"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2874681/
Oh, here's another reminder of the results you may get if you follow the ketogenic diet properly, keyword: properly, see photo:
