The most dramatic and rapidly occurring changes in the women around the age 50 is menopause. The level of cycling estradiol (E2) production during the reproductive years drops dramatically. Not long ago, the prevailing view was that menopause resulted from an exhaustion of ovarian follicles. An alternative perspective is that age-related changes in the central nervous system and hypothalamopituitary unit initiate the menopausal transition. The evidence that both of the ovary and the brain are key pacemakers in menopause in now clears.

Since 1946, the UK Medical Research Council has collected medical, psychological, and demographic date on more than 5000 people on everything for verbal and nonverbal reasoning to algebra and visual memory. Tapping in this data base, psychologist Marcus Richards of University College London and his colleagues found that the smarter women is during childhood, the more likely she will begin menopause later in life. After adjusting for factors such as education, number of children, and socioeconomic states, they found that higher cognitive scores correlated with later menopause.

The finding, reported in the 22 July issue of Neurology, suggests that the link between hormones and brain development might be stronger than researchers suspected, pushing the connection and back to an earlier age. Other research has shown that hormones including estranger can influence both brain development and reproductive aging.

Education, knowledge and advances in reproductive techniques are rapidly growing.

From Biomedicine: January 2000, Vol.3 No1