The new year started off with a bang — especially when it comes to confirming two simple steps you can take to protect your brain from cognition problems and Alzheimer's.

It's not news to anyone who reads this column that eating processed red meat poses a huge risk for body-wide inflammation, heart disease, diabetes and other chronic conditions. But a new study in the journal Neurology now explains how it affects brain health.

It turns out that the saturated fat and salt content in processed red meat may damage circulation in the brain, and byproducts in the gut from digesting meat are implicated in the accumulation of amyloid tangles and clumps of tau protein that are markers for Alzheimer's disease.

The good news: Replacing one serving of processed red meat a day with nuts and legumes is associated with a 19% lower risk of dementia and a 21% lower risk of milder cognition problems.

What’s the second simple step? Aerobic exercise.

Researchers conducted a lab study and found that rodents that did aerobics had around 63% reduction in tau tangles and 76% reduction in amyloid plaques. Brain inflammation was cut by up to two-thirds.

Human clinical trials are planned, but why wait for those results?

Moderate to vigorous walking, swimming, and playing pickleball are all fun, and our research makes us confident that they improve the health of every organ system in the body, brain included.

For more information on using diet and exercise to protect your brain, read "The Great Age Reboot." It presents 40 things you can do that, together, may reduce your dementia risk by 90%.