According to a new research study, fasting regularly helps protect the brain from degenerative illnesses and help a person live longer.

Researchers at the National Institute on Ageing in Baltimore found evidence, which shows that skipping all types of food for a couple of days in a week could protect the brain from effects of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other illnesses.

Professor Mark Mattson, head of the institute's laboratory of neurosciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, said that reducing intake of calorie could help the brain but skipping meals is not the right way of triggering this protection.

"It is likely to be better to go on intermittent bouts of fasting, in which you eat hardly anything at all, and then have periods when you eat as much as you want," he said.

Mattson said that reducing daily food intake to around 500 calories for two days shows benefits in their studies. The study is the latest in the year's long debate about whether fasting is good or bad for health.

He was speaking at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Vancouver.