Yoga has been found to increase grey matter and alter key networks in the brain. Now there are hopes it could be used to help improve people's mental health.

My right arm is shaking. Sweat drips from my forehead as I twist my body from a side plank into a yoga pose known as "Wild Thing" – or "Camatkarasana". It is quite the contortion – I arch my back, stretching my left arm over my head. My right foot is planted on the ground, and I look up to the sky.

One translation of the Sanskrit word camatkarasana is "the ecstatic unfolding of the enraptured heart" and is said to elicit confidence. And – despite the strain – I feel invincible.

When I started practicing yoga, I wanted to sweat and to build strength. I saw it purely as a form of exercise – but I found it was so much more.

The practice of yoga dates back over 2,000 years to ancient India. And though today, there are many different types of yoga – from meditative yin yoga to flowing vinyasa – through their use of movement, meditation and breathing exercises, all forms focus on a mind-body connection. And there is growing evidence that yoga may not just have physical benefits but may also be good for your mind too. Some researchers even hope it could be a promising way of helping people with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) cope with their symptoms.

Certainly, research on the physical benefits of yoga is extensive. The first thing anyone who hasn't tried yoga should know is that it can be surprisingly strenuous. It improves strength, flexibility and cardio-respiratory fitness. Studies have found yoga can improve stamina and agility. It can prevent injuries (although it can also be a cause of injuries if not done correctly) and enhance performance in other sports – with advocates including world-class footballers, American footballers and basketball players.

And there is a growing body of research showing yoga can be beneficial for a wide range of health issues.

In epilepsy sufferers, for example, practicing yoga has been seen to significantly reduce the number of seizures – or even prevent them entirely. Yoga has been used as an intervention to help manage type 2 diabetes, reduce chronic pain, and aid in stroke rehabilitation. It has also been shown to be more effective than physiotherapy at improving the quality of life for people with multiple sclerosis, and one trial even suggests it could be beneficial for cancer survivors.

Yoga can also help you live a healthy life for longer, says Claudia Metzler-Baddeley, a cognitive neuroscientist at the Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre (Cubric) in the UK.

But yoga has also been found to change the makeup of your brain. Studies show practicing yoga positively impacts both the structure and function of parts of the brain including the hippocampus, amygdala, prefrontal cortex, cingulate cortex and brain networks including the default mode network, part of the brain involved in introspection and self-directed thought. Some researchers say this could mean it has potential to mitigate age-related and neurodegenerative declinesfthere.

Metzler-Baddeley's research focuses on the cognitive and neural mechanisms of ageing and neurodegeneration. "We think inflammation accelerates ageing – which can be caused by chronic stress," she says. "Stress hormones like cortisol cause inflammation, which can cause increased blood pressure. These are, of course, risk factors for unhealthy ageing."

Meditation and mindfulness, she adds, are integral to yoga practice, and "seem to induce changes in brain networks which are important for metacognition, meta-awareness, and regulating emotional responses to stress".

"We know there's potential [for yoga to] keep us healthy as we age," she says. "There are studies that have found a number of structural........

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