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September 24, 2025—A star in a death spiral, lifestyle changes that might prevent Alzheimer's, and a surprising finding about earthquakes. —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor | | A handful of early trials suggest that improvements to diet and exercise can prevent the onset of Alzheimer's disease. For example, one study of 1,200 people in Finland between the ages of 60 and 77 found that nutritional counseling, exercise regimes and brain-training games over two years improved cognition and memory. But scientists say the field is simply too young for anyone to make bold assertions that lifestyle interventions can act as treatments or cures. The complexity: Answering questions about lifestyle changes—what works, what doesn't and why—is particularly challenging because these interventions are not as easy to quantify as medications are. Tests for efficacy of new drugs are highly controlled and isolate the effect of the drug on certain receptors. Lifestyle factors act on multiple variables and complex systems in the body. Take exercise: There's no particular receptor to examine. Instead exercise might lead to better blood flow in the brain. It might affect cerebral metabolism. It could affect insulin levels or increase oxygen flow. All these factors have been linked to the development of Alzheimer's in some way. It's also difficult to investigate the timing and "dosage" of exercise. Such complexities arise for nearly all lifestyle interventions. What the experts say: Even under the best of circumstances, changes to diet and exercise cannot ward off Alzheimer's for everyone. "There's something called bad luck, and there's something called genetics," says Kristine Yaffe, a neurologist at the University of California, San Francisco. She estimates that roughly half of a person's Alzheimer's risk is based on genetics, and half probably depends on their activity level, diet and luck. But the biggest risk factor is age. | | Illustration of planet HIP 67522 b and its star. Janine Fohlmeister/Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam | | | This Planet Will Self-Destruct
| Hundreds of light years away, a planet is in a death spiral. A Jupiter-sized gas giant known as HIP 67522 b is seven times closer to its star than Mercury is to our sun. Using two space-based telescopes to study the HIP 67522 system, astronomers noticed that the star had gigantic flares that were synchronized with its closest planet's orbital period. The closeness of the planet combined with the star's volatile nature created a spectacle the astronomers had never seen before: a self-destructive planet. How it works: The planet most likely sparks these powerful flares by disturbing the star's strong magnetic field lines as it passes by. Waves of energy move downward along the lines. When those waves meet the star's surface, a flare bursts out. If this explosion is close to the planet, the flare can blast away the planet's atmosphere. What the experts say: Researchers had suspected this type of star-planet interplay might occur, but they had never previously confirmed it, says Antoine Strugarek, an astrophysicist at the Institute of Research into the Fundamental Laws of the Universe, which is part of the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission. "This is the first time we see very convincing evidence such interaction has been actually detected," says Strugarek, who was not involved in the study. —Andrea Tamayo, Newsletter Writer
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Today's Newsletter Sponsored by the Nanobiosym Research Institute | | Nanobiosym Global Summit 2.0: Quantum Convergence at MIT Scientific American is a proud media partner of Nanobiosym's next big summit, which will be held on October 11- 12, 2025 at MIT's Kresge Auditorium. This landmark event will bring together some of the world's brightest minds and boldest leaders to reimagine the future of science, technology, longevity, AI, consciousness and the 5th Industrial Revolution. Help shape the New Renaissance! | | | | |
- From our July 1975 issue:
Particle Annihilation: "A positron propagates as a wave toward an electron in the bulk of a crystal (left). When the two particles annihilate each other, the resulting gamma rays carry away the momentum of the electron at an angle different from 180 degrees (right)." | | - The biggest tech companies like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft rely on skilled foreign workers. Trump's new $100,000 fee for new applicants of H-1B visas could threaten the global talent pipeline. | Rest of World
- Dozens of psychiatric hospitals are illegally discharging patients who are at risk of harming themselves or others. | ProPublica
- 100 elementary school kids help professional product reviewers find the best pencil eraser. (This also includes a fascinating history of pencil erasers.) | Wirecutter
| | Exercise matters perhaps even more for your brain than your body. | | How do you add movement to your life (small ways count!)? Send them to: newsletters@sciam.com. See you tomorrow. —Andrea Gawrylewski, Chief Newsletter Editor
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