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[...] And when they looked at those beetles, they found that they have specialized antennae that have evolved to detect slight differences in temperature — similar to the heat-sensing receptors used by snakes to detect prey.

What's more, it turns out that the beetles' antennae seem to be tuned to the exact temperature range deployed by their host plant, since different beetle species frequent different cycad species.

"Infrared radiation is perhaps the oldest discovered pollination signal," says Nicholas Bellono of Harvard University, one of the authors of the new study.

Back when plants first evolved pollen, the insects that were around were nocturnal and had poor vision, says Valencia-Montoya. "So it makes a lot of sense that a signal like heat was guiding them."

But as new groups emerged that were active in the day and had better vision, like butterflies and bees, "it makes more sense for plants to change their signaling strategy to also tap into the sensory systems of these more recent pollinators," she says, adding that in evolution, there's a constant dance back and forth between plants and their pollinators. Once color became a possible signal, flowering plants had an immense range of color combinations at their disposal, allowing them to rapidly diversify.

These researchers used "a powerhouse of techniques" to prove that the temperature of cycad's heat-producing cones is intimately related to attracting pollinators, and that this association is ancient, says Roger Seymour, with the University of Adelaide in Australia, who wasn't part of the research team: "This is an important contribution."

Seymour thinks that heat could have more than one role, however, and the chance for a warm-up may be a bonus for beetles that require high body temperatures for activity. "Heat can be a direct energy reward to insect pollinators which may remain inside a thermogenic flower for much longer than insects visiting non-thermogenic species," he says.

Irene Terry at Tthe University of Utah, an ecologist who specializes in cycads and their insect interactions but wasn't part of this research team, says it's only been relatively recently that people realized these ancient plants even had pollinators, rather than just spreading their pollen with the wind.

[...] "I was not surprised at all that infrared was involved," says Terry, given that other insects like mosquitoes use infrared to find their way to a target. "There's a range of things that insects can see that we don't."

[...] "The infrared is an entirely different world that we don't experience," he says. "I think that's a cool thing to think about, going back in time, that this signal was around when the dinosaurs were there, long before us. And the beetles still use it to this day and are still experiencing that world."

Journal Reference: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adz1728

Original Submission

Of course, given Foxconn's general sense of discretion for its clients, as well as Apple's historic secrecy, it would decline to say who the factory is intended for.

Apple is a long-time partner of Foxconn, so immediate thoughts would turn to its product catalog. But, the relatively small scale and size of investment doesn't really point to it being for some of Apple's major products.

At Apple's scale of production, there's no way it can be for something like an iPhone or iPad. Add in that Apple would have to secure multiple sizable suppliers in the area, and that rules out most of the biggest items in Apple's catalog.

It could be used for lines with lower sales volumes, but again, there would be a need to establish a supply chain that meets Apple's exacting standards.

The chance of this being an Apple-centric facility is very slim, based on its size and Apple's existing supply chain sprawl.

Since Foxconn is a contract manufacturer for many big names in tech, there are a lot of potential clients that could take advantage of such an operation. There's every chance it will be used for one of Foxconn's other partners.

A further clue that this may not be Apple are claims that the facility will use AI and robotics in "all phases of production," including design and assembly.

Apple certainly has expressed a need for manufacturers to invest in automation, and the use of robotics would certainly help meet this goal. There have also been claims from U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick that Apple was waiting on the right "robotic arms" to bring manufacturing to the United States.

However, the description that AI will be used in design at the facility rubs against Apple's typical manufacturing processes. With it keen to work on its own designs and bring elements in-house, it's extremely unlikely for Apple to then allow Foxconn to make designs for its products using different AI.

Apple may want to get U.S. manufacturing up and running, but it will be a monumental effort. This doesn't seem like it.

Original Submission

A functional group containing two carbon-sulfur bonds and a disulfide bond were introduced early on, to help control the stereochemistry of the molecule, but the sensitive disulfides had to be "masked" and protected as a pair of sulfides to prevent them from breakdown under subsequent chemical reactions. The disulfide-containing groups were then regenerated after the dimerization reaction.

"This particular dimerization really stands out in terms of the complexity of the substrates that we're bringing together, which have such a dense array of functional groups and stereochemistry," Movassaghi says.

The overall synthesis requires 16 steps from the beta-hydroxytryptophan starting material to verticillin A.

Once the researchers had successfully completed the synthesis, they were also able to tweak it to generate derivates of verticillin A. Researchers at Dana-Farber then tested these compounds against several types of diffuse midline glioma (DMG), a rare brain tumor that has few treatment options.

The researchers found that the DMG cell lines most susceptible to these compounds were those that have high levels of a protein called EZHIP. This protein, which plays a role in the methylation of DNA, has been previously identified as a potential drug target for DMG.

"Identifying the potential targets of these compounds will play a critical role in further understanding their mechanism of action, and more importantly, will help optimize the compounds from the Movassaghi lab to be more target specific for novel therapy development," Qi says.

The verticillin derivatives appear to interact with EZHIP in a way that increases DNA methylation, which induces the cancer cells to under programmed cell death. The compounds that were most successful at killing these cells were N-sulfonylated (+)-11,11′-dideoxyverticillin A and N-sulfonylated verticillin A. N-sulfonylation — the addition of a functional group containing sulfur and oxygen — makes the molecules more stable.

"The natural product itself is not the most potent, but it's the natural product synthesis that brought us to a point where we can make these derivatives and study them," Movassaghi says.

The Dana-Farber team is now working on further validating the mechanism of action of the verticillin derivatives, and they also hope to begin testing the compounds in animal models of pediatric brain cancers.

"Natural compounds have been valuable resources for drug discovery, and we will fully evaluate the therapeutic potential of these molecules by integrating our expertise in chemistry, chemical biology, cancer biology, and patient care. We have also profiled our lead molecules in more than 800 cancer cell lines, and will be able to understand their functions more broadly in other cancers," Qi says.

Reference: “Total Synthesis and Anticancer Study of (+)-Verticillin A” by Walker Knauss, Xiuqi Wang, Mariella G. Filbin, Jun Qi and Mohammad Movassaghi, 2 December 2025, Journal of the American Chemical Society.

DOI: 10.1021/jacs.5c16112

Original Submission

In October, Google ended software support for its first- and second-generation Nest thermostats. For lots of users, the devices still worked but couldn't be controlled anymore, because the software was no longer supported. Users lamented that their fancy thermostats had now become hunks of e-waste on their walls.

Fulu set up a bounty that called for a software fix to restore functionality to the affected Nest devices. Cody Kociemba, a longtime follower of Rossmann's YouTube channel and a Nest user himself, was eager to take the bounty on. (He has "beef with Google," he says on his website.) After a few days of tinkering with the Nest software, Kociemba had a solution. He made his fix publicly available on GitHub so users could download it and restore their thermostats. Kociemba also started No Longer Evil, a site devoted to his workaround of Nest thermostats and perhaps hacks of future Google products to come.

"My moral belief is that this should be accessible to people," Kociemba says.

Kociemba submitted his fix to Fulu, but discovered that another developer, calling themselves Team Dinosaur, had just submitted a fix slightly before Kociemba did. Still, Fulu paid out the full amount to both, roughly $14,000 apiece. Kociemba was surprised by that, as he thought he had lost the race or that he might have to split the prize money.

O'Reilly says that while they probably won't do double payouts again, both fixes worked, so it was important for Fulu's first payout to show support for the people willing to take the risk of sharing their fixes.

"Folks like Cody who are willing to put it out there, make the calculated risk that Google isn't going to sue them, and maybe save some thermostats from the junk heap and keep consumers from having to pay $700 or whatever after installation to get something new," O'Reilly says. "It's been cool to watch."

This week, Fulu announced it had paid out its second-ever bounty. It was for a Molekule Air Pro and Air Mini, air purifier systems that used an NFC chip in its filters to ensure the replacement filters were made by Molekule and not a third-party manufacturer. The goal was to disable the DRM and let the machine use any filter that fit.

Lorenzo Rizzotti, an Italian student and coder who had gone from playing Minecraft as a kid to reverse engineering and hacking, submitted proof that he had solved the problem, and was awarded the Fulu bounty.

"Once you buy a device, it's your hardware, it's no longer theirs," Rizzotti says. "You should be able to do whatever. I find it absurd that it's illegal."

But unlike Kociemba, he wasn't about to share the fix. Though he was able to fix the problem, he doesn't feel safe weathering the potential legal ramifications that he might face if he released the solution publicly.

"I proved that I can do it," he says. "And that was it."

Still, Fulu awarded him the bounty. O'Reilly says the goal of the project is less about getting actual fixes out in the world, and more about calling attention to the lengths companies are allowed to go to wrest control from their users under the auspices of Section 1201.

"We need to show how ridiculous it is that this 27-year-old law is preventing these solutions from seeing the light of day," O'Reilly says. "It's time for the laws to catch up with technology."

Original Submission

Holiday travel and an increase in social gatherings can also contribute to the spread of norovirus.

"Close quarters and sharing food or being on crowded buses and trains, as well as touching so many things, create an environment that will allow Norovirus to spread before you even realise you've come into contact with someone who has it," Tesfu said.

Cold weather can also affect how well our immune system defends us. Lower vitamin D levels in winter and drier air can weaken natural immune barriers, making it easier for viruses like norovirus to spread.

Colder temps play a part, too. "The virus survives better in cool, dry air," Paria Sanaty Zadeh, PharmD, clinical pharmacist at Drugwatch, told Healthline.

Many people associate norovirus outbreaks with cruise ships, but the virus can also present in various other settings, including schools and nursing homes.

Norovirus infection may lead to telltale symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea, as the virus primarily affects the gut.

"Unlike the flu, norovirus targets the gut," Zadeh said. "It's a viral gastroenteritis, [or] what people call a 'stomach bug,' even though the virus affects the small intestine more than the stomach."

Norovirus typically has an abrupt onset, manifesting as vomiting and diarrhea, and is highly contagious.

"Getting it from contaminated hands or food is most common, either touching something contaminated and then touching your mouth, or eating something contaminated," Zadeh said.

"You can get it from touching a surface that wasn't cleaned well after someone was sick, then touching your mouth. And you only need a tiny amount of the virus to get infected. It moves and spreads easily."

Original Submission

There's still the question of why Verizon and its brands are demanding 60 days of paid active service before unlocking phones when the FCC-imposed conditions require it to unlock phones 60 days after activation. Roach filed a complaint to the FCC, alleging that Verizon violated the conditions. Verizon has meanwhile petitioned the FCC to eliminate the 60-day requirement altogether.

Before his small-claims court win, Roach turned down a Verizon settlement offer of $600 plus court fees because he didn't want to give up the right to speak about the case publicly. Roach said he filed an arbitration case against Verizon nearly a decade ago on a different matter related to gift cards that were supposed to be provided through a device recycling program. He said he can't reveal details about the settlement in that previous case because of a non-disclosure agreement.

After refusing Verizon's settlement offer in the new case, Roach gained a modest financial benefit from his court victory. The judge ordered Verizon to pay back the $410.40 he paid for the device, plus court costs and service fees.

When it appeared that the Straight Talk iPhone wouldn't be unlocked, Roach decided to buy an unlocked phone from Costco for $643.93. But he ended up returning that phone to Costco and paying Straight Talk for a second month of service to get the original phone unlocked, he said.

The now-unlocked phone—the one he bought from Straight Talk—is being used by his wife on their US Mobile plan. The court-ordered refund check that Verizon sent Roach included the phone cost and one month of service fees, he said.

Roach estimated he spent 20 or so hours on the suit, including arranging to have a summons served on Verizon and arguing his case in a court hearing. Roach didn't get much of a payout considering the amount of time he spent, "but it wasn't about that," he said.

Roach provided Ars with the emails in which Verizon offered the $600 settlement. A Verizon executive relations employee wrote to Roach, "My offer is not an admission of guilt but trying to extend the olive branch."

In his email declining the offer, Roach told Verizon, "I highly value the non-monetary outcomes I would achieve in court—transparency, accountability, and the absence of restrictions such as NDAs. Any settlement proposal that requires me to remain silent about the issue, while offering only modest monetary compensation, is less attractive to me than pursuing the matter through judgment. If Verizon Value is genuinely interested in settlement, the offer would need to reflect both the tangible costs I've incurred and the intangible but significant benefits the company receives by avoiding litigation and publicity."
"It was really starting to irk me"

The FCC has taken no action on Roach's complaint, and in fact, the commission could allow Verizon to scrap the 60-day requirement. As we reported in May, Verizon petitioned the FCC to let it lock phones to its network for longer periods of time. This would make it harder for customers to switch to other carriers, but Verizon claims longer locking periods are necessary to deter fraud.

The FCC hasn't ruled yet on Verizon's petition. Roach says Verizon seems to be acting as if it can change the rules without waiting for the FCC to do so formally. "It was really starting to irk me that they were basically just going ahead with it anyways while they had an open request," Roach said.

He doesn't expect the FCC to penalize Verizon, though. "It's just kind of slimy of them, so I feel like it deserves a spotlight," he said. "I'm not sure with the current state of the FCC that anything would happen, but the rule of law should be respected."

The Verizon petition to relax the unlocking requirements was opposed in a filing by Public Knowledge and other consumer advocacy groups. Public Knowledge Legal Director John Bergmayer, who wrote the filing, told Ars that Roach "has a pretty strong argument under the law as it stands."
Verizon must unlock phones automatically

The unlocking rules applying to Verizon used to be stricter, resulting in the company selling phones that were already unlocked. In 2019, Verizon requested a waiver to let it lock phones for 60 days.

The FCC granted the waiver in June 2019, allowing Verizon "to lock a customer's handset for 60 days from the date it becomes active on Verizon's network" and requiring it to unlock the handset once the period is over. This condition was expanded to TracFone and its brands such as Straight Talk in the 2021 merger, with the FCC approval stating that "For 700 MHz C Block TracFone devices that operate on the Verizon network and are capable of unlocking automatically (e.g., Apple devices), they will unlock automatically 60 days after activation."

The 2019 waiver grant said Verizon must automatically unlock phones after 60 days "regardless of whether: (1) the customer asks for the handset to be unlocked, or (2) the handset is fully paid off." The FCC order specifies that "the only exception to the rule will be that Verizon will not have to automatically unlock handsets that it determines within the 60-day period to have been purchased through fraud."

Bergmayer said the FCC order "granting the waiver just starts a countdown, with no 'paid service' requirement, or room for Verizon to just impose one. Many people may use prepaid phones that they don't keep in continuous service but just charge up as needed. Maybe people are fine with just having Wi-Fi on their phones for a while if they're at home anyway."

Given the restrictive nature of the FCC conditions, "I don't think that can be read to allow a paid service requirement," Bergmayer said. But as a practical matter, the FCC under Chairman Brendan Carr has been aggressively eliminating regulations that apply to telecom carriers under Carr's "Delete, Delete, Delete" initiative. To actually enforce Verizon's obligations under the current rules, "you have to convince the current FCC not to just change it," Bergmayer said.

The FCC and Verizon did not respond to requests for comment.
Retroactive policy change irked other buyers, too

Roach wasn't the only person whose plans to buy a discounted phone were thwarted by Verizon refusing to unlock the device after 60 days. Roach had learned of the discount offer from a Slick Deals thread. Eventually, users posting in that thread started reporting that they weren't able to get the phone unlocked.

"My status: I used 30 days with Straight Talk. Waited another 35 days but it did not unlock," one person wrote.

Some people in the thread said they canceled after 30 days, like Roach did, but eventually bought a second month of service in order to get the unlock. Although Verizon and its brands are required to unlock phones automatically, some commenters said they had to contact Straight Talk support to get an unlock. "Needless to say this has been an arduous journey. Good luck to others and hope you manage to successfully unlock your devices as well," one user wrote.

There's also a Reddit thread started by someone who said they bought a Samsung phone in February and complained that Straight Talk refused to honor the unlocking policy that was in place at the time.

"I called to ask for the phone to be unlocked on April 16 but was told it can't be unlocked since it did not have 60 days of paid service," the Reddit user wrote. "When I said that was not the policy on phones activated prior to April 1, the rep told me 'we have the right to change our policy.' I agreed, they do [have] the right to change their policy GOING FORWARD but can't change the rules going backwards. He disagreed."
FCC complaint didn't go anywhere

Roach's FCC complaint received a response from Verizon, but nothing substantial from the FCC itself. "There's not really any sort of moderation or mediation from the FCC, it's just kind of a dialogue between you and the other party. And I'm not really sure if any human eyes from the government even look at it. It's probably just a data point," Roach said.

Roach had previously called Straight Talk customer service about the changed terms. "There were a couple phone calls involved, and they were just very unrelenting that the only way that thing was getting unlocked is with the extra month of paid service," he said.

In its formal response to the FCC, Verizon's TracFone division asserted that it could apply the April 1, 2025, policy change to the phone that Roach bought over a month earlier. The carrier's letter to the FCC said:

We understand Mr. Roach's desire to use his device on another carrier's network, and we want to provide clarity based on our Unlocking Policy, which became effective on April 1, 2025. As outlined in our policy, for cellphones capable of remote unlocking (this includes most iPhones and some Android cellphones) that were activated with Straight Talk service prior to November 23, 2021, on any carrier network, the device becomes eligible for remote unlocking upon the customer's request after 60 days of active paid service.

Our redemption records indicate that Mr. Roach's account does not have the required minimum 60 days of active paid service based on the payment records. Therefore, the device does not currently meet the eligibility criteria for unlocking as outlined in our policy. Once the account reflects the required 60 days of active paid service, and the device meets the other conditions, he can resubmit the unlocking request.

Verizon's letter did not explain how its new policy complies with the FCC conditions or why the new policy should apply to phones purchased before the policy was in place.

Roach's complaint said the FCC should force Straight Talk to "honor the FCC-mandated 60-day post-activation unlock condition for all affected phones, without imposing the additional 'paid service' requirement." His complaint further urged the FCC to "investigate this practice as a violation of FCC rules and the merger conditions" and "take enforcement action to protect consumers' rights."

"Straight Talk's new policy conflicts with the FCC's binding conditions," Roach told the agency. "The Commission's order clearly requires unlocking after 60 days from activation, with no additional obligation to maintain service. By conditioning unlocks on two months of service, Straight Talk is effectively adding a term that Verizon did not promise and the FCC did not approve."

In his small claims court filing, Roach alleged that Verizon and Straight violated the FCC conditions and that the retroactive application of the "60 days of paid service" term, without disclosure at the point of sale, is an unfair and deceptive practice prohibited by the Kansas Consumer Protection Act.

The magistrate judge's ruling in Roach's favor said, "It does appear that defendant's change unlocking policy is contrary to the applicable FCC regulations." She noted that federal communications law does not prevent users from suing carriers individually and that the Kansas Consumer Protection Act "contains provisions prohibiting deceptive acts by a supplier which would be applicable in this case."

Roach asked for $10,000, mainly because that was the limit on damages in the venue, but the judge decided to award him damages in the amount of his actual losses. "He lost the benefit of the bargain he made with defendant such that his damages were loss of the $410.40," the ruling said.

Straight Talk's terms of service require disputes to be resolved either in arbitration or small claims court. Verizon pays the arbitration fees if users go that route. Arbitration is "a little more murky" in terms of how the parties' interests are aligned, Roach said.

"When the arbitrators are being paid by Verizon, are they really a neutral party?" he said. Roach also said he "thought it was honestly just a good opportunity for an easy win and an opportunity to learn about the small claims court system a bit. So at that point I was like, if I don't make any money from this, whatever, but at least I'll learn a little bit about the process."

Roach said he did not consult with a lawyer on his small claims case, instead opting to do it all himself. "The first time I showed up to court for the original date, they asked for proof of the returned mail summons, and I did not have that," he said.

The court hearing was rescheduled. When it was eventually held, the carrier sent a representative to argue against Roach.

"Their argument was pretty weak, I guess," Roach said. "It was basically like, 'Well, he didn't pay the two months of service, so we didn't unlock his phone. We offered him a settlement but he rejected it.'... My argument was, yeah, the terms had changed in kind of a consumer-unfriendly way. But beyond that, it was the fact that the terms had changed from something that was legal to something that was not legal with the federal regs. So regardless of the fact that the terms had changed, the current terms were illegal, which I thought was my strongest argument. And then I also put in that it was probably a violation of Kansas consumer protection law, which I'm glad I did."

Roach said that toward the end of the hearing, the judge indicated that she couldn't make a judgment based on FCC regulations and would need to rule on what the Kansas court has jurisdiction over. She issued the ruling that Verizon violated the state's consumer protection law about five or six weeks later, he said.

Given that the FCC hasn't acted on Verizon's petition to change the unlocking rules, the federal regulations "haven't changed at all in regards to Verizon's obligation to unlock devices," Roach said. He believes it would be relatively easy for consumers who were similarly harmed to beat Verizon in court or even to pursue a class action.

"I would think this would be a slam dunk for any further cases," Roach said. "I don't think I have any grounds anymore since my damages have been resolved, but it seems like it'd be a very easy class action for somebody."

= Links are in the article.

Original Submission

Some see such oversized battery systems as a bad thing, but households choosing to install larger battery systems achieves major labour productivity gains and provides the power system with extra storage capacity at much lower economic cost than if they were to stick to a small system.

Also, the fact that households are installing batteries larger than their own consumption needs isn't actually unusual – we've done exactly the same thing with solar. Over last financial year the average household solar system reached 9.1 kW. This produces 80% more electricity than the typical home could consume, with the remainder exported to the grid.

Another way to think about battery size is that it is sized not just to meet a household's own needs but also to soak up all the household's solar generation so it can be re-directed into a higher value period of the electricity market.

With this lens on, a 25 kWh battery makes much more sense. That's because the average new 9 kW solar system will usually produce an average of about 28 kWh of power excess to a household's daytime load. This quite closely matches the storage capacity of the typical battery now being installed.

But for this to all work we need to make sure that two things happen:

• Batteries are coupled with control software that will export excess power to the grid during the evening peak demand period (4pm to 9pm);
• We see far more electricity retailers offering time varying feed-in tariffs that provide a premium for power exported during the evening peak period that reflects the far higher wholesale power prices during this time.

Original Submission

Because of their shared history, the X-ray and ultraviolet emissions of quasars are tightly connected – brighter ultraviolet light typically means stronger X-ray intensity. This correlation, discovered nearly 50 years ago, provides fundamental insights into the geometry and physical conditions of the material close to supermassive black holes and has been the focus of intense research for decades.

The latest research adds a new twist to previous studies by challenging the universality of the correlation – a fundamental assumption that implies that the structure of matter around black holes is similar throughout the universe.

It shows that when the universe was younger – about half its present age – the correlation between the X-ray and ultraviolet light of quasars was significantly different from that observed in the nearby universe. The discovery suggests that the physical processes linking the accretion disc and the corona around supermassive black holes may have changed over the last 6.5 billion years of cosmic history.

"Confirming a non-universal X-ray-to-ultraviolet relation with cosmic time is quite surprising and challenges our understanding of how supermassive black holes grow and radiate," said Dr. Antonis Georgakakis, one of the study's authors.

"We tested the result using different approaches, but it appears to be persistent."

The study combines new X-ray observations from eROSITA X-ray telescope and archival data from the XMM-Newton X-ray observatory of the European Space Agency to explore the relation between X-ray and ultraviolet light intensity of an unprecedentedly large sample of quasars. The new eROSITA's wide and uniform X-ray coverage proved decisive, enabling the team to study quasar populations on a scale never before possible.

The universality of the UV-to-X-ray relation underpins certain methods that use quasars as "standard candles" to measure the geometry of the universe and ultimately probe the nature of dark matter and dark energy. This new result highlights the necessity for caution, demonstrating that the assumption of unchanging black hole structure across cosmic time must be rigorously re-examined.

"The key advance here is methodological," said postdoctoral researcher Maria Chira, of the National Observatory of Athens, who is the paper's lead author.

"The eROSITA survey is vast but relatively shallow – many quasars are detected with only a few X-ray photons. By combining these data in a robust Bayesian statistical framework, we could uncover subtle trends that would otherwise remain hidden."

The full set of eROSITA all-sky scans will soon allow astronomers to probe even fainter and more distant quasars. Future analyses using these data – together with next-generation X-ray and multiwavelength surveys – will help reveal whether the observed evolution reflects a genuine physical change or simply selection effects.

Such studies will bring new insight into how supermassive black holes power the most luminous objects in the universe, and how their behavior has evolved over cosmic time.

Reference: “Revisiting the X-ray-to-UV relation of quasars in the era of all-sky surveys” by Maria Chira, Antonis Georgakakis, Angel Ruiz, Shi-Jiang Chen, Johannes Buchner, Amy L Rankine, Elias Kammoun, Catarina Aydar, Mara Salvato, Andrea Merloni and Mirko Krumpe, 11 December 2025, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

DOI: 10.1093/mnras/staf1905

Original Submission

To investigate further, the NTU team compared the clogged brain drains with a wider range of Alzheimer's indicators than in earlier studies. They also evaluated how these blockages related to hallmark signs of the disease, including beta amyloid buildup and damage to the brain's white matter, a network of nerve fibers that links different brain regions.

The researchers studied close to 1,000 participants in Singapore, including nearly 350 who do not have any cognitive problems, meaning their mental abilities, such as their ability to think, remember, reason, make decisions, and focus, are normal.

The rest of the participants had features suggesting early stages of cognitive disease, including mild cognitive impairment, which is a stage that precedes overt dementia. According to past research, those with mild cognitive impairment have a higher risk of developing dementia, like Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia, which is a type of dementia caused by reduced blood flow to the brain.

For the latest study, the researchers analyzed the MRI scans of the participants and found that those with mild cognitive impairment tend to have clogged drains in their brains, or enlarged perivascular spaces, compared to the other participants.

The scientists also took seven measurements based on specific biochemicals in the participants' blood, including beta amyloid and tau proteins. Their presence is a warning sign that a person has Alzheimer's.

The presence of clogged drains in the brain was linked to four of the seven measurements. So, people with enlarged perivascular spaces are likely to have more amyloid plaques, tau tangles, and brain cell damage in their brains than normal, and are thus at higher risk of developing Alzheimer's.

The researchers also studied if damage to the brain's white matter, a well-known indicator of Alzheimer's, was linked to the biochemicals tied to the disease, and they did find such links with six of the seven biochemical measurements, but with a twist.

They further compared the white matter damage against enlarged perivascular spaces, and discovered that in participants with mild cognitive impairment, the link with biochemicals tied to Alzheimer's was stronger for enlarged perivascular spaces than for white matter damage. This suggests that choked brain drains are early indicators of Alzheimer's disease.

Knowing all this allows clinicians to better figure out what kind of treatment they should use to slow and prevent Alzheimer's early, possibly before permanent brain damage has happened.

Clinical significance and expert interpretation

"The findings carry substantial clinical implications," said Assoc Prof Kandiah. "Although white matter damage is more widely used in clinical practice to evaluate for dementia, as it is easily recognised on MRI scans, our results suggest that enlarged perivascular spaces may hold unique value in detecting early signs of Alzheimer's disease."

Dr Rachel Cheong Chin Yee, a Senior Consultant and Deputy Head at Khoo Teck Puat Hospital's Department of Geriatric Medicine, said that the study highlights how changes in the brain's small blood vessels – in this case, enlarged perivascular spaces that surround the blood vessels and help clear waste from the brain – may contribute to Alzheimer's disease.

"These findings are significant because they suggest that brain scans showing enlarged perivascular spaces could potentially help identify people at higher risk of Alzheimer's disease, even before symptoms appear," said Dr Cheong, who was not involved in the study.

Dr Chong Yao Feng, a Consultant at the National University Hospital's Division of Neurology and who was also not involved in the NTU study, said that cerebrovascular diseases – conditions that cause problems in the blood vessels of the brain – and Alzheimer's disease are traditionally believed to be caused by different processes.

"The study's findings are intriguing as they demonstrate that both diseases do interact in a synergistic manner," said Dr Chong, who is also a Clinical Assistant Professor at the National University of Singapore's Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine.

So, if a doctor orders an MRI brain scan to evaluate a patient's cognitive symptoms and notices that the scan shows markers of cerebrovascular diseases, such as the enlarged perivascular spaces investigated in the NTU study, the clinician should not assume the patient's cognitive impairment is due only to blood vessel problems. This is because the markers' presence might increase the risk of the patient also having Alzheimer's disease.

"Doctors will then have to use their clinical judgment of the patient's scan and symptoms, as well as discuss with the patient, to determine if more checks are needed to confirm whether a patient has Alzheimer's disease or not," said Dr Chong.

The NTU research team plans to follow up on the study participants to check how many go on to develop Alzheimer's dementia and to confirm that enlarged perivascular spaces can predict that people with these choked drains are more likely to progress to dementia.

Also, with more studies establishing the link between the clogged drains and Alzheimer's in other populations, detecting enlarged perivascular spaces in MRI scans could one day be added to the existing tools available to clinicians to determine much earlier whether a patient will develop Alzheimer's.

Reference: “Association of Enlarged Perivascular Spaces With Early Serum and Neuroimaging Biomarkers of Alzheimer Disease Pathology” by Justin Jit Hong Ong, Yi Jin Leow, Bocheng Qiu, Pricilia Tanoto, Fatin Zahra Zailan, Gurveen Kaur Sandhu and Nagaendran Kandiah, 22 August 2025, Neurology.

DOI: 10.1212/WNL.0000000000213836

Original Submission