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Cells struggle to migrate on soft substrates, which don’t provide enough traction. Here, the authors show that rapid, cyclic changes in substrate rigidity allow cells to overcome this limitation and move quickly.

The nature of the defects in amorphous materials, analogous to vacancies and dislocations in crystals, remains a matter of debate. Scalliet et al. show that localized and extended defects coexist in a wide range of conditions, yet are associated with distinct energy scales in a prototypical glass model.

Across species, how aging leads to progressive spatial memory decline is not fully understood. This study reports dysfunctional spatial coding by aged entorhinal grid cells and networks related to impaired spatial memory and identifies implicated neuronal gene expression changes.

How musical expertise impacts the brain’s processing of complex musical information remains unclear. Using generative music models, this study reveals that musicians display enhanced disentangled and contextual neural encoding of music.

The authors report single-pixel infrared imaging thermometry via diagonally aggregated encoding masks and non-iterative reconstruction for passive, non-contact, accurate mapping of inner canthi temperature variations linked to physiology and habits.

A proteotoxic stress response specific to exhausted T cells, governed by AKT signaling and accompanied by increased protein translation, represents a mechanistic vulnerability and a new therapeutic target to improve cancer immunotherapies.

Biomolecular condensates (BCs) are ubiquitous compartments that regulate key functions in cells. Authors demonstrate that phase separation is suppressed with glycine by using model heterotypic condensates composed of nucleophosmin 1 and ribosomal ribonucleic acid.

NatD is an acetyltransferase responsible for N-α-terminal acetylation of the histone H4 and H2A and has been linked to cell growth. Here the authors show that NatD-mediated acetylation of histone H4 serine 1 competes with the phosphorylation by CK2α at the same residue thus leading to the upregulation of Slug and tumor progression.

Creative experiences such as dance, music, drawing, and strategy video games might preserve brain health. The authors show that regular practice or short training in these activities is linked to brains that look younger and work more efficiently.

The authors model regional electricity grid coordination, which enables access to geographically dispersed resources. Results suggest grid integration can reduce planning uncertainty region-wide but may impact individual countries differently.

Giardini et al. present an imaging method that combines quantitative measurements of cardiac electrophysiology with high-resolution three-dimensional structural reconstructions, enabling the detection of arrhythmogenic electrical coupling between cardiomyocytes and non-myocytes in murine hearts.

The antibiotic polymyxin B requires bacterial metabolic activity to cause sufficient damage to the outer membrane to access the inner membrane, which it permeabilizes via an energy-independent mechanism to kill the cell.

Results from the randomized, noncomparative, phase 2 MATISSE trial show that ultra-short neoadjuvant therapy with ipilimumab and nivolumab can prevent surgery and radiotherapy in patients with resectable cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, with an early decrease in total lesion glycolysis by [¹⁸F]FDG-PET/CT associated with response.

A 165 Myr record of N and Corg isotopes show that the N-cycle responds to feedbacks associated with productivity and the location of upwelling centers changing due to continental meander.

This study reveals that females with isolated REM sleep behavior disorder show less neurodegeneration than males. The least affected regions in females are regions that overexpress estrogen-related genes, suggesting potential sex-specific neuroprotection.

Breugnathair elgolensis gen. et sp. nov., an early squamate identified from a newly discovered Middle Jurassic skeleton on the Isle of Skye, provides new evidence on the origins of snakes.

Growth of wind and solar energy share demonstrates different dynamics between the initial phases of adoption as compared with the advanced stages. Cherp et al. study the growth dynamics of renewable energy and show that laggards may continue to struggle to achieve high growth rates despite learning from early adopters’ experience.

Temporal interference stimulation is thought to act via low-frequency envelope demodulation. Here, the authors demonstrate that stimulation thresholds in TIS follow the same carrier frequency dependence as direct kHz stimulation, indicating a shared biophysical mechanism.

Iron is an essential micronutrient for plants and a lack of iron availability limits crop yield in many parts of the world. Here the authors show that natural variation in root growth ofArabidopsis plants under iron deficiency can be caused by allelic variation at the FRO2locus.

Energy security is an important policy objective across Europe. Public concern about energy security varies across countries due to differences in national energy context and more general national indicators of economic and human well-being, over-and-above individual population characteristics.

Issa et al. show that the ciliary small guanosine triphosphatase Arl3 displaces the inhibitory regulator Shulin/DNAAF9 from the outer dynein arm, leading to motor activation.

An optical detection and analysis platform quantifies aggregate density, distribution and size in fluorescently labelled post-mortem human brain tissue.

Psychometric network models have become increasingly popular in psychology and the social sciences. Huth et al. show that a large proportion of reported network findings are based on weak or inconclusive evidence inviting caution when interpreting results.

Mitochondrial DNA from horses at the Middle Pleistocene archaeological site of Schöningen reveals insight into the evolutionary history of horses and advances techniques for the analysis of ancient DNA retrieved from highly degraded samples.

The authors estimate genomic vulnerability for closely related species of rainbowfish. They find that narrow endemic species that have hybridized with a warm-adapted generalist show reduced vulnerability to climate change and that hybridization may facilitate evolutionary rescue for such species.

Here, the authors found that human NAT16 acetylates histidine in vitro and in vivo. Biochemical and structural characterisation uncovered a double-GNAT fold with distinct active site architecture that is conserved across species.

Adherent-invasive strains of E. coli are commonly isolated from patients with Crohn’s disease. Here, the authors show that an AIEC harbours a hybrid Type IV secretion system (T4SS) that mediates pilin polymerization and biofilm formation in vivo.

This study quantitatively identifies contaminant loss as the dominant limitation for silica microcavity Q factors. Through laser polishing and thermal annealing, a record-high Q of 8.28 × 10⁹ is achieved, enabling fully stabilized soliton microcombs with >60.6 dB repetition-rate phase-noise suppression.

Near-infrared mechanoluminescence can be used in biostress imaging, but is subject to limitations in terms of the pre-irradiation process and low intensity. Here, the authors have circumvented these limitations by constructing an MgO/MgF₂:Cr³⁺ heterojunction piezo-photonics system.

A national classification system of wetland hydrologic connectivity to streams, which could be applied globally, demonstrates and advances current understanding of how wetland connectivity affects surface water quality.

Exercise promotes recovery after stroke, but the underlying mechanisms are unclear. Here, the authors show that regulatory T cells enable exercise-induced repair by reducing neuronal hyperexcitability via interleukin-10, linking immunity to functional regeneration.

The function of serotonin receptors and the neuroimmune relationship in psoriasis is not fully understood. Here, the authors find HTR2A antagonistic drugs worsened psoriasis outcomes in a study population, and that HTR2A modulation reduced psoriasis severity in imiquimod mouse models and that this involved HTR2A-expressing monocyte-derived Langerhans cells.

Native crystallographic defects are often introduced during synthesis of battery materials, but has been overlooked. Here, using in situ synchrotron X-ray probes and electron microscopy, the authors have revealed their adverse effect during battery operation.

This study discovers human SERF2 as a key partner in stress granule formation by binding specific RNA G-quadruplexes. SERF2 and these RNAs provide a detailed structural model of protein-RNA interactions driving liquid-liquid phase separation in condensates.

Wu, Zhang and colleagues introduce ‘compare and contrast spatial transcriptomics’ (CoCo-ST), a graph contrastive learning-based method for spatial transcriptomics analysis that detects low-variance structures.

Plasmodium vivax reticulocyte binding protein 2b (PvRBP2b) is important for invasion of reticulocytes and PvRBP2b antibodies correlate with protection. Here, Chan et al. isolate and characterize anti-PvRBP2b human monoclonal antibodies and describe mechanisms by which these antibodies inhibit invasion.

Understanding collective behaviour is an important aspect of managing the pandemic response. Here the authors show in a large global study that participants that reported identifying more strongly with their nation reported greater engagement in public health behaviours and support for public health policies in the context of the pandemic.

Experiments and modelling unravel mechanisms of nitrous oxide production from nitrate, the primary nitrous oxide production pathway in oxygen minimum zones. Results highlight the critical role of microbial interactions in regulating this pathway.

People living in rural areas of the United States have poorer outcomes from acute COVID-19. Here, the authors show that higher mortality rates among rural dwellers persist for up to two years after the initial infection, even after accounting for baseline risk factors.

A decade of BGC-Argo and plankton records shows North Pacific heatwaves reshape food webs and trap small particles in midwater, slowing deep-ocean carbon export. Impacts vary by event, underscoring the need for sustained ocean monitoring.

Adult stem cells often reside in specialized niches that they exit upon injury. Here they show that in Drosophila, after damage the gut-associated trachea produces the PDGF-VEGF-related ligand Pvf1, which acts as a guidance cue directing ISC migration toward injury sites.

The melting of the last remnants of the North American ice sheets in the early Holocene led to 14 m of global sea-level rise, higher than prior estimates, according to proxy constraints from the Mississippi Delta and other localities.

Delocalized radical systems are appealing for controlling stereoselectivity in organic synthesis. Here the authors report on a Co(II)-based enantioselective radical system for the dearomative 1,7-conjugate amination of readily available 4-vinylphenols with aryl azides.

An inherently explainable AI trained on 1,015 expert-annotated prostate tissue images achieved strong Gleason pattern segmentation while providing interpretable outputs and addressing interobserver variability in pathology.

Underexplored atom swap reactions offer the opportunity to selectively edit organic molecules and to streamline lead discovery and optimization in the pharmaceutical and agrochemical industry. Now it has been shown that benzimidazoles can be accessed from indoles via C-to-N atom swap. The method was applied to 15 drug-like indoles.

The authors develop a molecular dopant to avoid the dimerization of the electron-selective material phenyl-C₆₁-butyric acid methyl ester, resulting in enhanced stability and efficiency in inverted perovskite solar cells.

Structural and functional characterization of the β-barrel assembly machinery complex in Bacteroidota reveals a distinct, seven-component complex with a large extracellular domain that may enable β-barrel–surface lipoprotein complex assembly.

Scoliosis is a common yet poorly understood pediatric disorder. Using zebrafish disease models, Pumputis et al. identify pervasive cell stress responses as causing spine deformity and present possibilities for new therapies and diagnostic tools.

Infant KMT2A-rearranged acute lymphoblastic leukemia is associated with poor overall survival rates. Here, the authors use WGS and WES of 36 relapsed KMT2A-rearranged ALL and AML patients and find alterations in drug response genes in ALL, which may correspond with relapse time. Longitudinal analyses of >250 samples could track residual leukemia cells, clonal drug responses, and the upcoming relapse.

RNA splicing is an important mechanism for gene regulation. Here, the authors present a core logic that links sequence variation and splice-site choice across eukaryotes.