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Head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) frequency and risk factors vary considerably across regions and ancestries. Here, the authors conduct a multi-ancestry genome-wide association study and fine mapping study of HNSCC subsites in cohorts from multiple continents, finding susceptibility and protective loci, gene-environment interactions, and gene variants related to immune response.

A horizon scan of international respondents identifies and discusses ten developing challenges in Antarctic conservation, revealing an increased emphasis on challenges related to governance, geopolitics and economics compared to a similar scan from 2012.

Oby, Degenhart, Grigsby and colleagues used a brain–computer interface to challenge monkeys to override their natural time courses of neural activity. They found the time courses to be highly robust, suggestive of network-level computational mechanisms.

Neutron scattering on a model system of highly concentrated solutions of charged carbon nanotubes reveals a strong solvent ordering up to ∼40 Å around the charged nanoscale surface.

Plasmodium vivax is the most widespread human malaria parasite but due to its tropism for immature red blood cells in vitro culturing and studies are difficult. Here, LuizaBatista et al. generate a humanized mouse supporting human erythropoiesis and allowing asexual and sexual development of P. vivax in bone marrow and peripheral blood, as well as transmission to mosquitoes.

Batista, Schief and colleagues use a series of germline-targeting immunogens in knock-in mice expressing heavy chain sequences derived from the HIV broadly neutralizing antibody 10E8 to characterize the requirements of 10E8 B cell precursors for entry and maturation in the germinal center.

The advantage of living in cities compared with rural areas with respect to height and BMI in children and adolescents has generally become smaller globally from 1990 to 2020, except in sub-Saharan Africa.

Although quantum fluctuations of the spins occur on a local scale, they can have a macroscopic impact on the properties of magnets. Here, the authors observe the macroscopic influence of magnetic quantum fluctuations on the dielectric properties of a multiferroic oxide.

A microfluidics- and electron-microscopy-based method enables the characterization of polyclonal antibody responses to infection and vaccination.

The concept of resonant valence bond phases has inspired many areas of condensed matter physics, but few realistic models have been identified. Now an analytical solution of such a phase has been found for pyrochlore and related lattices.

Flooding may cause loss of life and economic damage, therefore temporal changes need assessment. Here, the authors show that since 1870 there has been an increase in area inundated by floods in Europe, but a reduction in fatalities and economic losses, although caution that smaller floods remain underreported.

The Fermi-LAT Collaboration reports a significant γ-ray detection (5.2σ) from the coronae of radio-quiet active galactic nuclei, revealing compact (~10 gravitational radii) and extended (~2.7 × 10⁶ gravitational radii) corona regions, challenging existing models.

Olfactory neuroblastoma (ONB) is a rare malignant tumor whose genetic basis is poorly understood. Here the authors identify recurrent deletions involving dystrophin in the majority of ONB patient tumors examined.

As presented at the 2025 ASCO Annual Meeting: in cohort 3 of the phase 2 TUXEDO-3 trial, patients with leptomeningeal metastatic disease from any solid tumor were treated with the HER3-targeting antibody–drug conjugate patritumab deruxtecan and showed encouraging 3-month overall survival rates.

Using a combination of MD simulations and NMR, the authors investigate how temperature affects allostery in imidazole glycerol phosphate synthase (IGPS), revealing that increase of temperature triggers local amino acid dynamics and providing insights into mechanism of allosteric regulation.

The Efimov effect is a universal phenomenon displaying an infinite tower of three-body bound states. Recently it was observed in an ultracold atomic gas, and now Efimov physics has been predicted to exist in a quantum magnet.

Reactive oxygen species can enhance B cell antigen receptor (BCR) signaling strength. Dyer and colleagues show that the voltage-gated proton channel HVCN1 associates with BCRs and contributes to BCR signaling via the generation of reactive oxygen species.

Ruthenium complexes with facially coordinating tripodal phosphine ligands are privileged catalysts for a broad range of (de-)hydrogenation-based transformations but the mechanism remains poorly understood. Here the authors present a detailed investigation on the triphos-Ru catalysed C–O bond scission on a molecular level.

The mechanisms underlying host-commensal coevolution are incompletely understood. Here the authors show that host adaptive immunity directs the evolution of Escherichia coliin the mouse gut towards host benefit by influencing the microbiome composition.

Objects moving through fluids and granular media experience drag forces that determine their dynamics. The authors consider the case of multiple objects moving through a low-density granular material and show that their dynamics are cooperative.

A diverse, multidisciplinary panel of 386 experts in COVID-19 response from 112 countries provides health and social policy actions to address inadequacies in the pandemic response and help to bring this public health threat to an end.

The authors report Bose–Einstein condensation of a two-magnon bound state in Na₂BaNi(PO₄)₂. This should stimulate further work on these types of geometrically frustrated materials.

The anomalous Hall effect is a macroscopic manifestation of a quantum mechanical effect. Here, Uelandet al. report the observation of a high Hall conductivity in the heavy-fermion compound UCu5, a metallic system, and explain its origin in terms of geometric frustration effects.

Ferroelectric materials are appealing for use in a range of technological applications. This study demonstrates the onset of ferroelectric behaviour in a superlattice structure that consists of three non-ferroelectric layers, suggesting ferroelectricity can also be induced by interface effects.

Schief and colleagues show that germline-targeting epitope scaffolds can elicit responses from rare broadly neutralizing antibody precursor B cells with predefined binding specificities and genetic features.

Variants of the 3′−5′ exonuclease TREX1 can cause retinal vasculopathy with cerebral leukoencephalopathy (RVCL). Here, the authors show that RVCL-associated TREX1 variants trigger DNA damage in humans, mice, and Drosophila, and render cells more vulnerable to DNA damage inducing agents.

Official data on the distribution of human population often ignores the changing spatio-temporal densities resulting from mobility. Here, authors apply an approach combining official statistics and geospatial data to assess intraday and monthly population variations at continental scale at 1 km² resolution.

Metal-ligand δ and φ interactions, though considered weak, may be necessary for fully describing the electronic and geometric structures of certain compounds. Here, in actinide metallacycles, the authors discover two new types of M-L δ and φ back-bonds that contribute substantially to their unusual chemical behavior.

Although action and motor imagery share similar population-wide neural responses in motor cortex, a subset of those responses exists in orthogonal action-unique and imagery-unique subspaces.

The behavior of exosomes in vivo is not completely elucidated. Here the authors develop a genetically engineered mouse model (ExoBow) to trace the distribution of exosomes, showing local and inter-organ communication networks, either specific or shared between healthy pancreas and pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

A spin-glass forms in frustrated magnetic systems when at low temperatures impurity sites “freeze” into a random spin configuration. Here, by looking back at previous experimental results, Syzranov and Ramirez show that the glass-transition temperature grows with decreasing impurity concentration.

Hennig et al. study how changes in internal state interact with learning in primates. They report stereotyped activity fluctuations in the motor cortex that reflect the animal’s level of engagement and predict how quickly the animals learned.

Fort et al. identify CYRI as a conserved negative modulator of Scar–WAVE-induced lamellipodia by interacting directly with active Rac1, thereby conferring pseudopod plasticity and dynamics during motility.

Confining plasma and managing disruptions in tokamak devices is a challenge. Here the authors demonstrate a method predicting and possibly preventing disruptions and macroscopic instabilities in tokamak plasma using data from JET.

Solid-state NMR snapshots of Aspergillus sydowii and other halophilic fungal species reveal the structural rearrangement of polysaccharides and proteins, which create a thick, stiff and hydrophobic cell wall to withstand external stress and thrive in hypersaline environment

Analysis of HbA1c and FPG levels across 117 population-based studies demonstrates regional variation in prevalence of previously undiagnosed screen-detected diabetes using one or both measures and suggests that use of elevated FPG alone could underestimate diabetes prevalence in low- and middle-income countries.

A detailed analysis of inelastic neutron scattering data, including the evaluation of entanglement witnesses used in quantum information theory, supports the proposal that the triangular-lattice antiferromagnet KYbSe₂ is close to a spin-liquid phase.

Magnetic skyrmions are topological spin textures, most notably occurring in magnetic materials. So far, the skyrmions that have been reported correspond to topological textures of magnetic dipole moments. Zhang et al show theoretically that quantum effects can lead to a distinct type of skyrmion that combines dipolar and quadrupolar moments, proposing a variety of materials, including magnets and quantum paramagnets, where such textures can be stabilized.

During learning, the new patterns of neural population activity that develop are constrained by the existing network structure so that certain patterns can be generated more readily than others.

Neural activity residing in a low-dimensional space that reflects specific correlation patterns among neurons can be used to maintain the performance of brain–computer interfaces in the presence of recording instabilities.

Antiferromagnetic excitonic insulators are a distinct form of excitonic insulator, in which electrons and holes are bound by magnetic exchange rather than Coulomb attraction. Here, Mazzone et al. show, using X-ray scattering, that Sr3Ir2O7 realizes this particular state.

Chiral gold nanoparticles coated with enantiomerically pure phenylalanine were assembled into nanoporous membranes, whose ionic conductivity depends on the handedness of the incident circularly polarized light.

Frustrated magnetic materials attract significant interest because their properties can become dominated by quantum fluctuations. Here the authors show that excitations in the plateau phase of a quantum magnet can be understood semiclassically even though the ground state involves strong quantum effects.