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With thousands of papers being published everyday, it can be a task working out which matter. Here are some tips to help you decide.

Laser-driven ultrafast tranmission electron microscopy (UTEM) approaches such as stroboscopic UTEM enable the study of ultrafast reversible processes at time resolutions at the femtosecond scale and beyond. This Primer focuses on stroboscopic UTEM, describing its experimental set-up and variants, and covers the various applications of this technique in condensed matter physics, including imaging structural dynamics, photo-induced near-field electron microscopy, attosecond-scale imaging, dark-field imaging and beyond.

At equilibrium, the ferroelectric polarization is proportional to the strain. At ultrafast timescales, an above-bandgap laser excitation decouples strain and polarization, which, out of equilibrium, is mainly determined by the photoexcited electrons.

In correlated materials, new phases emerge when the balance between many-body interactions is perturbed. Here, Ma et al. induce a mosaic charge-density-wave phase out of Mott insulating state in layered 1T-TaS₂by voltage pulses, which reveals a dominating role of interlayer stacking order.

Zhang et al. unveil that asymmetrically-dividing neural stem cells (NSCs) differentially propagate cell fate memory to future NSCs versus differentiating progenitors through a dual mitotic bookmarking and selective molecular competition mechanism.

Multiplexed error-robust fluorescence in situ hybridization (MERFISH) together with deep-learning-based nucleus segmentation enabled the construction of a highly detailed and informative spatially resolved single-cell atlas of human fetal cortical development.

Thermoelectric materials are required to be electrically conducting while thermally insulating, which can be challenging to achieve. Here, the authors report a thermoelectric transport regime with defect tolerant charge transport but defect intolerant heat propagation in two-dimensional coordination polymer films.

The photocatalytic reforming of plastics into value-added chemicals offers a promising strategy to address environmental challenges while providing significant energy benefits. Here, the authors develop modified carbon nitride with enhanced visible light absorption, effectively anchoring under-coordinated IrN₂O₂ sites to catalyze the oxidation of persistent plastic derivatives.

Depletion of a transcriptional factor ZBTB11 using molecular glue degraders can overcome oxidative-phosphorylation-mediated KRAS inhibitor resistance in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma with low acute neurotoxicity.

Deep learning enables large-scale protein structure prediction, yet linking structure to function remains a challenge. Here, the authors use topology to reveal fundamental organising features of the protein universe, providing insights into domain architecture, binding sites, evolution, and disease.

Nonlinear optical phonons often exhibit rapid decay. Here, the authors demonstrate long-lived nonlinear optical phonons through the spontaneous formation of phonon frequency combs in CrXTe₃ (X=Ge,Si).

Since publication of the first issue of Nature Reviews Nephrology 20 years ago, advances across various subspecialities of nephrology have provided insights into disease processes and led to the development of new therapeutics for people with kidney disease. However, despite this progress, many kidney diseases remain untreatable, the costs of kidney disease care are immense, and vast inequities persist in disease burden and access to care. In this Viewpoint, we ask experts from several key subspecialties of nephrology to reflect on progress made over the past 20 years, remaining challenges and the steps needed to move the field forward.

While the contribution of sharp wave ripples in memory consolidation and decision-making is established in rodent models, our understanding of their role in human memory is incomplete. Here, the authors discuss common methodological challenges in detecting, analyzing, and reporting sharp wave ripples, then they suggest practical solutions to distinguish them from other high-frequency events

The authors report resonant soft x-ray scattering and polarimetry measurements on epitaxial thin films of La3Ni2O7. They find a diagonal bicollinear double spin stripe order, with no evidence of charge modulation.

This study identifies an electrically anisotropic layer within the lithospheric mantle of the Superior Craton, interpreted as a network of preferentially oriented phlogopite-bearing domains emplaced as a result of Proterozoic geodynamic activity.

A high-bandwidth neuromotor interface offers performant out-of-the-box generalization across people.

Magmas beneath the Main Ethiopian Rift ascend through the crust on timescales of only weeks to months, indicating that, during continental rifting, a magmatic plumbing system can be well established before the lithosphere has thinned.

Carbon-based rods can adsorb water at low humidity and release it at high humidity through a reversible physical process that is associated with the dynamic spacing between rods.

Using viral barcode tracing to detect interactions between glioblastoma cells and non-malignant astrocytes in patient samples, investigators discovered a pathway that reduces tumour-specific immunity and identified potential therapeutic targets.

This study shows that over the past three decades, the interior of East Antarctica has experienced significant warming due to changes in atmospheric circulation, which are attributed to warming in the southern Indian Ocean.

A structure homologous to the mammalian claustrum exists in reptiles and has a role in generating sharp waves in the brain during slow-wave sleep.

Here, the authors developed a plasma cell-free RNA test for early PDAC detection in high-risk and symptomatic patients.

The mechanisms underlying gut microbial metabolite (GMM) contribution towards alcohol-mediated cardiovascular disease (CVD) are unknown. Herein, the authors reveal that alcohol-induced microbial reorganization and resultant elevation in GMM phenylacetylglutamine, directly contributes to CVD.

Magnetic reconnection, thought to drive solar eruptions, has been studied with remote sensing. The Parker Solar Probe has directly measured reconnection-associated plasma properties in situ in the solar corona, deepening our understanding of the process.

The mechanisms by which Xist, a long non-coding RNA, silences one X chromosome in female mammals are unknown; here a mass spectrometry-based approach is developed to identify several proteins that interact directly with Xist, including the transcriptional repressor SHARP that is required for transcriptional silencing through the histone deacetylase HDAC3.

Clonal or isogenic model organisms allow for controlled replication, but their isolation from natural systems compromises their relevance for ecology and evolution research. However, a substantial number of vertebrate species reproduce clonally in nature and are an underused resource.

In this prespecified interim analysis of the KEYNOTE-756 phase 3 trial, pembrolizumab and chemotherapy treatment of patients with high-risk, early-stage, estrogen receptor-positive/human epidermal growth factor receptor-negative breast cancer improved the pathological complete response rate compared with chemotherapy alone.

Cover cropping has been used in climate-smart agriculture due to benefits such as reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, but it can also have negative effects, such as decreased yields. Here the authors assess the various effects of cover crop adoption in the USA using data from over 100,000 fields.

To better understand the etiology of frailty, the authors perform a large genetic study. They identified 45 additional variants and implicated MET, CHST9, ILRUN, APOE, CGREF1 and PPP6C as potential causal genes, linking frailty to immune regulation, metabolism and cellular signaling.

A genomic barcoding scheme called two-layer DNA seqFISH+ enables the simultaneous mapping of more than 100,000 loci and has been used to identify cell-type-specific subnuclear compartments in the mouse brain.

Scale-invariant magnetic anisotropy in RuCl₃ has been revealed through measurements of its magnetotropic coefficient, providing evidence for a high degree of exchange frustration that favours the formation of a spin liquid state.

The flagship paper of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes Consortium describes the generation of the integrative analyses of 2,658 cancer whole genomes and their matching normal tissues across 38 tumour types, the structures for international data sharing and standardized analyses, and the main scientific findings from across the consortium studies.

Parks, Schneider et al. show that brain states like sleep and wake can be reliably detected from milliseconds of neural activity in local regions in mice. Regions can briefly switch states independently, coinciding with fleeting behavioral changes.

The authors demonstrate a nanoscale particle-exchange heat engine using a diradical molecule coupled to superconducting electrodes. By driving a phase transition into the Yu-Shiba-Rusinov regime, they achieve a fivefold boost in thermoelectric power, enabling advances in cryogenic heat recovery and quantum cooling.

In cohort B of the phase 2 SWOG S1512 trial, pembrolizumab monotherapy in patients with unresectable desmoplastic melanoma elicited a complete response rate of 37% and an objective response rate of 89%, supporting a new treatment option for this tumor type.

Meningeal immunity represents an emerging focus in neuroimmune interactions with implications for vaccine development. Here, the authors review how insights from meningeal immunity are being integrated into vaccine innovation, with implications for treating CNS tumors, infectious diseases, and age-related neuroinflammation.

Experiments suggest that placing molecules in an infrared cavity alters their reactivity, an effect lacking a clear theoretical explanation. Here, the authors show that the key to understanding this process may lie in quantum light-matter interactions.

This large integrated analysis of the KRAS^G12C inhibitor sotorasib clinical efficacy biomarkers from the phase 2 CodeBreaK 100 and phase 3 CodeBreaK 200 trials shows that low expression of TTF-1 and high expression of NRF2 determine anti-tumor efficacy of sotorasib in non–small-cell lung cancer.

Exploratory post hoc analysis of molecular residual disease from the ADAURA trial of adjuvant osimertinib in patients with resected EGFR-mutated stage IB–IIIA non-small-cell lung cancer shows that molecular residual disease detection predicts disease recurrence with long-term adjuvant osimertinib treatment.

In most compounds, a roughly linear rise in thermal conductivity (k) with pressure (P) is observed. Here, the authors predict boron phosphide exhibits what may be the steepest rise in k with P of any compound followed by a peak and drop in k due to the action of phonon-scattering selection rules.

Aldol condensation is an important reaction in polymer synthesis, but due to the lack of reliable analytical methods, direct evidence of the polymer microstructure and sequence has remained elusive. Here, the authors combine electrospray deposition and scanning tunnelling microscopy to image four n-type polymers at sub-monomer resolution, revealing and quantifying unexpected structural defects intrinsic to the aldol condensation process.