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Seed traits are critical for soybean yield and quality. Here, the authors report a NF-YA transcription factor gene SW14 regulates soybean seed traits without affecting other agronomic traits by inhibiting GmLEC1-mediated transcriptional activation.

This study uses brain recordings, self-reports, and facial analysis to decode acute pain in epilepsy patients. Machine learning reveals stable neural markers in mesolimbic, striatal, and cortical regions, plus facial cues, enabling reliable pain detection in naturalistic settings.

Natural disasters induce power outages with unequal impacts on poverty and non-poverty counties in China. Climate change will further exacerbate this disparity.

CRISPR-based diagnostics are often limited by complex workflows and poor validation. Here the authors develop and validate a one-pot asymmetric CRISPR assay, which permits rapid and sensitive diagnosis of tuberculosis in a format which is suitable for resource-limited settings.

Thermal lepton pairs are ideal probes for the temperature of quark-gluon plasma. Here, the STAR Collaboration uses thermal electron-positron pair production to measure quark-gluon plasma average temperature at different stages of the evolution.

China’s cropland soil experienced acidification between the 1980s and about 2013 correlating with nitrogen fertilizer application patterns, followed by heterogeneous soil pH recovery, according to combined regional surveys and machine learning.

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.

Cartilage-targeted gene therapy is dependent on delivery efficiency. Here, the authors develop non-pathogenic, virus-inspired lipopeptide-based nanoplatforms to deliver nucleic acids to cartilage with increased transfection efficiency over conventional lipid nanoparticles.

Engineering an immune receptor improves resistance to bacterial and fungal pathogens in a variety of plants.

To fully realize LLMs’ potential value in clinical applications, effective methods to enhance their quality and credibility are required. Here, the authors present LINS, a framework to enhance medical LLM responses by integrating up-to-date evidence and supporting clinical tasks, and validate it through new physician-curated datasets and large-scale user trials.

Sweat sensors are important in personalized healthcare using natural oxidase to target biomolecules but these reactions are susceptible to external interference. Here, the authors report tryptophan- and histidine-treated copper metal-organic frameworks which show highly selective activity for ascorbate oxidation and can serve as an efficient ascorbate oxidase-mimicking material in sensitive sweat sensors.

A large perturbation model that integrates diverse laboratory experiments is presented to predict biological responses to chemical or genetic perturbations and support various biological discovery tasks.

Negative regulator of thermotolerance 1 (NAT1) is identified as a negative regulator of thermotolerance in rice through the NAT1–bHLH110–CER1/CER1L module. Modifying NAT1 by targeted gene editing increases wax deposition and enhances thermotolerance in rice.

G2E3-catalysed H3K14 mono-ubiquitination is crucial for SUV39H compartmentalization and H3K9 trimethylation in pericentromeric heterochromatin, which is essential for proper euchromatin organization and transcriptional regulation in mammalian cells.

Young adults face rising loneliness and mental health challenges. In a study of 5,192 undergraduates, Pei et al. find that perceiving peers as empathic is related to better well-being. Students, however, underestimate peers’ empathy. Two field experiments offered simple interventions that reduced this empathy perception gap and increased social behaviour and connection.

The commercialization of perovskite solar cells has been impeded by lead toxicity and environmental leakage risks. Here, the authors incorporate a cellulose material into perovskite crystal to suppress lead leakage, achieving an optimal efficiency of 26.27% in environmentally stable devices.

NaHCO₃ production is energy- and cost-intensive. Here the authors report an operando electrosynthesis system by embedding nitrate reduction reaction into Solvay system, achieving high NaHCO₃ productivity even up to 4.58 times of benchmark industrial route.

Enzyme design with non-canonical amino acids has achieved rapid progress in biocatalysis. Here, the authors present an efficient strategy for the design of artificial enzymes with unnatural catalytic center by the combination of non-canonical amino acid biosynthesis and genetic incorporation into protein of interest.

This study reports that the gene SMPED1, located in a previously identified dichogamy-determining region in Alpinia species, controls the timing of sex-organ synchrony, improving our understanding of the evolutionary mechanisms of plant sexual diversity.

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.

Liang et al. estimate the prevalence of text modified by large language models in recent scientific papers and preprints, finding widespread use (up to 17.5% of papers in computer science).

Transcription factors must retain specificity despite recognising a variety of DNA sequences. Here, the authors find that the transcription factor AflR does this by using its structured and disordered regions together to recognise DNA sequences.

The Macaque Biobank initiated by Zhang et al. provides a comprehensive genetic and phenotypic characterization of Chinese rhesus macaques (CRMs). This resource enhances our understanding of the genetic diversity of CRMs and holds potential for biomedical research.

A single umbilical cord blood unit of CD34⁺ HSPCs produces a high number of CD19 CAR-iNK cells using a modified cell culture method.

The pachycephalosaurian Zavacephale rinpoche, from the Early Cretaceous of Mongolia, provides crucial insights into the early evolution of dome-headed dinosaurs, including the development of the frontoparietal dome and decoupling of sociosexual and somatic maturity.

Garnet-type LLZO electrolytes are considered among the most promising solid-state electrolytes for all-solid-state batteries; however, numerous challenges need to be addressed before they are integrated into a cell. By precipitating amorphous zirconium oxide onto grain boundaries, increased ionic conductivity is observed and dendrite growth is suppressed.

A comprehensive phylogeny and taxonomy for the medically and ecologically important genus Artemisia remain unavailable. Here, the authors combine genomic data with morphological analyses to reconstruct the most comprehensive phylogeny and taxonomy of global Artemisia.

Lead (Pb) isotopes from a ferromanganese crust reveal that during lukewarm interglacials before the Mid-Brunhes Event, stronger deep Southern Ocean stratification limited CO₂ release, helping keep atmospheric CO₂ levels lower.

Genetic basis of the drought tolerance of upland rice is unclear. Here, the authors report the cloning of a COBRA-like protein encoding gene DROT1 and reveal that it is repressed by ERF3 and activated by ERF71 to help control the balance between growth and drought tolerance in upland rice.

Shear stiffening gels have promise in impact protection, but can have problems with toxicity and corrosion. Here, the authors report the development of a boron-free material based on a shear-stiffening polytitanosiloxane network through a metal-ion-mediated hydrogen bond enhancement strategy.

All-solid-state batteries require external high pressure for good contact between the solid electrolyte and electrodes. Here the authors introduce iodine anions into electrolytes to form interphases that adapt to morphology at the interface, lifting the dependence on high pressure.

Adaptive optical vision Fourier transformer (AOViFT) is a machine learning-based framework for accurately inferring aberrations and restoring diffraction-limited performance in diverse biological specimens.

Using data from the CoVPN 3008 study, the authors show that the neutralizing antibody correlate of risk holds in people living with HIV. However, the nAb correlate was weaker and shorter-lived in a vaccine-immunity versus hybrid-immunity population.

Control over photo-activated phosphorescence lifetime and photo-activated time is desirable, but manipulation within a given material is challenging. Here, the authors report a method to increase phosphorescence emission by consumption of oxygen within the polymer matrix.

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.

The authors propose a design strategy of multiscale engineering to boost the polar entropy of BaTiO3-based system, by which the large and flexible polarization change can be offered synchronously, availing superior electrocaloric performance.

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.

Here, Ni-anchored Ru/RuO₂ heterostructure nanosheets serve as CO-tolerant hydrogen oxidation catalyst delivering a peak power density of 1.76 W cm^-2, along with long-term stability in an alkaline exchange membrane fuel cell operating under H₂/Air conditions.

This study provides a single-cell and spatial atlas of the prometastatic tumor microenvironment in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma and characterizes the immunosuppressive function of GPR116⁺ pericytes in cancer metastasis and immune evasion.

Pseudokinases are non-canonical protein-kinase-like proteins deficient in kinase activity, few of which have enzymatic activity that differs from phosphorylation. Now a pseudokinase-enabled cyclization activity for the biosynthesis of ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides has been observed. Here pseudokinases can catalyse a Michael addition for (ene)thioether crosslinking through a sandwich-like substrate-assisted process.

High performance dielectric polymers are applicable to power conversion systems for renewable energy generation and electric vehicles. Here, the authors report the melt blending of multiple immiscible polymers to achieve high dielectric permittivity while retaining low dielectric loss tangent.

Anthropogenic climate change is projected to cause “Day Zero Drought”, when water demand exceeds supply, emerging as early as 2030 and occurring more frequently than recovery allows, posing escalating risks to regions worldwide.

Klein and colleagues characterize 04_A06, a new V_H1-2-encoded broadly neutralizing antibody that has marked breadth and potency against extended multiclade HIV-1 pseudovirus panels and can maintain full viral suppression in HIV-1-infected humanized mice.

Artificial cilia array devices are developed for sound frequency decoding and executing tasks such as drug release.

Rudensky and colleagues demonstrate a context-dependent differential requirement for Foxp3 for T_reg cell transcriptional and functional programs.

Wheat powdery mildew resistance is typically controlled by single-gene-encoded resistance protein. Here, the authors report the cloning of powdery mildew resistance locus PmWR183 and show that it encodes two adjacent nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat proteins originated from wild emmer wheat.

In a phase 1 trial, the co-infusion of CD19-targeting and BCMA-targeting CAR-T cells in adults with treatment-refractory lupus was safe and had promising efficacy, with most patients achieving remission after 3 months.