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Mechanical response of semiconducting polymers affects their electrical properties, yet the detail remains elusive. Zhong et al. examine the multiscale structural evolution of conjugated polymer thin films during uniaxial deformation and link it to mechanical resilience and solar cell performance.

By generating whole genomes of 150 participants representing 12 Khoe-San click-speaking groups, the authors, reveal over 1.3 million unknown DNA variants, distinct San and here described Damara genetic trajectories, while achieving century-long global predominance.

Autopsy brain studies can be distorted because time and temperature alter gene expression. Here, the authors show that neurons, then oligodendrocytes, sequentially activate artifact genes, and provide a tool to measure these effects in RNA sequencing data.

Plants require the plastid encoded RNA polymerase PEP to generate viable photosynthetic apparatus. Here the authors genetically engineer an optoswitch that enables photo-induced complementation of an albino mutant restoring transcription and chloroplast biogenesis on demand.

The limited tunability of threshold voltage is a major obstacle for applying two-dimensional transistors in post-silicon electronics. Here, the authors show that bimetallic thiophosphates, such as LiInP₂S₆, enable programmable threshold voltages in both n-type and p-type 2D transistors, leading to low-power, high-speed complementary logic inverters.

Gel ionotronics are typically easy to prepare, but control of local ionic character is unusual. Here, the authors report the combination of elastomers with photo-ion generators for photopatterned control of conductivity in the gel materials.

R2SP belongs to the R2TPlike quaternary chaperone family and consists of RUVBL1/RUVBL2 AAA+ ATPases, SPAG1 and PIH1D2. Here, authors combined biochemistry, NMR, structural MS and cryo-EM to investigate its 3D organization, mode of assembly and ATPase activity.

The APOE-ε4 allele is the strongest genetic risk factor for late-onset Alzheimer’s disease, but it is not deterministic. Here, the authors show that common genetic variation changes how APOE-ε4 influences cognition.

Here the authors compare genetic testing strategies in rare movement disorders, improve diagnostic yield with genome analysis, and establish CD99L2 as an X-linked spastic ataxia gene, showing that CD99L2–CAPN1 signaling disruption likely drives neurodegeneration.

Meningiomas are common brain tumors with variable behavior. This study reveals high STING expression across multiple cell types in the meningioma microenvironment. STING agonism triggers tumor cell death via programmed necrosis and pyroptosis, enhancing survival in preclinical models.

Alternative splicing generates diverse protein isoforms, yet the functions of most exons remain unknown. Here, the authors introduce scCHyMErA-Seq, a scalable single-cell CRISPR exon-deletion platform that maps exon-specific transcriptional functions shaping gene expression and cell-cycle states.

Skin-targeted siRNA therapies require optimized delivery to achieve therapeutic efficacy. Here, authors show that increasing conjugate hydrophobicity enhances siRNA skin retention and gene silencing in porcine and human models while limiting systemic tissue exposure.

It is unclear whether the harsh abiotic conditions of drylands hinder biological invasions. This global analysis shows that drylands are vulnerable to non-native plants and are likely to become more so as native plant diversity declines and grazing pressure intensifies.

From 2014–2017, marine heatwaves caused global mass coral bleaching, where the corals lose their symbiotic algae. The authors find, this event exceeded the severity of all prior global bleaching events in recorded history, with approximately half the world’s reefs bleaching and 15% experiencing substantial mortality.

GDF15 has been associated with cancer-associated cachexia. Here, the authors show that STK11/LKB1 loss-of-function mutations in non-small cell lung cancer result in an exaggerated integrated stress response culminating in the tumor cell secretion of the cytokine GDF15 promoting cachexia.

After two years of mass azithromycin distribution to preschool age children in rural Niger, in this study, authors present evidence that selection of antibiotic resistance genes was not spread from treated villages to nearby untreated villages.

Post-acute infection syndromes often have heterogeneous symptoms that are difficult to interpret. Here, the authors develop a latent trajectory analysis framework designed to categorise complex relationships in longitudinal data into distinct disease phenotypes and analyse transitions between them.

An outbreak of MPXV in sooty mangabeys in Côte d’Ivoire was linked to MPXV-infected fire-footed rope squirrels, providing direct evidence of interspecies transmission and indicating risk for zoonotic transmission of MPXV from both hosts.

Analysis combining multiple global tree databases reveals that whether a location is invaded by non-native tree species depends on anthropogenic factors, but the severity of the invasion depends on the native species diversity.

Phosphorylation-dephosphorylation and ubiquitination tune TCR signaling to avoid self-reactivity. Kim and colleagues show that acetylation also modulates TCR signaling.

Mucosal administration of a multivalent, adjuvanted vaccine against Clostridioides difficile promoted bacterial clearance and protected against morbidity, mortality, tissue damage and recurrence in mice.

The authors developed a microfluidic device, FIND-Chip, designed to automate and enhance oocyte recovery from follicular fluid, a process traditionally done manually. When used in clinical settings, the device recovered additional oocytes missed during manual screening, substantially increasing the number of viable oocytes available for in vitro fertilization.

Genome-wide association meta-analysis identifies 58 independent risk loci for major anxiety disorders among individuals of European ancestry and implicates GABAergic signaling as a potential mechanism underlying genetic risk for these disorders.

Neuroinflammation triggers DNA damage and subsequent parthanatos-mediated neuron death. Inhibiting parthanatos in a mouse model of autoimmune inflammation is neuroprotective and reduces disease-associated paralysis.

Jacquemyn et al. identify key lipid determinants controlling ectosome shedding from neurons. They find that ectosomes are a major route for the intercellular transport of misfolded α-synuclein, with relevance to Parkinson’s disease pathology.

TREM2 is an important AD risk factor playing essential roles in the microglial response to amyloid pathology. Here, authors show using a TREM2 reporter mouse that TREM2 levels are critical for efficacy of TREM2 agonism informing current clinical efforts.

Tan and colleagues present “cycling molecular assemblies” that borrow cellular lipidation machinery to build nanostructures inside the Golgi apparatus. These tools enable rapid organelle imaging and selective destruction of cancer cells.

Global Burden of Disease estimates show that between 1990 and 2023, the prevalence and burden of drug use disorders, inclusive of amphetamine, cannabis, cocaine and opioid use, have been increasing in high-income countries, particularly in the USA.

Crohn’s disease is associated with disturbances in the B-cell compartment and secreted antibodies. Here, the authors reveal impaired colonic dimeric IgA responses in patients with Crohn’s disease and verify this phenotype in murine models, demonstrating that mitochondrial dysfunction drives defective mucosal humoral immunity.

A measurement strategy is described that is able to read out the parity of minimal two-site Kitaev chains in real time, by coupling two Majoranas and resolving their quantum capacitance.

Using 63 globally distributed grassland and shrubland sites from the International Drought Experiment, this study identified plant traits linked to drought resistance after 1 year of extreme drought across growth forms, lifespans and climate.

Here, in a cross-sectional study of 209 individuals living in communities with contrasting Schistosoma mansoni endemicity in Uganda, the authors identify gut microbiome and metabolome signatures associated with S. mansoni infection and cardiovascular disease risk.

Electron transfer in molecular wires is typically dominated by tunnelling at short lengths. Now it is shown that conjugated molecular wires anchored to indium tin oxide electrodes exhibit a hopping mechanism even at 1-nm lengths, enabling charge extraction in tin perovskite solar cells and improved device performance.

This paper uses multiomics to profile a large cohort of meningioma samples to highlight the role of the tumor microenvironment in driving the epigenetic changes underpinning tumor classification and prediction of outcome.

New hominin fossils from the Grotte à Hominidés at Thomas Quarry I (ThI-GH) in Casablanca, Morocco, dated to around 773 thousand years ago are similar in age to Homo antecessor, yet are morphologically distinct.

The authors released NSD-synthetic, a dataset of 7T fMRI responses from the same eight NSD participants for 284 out-of-distribution synthetic images, to facilitate the development of more robust models of visual processing.

Identifying jets originating from heavy quarks plays a fundamental role in hadronic collider experiments. In this work, the ATLAS Collaboration describes and tests a transformer-based neural network architecture for jet flavour tagging based on low-level input and physics-inspired constraints.

The use of antimicrobial agents can exacerbate the proliferation of antimicrobial resistance genes, which can put public health at risk; evaluating this risk requires proper monitoring. An extensive investigation of Australian wastewater reveals a distinct correlation between the type of antimicrobial used and the socioeconomic status of the population.

Application of multiancestry and ensemble-based approaches yields improved polygenic risk prediction models for breast cancer and its subtypes among women of African ancestry.

A comprehensive atlas platform integrating transcriptional and epigenetic data enables more precise engineering of T cell states, accelerating the rational design of more effective cellular immunotherapies.

One of three back-to-back papers to show that dosage of BACH2 can modulate T cell differentiation and function and how we might apply this to enhance CAR T cell therapies for cancer.

KRAS mutations are keenly associated with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma and represent a potential therapeutic target. Here the authors present the findings from a phase I clinical trial testing pooled KRAS mutant peptides in combination with immune checkpoint blockade in patients with resected pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

A streamlined blood test using mass spectrometry improves measurement of amyloid-β for early Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis, requiring less sample volume and reagents while maintaining high accuracy, sensitivity and strong agreement with brain imaging.