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The authors jointly assess the changes in land and ocean net primary production from 2003 to 2021. They show contrasting trends, with overall planetary increases (0.11 ± 0.13 PgC yr⁻¹) driven by terrestrial enhancement and offset by oceanic decline.

R2 retrotransposons are natural RNA guided gene insertion systems. Here, Edmonds et al. characterize the structure and biochemistry of an avian R2 and engineer a compact, all-RNA system to integrate DNA in mammalian cells, aiding the development of future retrotransposon-based gene editors.

Integrative analyses of transcriptome and whole-genome sequencing data for 1,188 tumours across 27 types of cancer are used to provide a comprehensive catalogue of RNA-level alterations in cancer.

The regulation of the E2F pathway remains incompletely established. Here the authors find that the O-GlcNAcylated FOXK1 associates with the deubiquitinase BAP1 to upregulate transcription of E2F target genes and promote cancer progression.

Combining attosecond metrology and soliton dynamics in hollow-core fibres, the generation of attosecond laser pulses from the deep-ultraviolet to the near-infrared regime and the measurement of attosecond solitons with 350-as durations at optical wavelengths are demonstrated, providing an efficient route to generate intense isolated attosecond pulses complementary to those based on high-harmonic generation in gases.

Aeneas, a generative neural network trained on ancient texts, helps historians contextualize inscriptions and perform epigraphic tasks, offering an improved starting point for historical research.

Inbreeding depression has been observed in many different species, but in humans a systematic analysis has been difficult so far. Here, analysing more than 1.3 million individuals, the authors show that a genomic inbreeding coefficient (FROH) is associated with disadvantageous outcomes in 32 out of 100 traits tested.

Longitudinal multi-omics reveals shifts to the human microbiome across multiple body sites and the associated immune responses during short-term spaceflight.

This study identifies genetic polymorphisms in PfRAD5 and PfWD11 as new markers of artemisinin resistance of malaria infections. These represent putative factors of the artemisinin resistance pathophysiological background along several differentially expressed transcripts.

Analysis of more than 95% of each diploid human genome of a four-generation, twenty-eight-member family using five complementary short-read and long-read sequencing technologies provides a truth set to understand the most fundamental processes underlying human genetic variation.

A single-cell sequencing study using more than 30,000 tumour genomes from human ovarian cancers shows that whole-genome doubling is an ongoing mutational process that drives tumour evolution and disrupts immunity.

Feuerer and colleagues use multiomic analyses to identify DNA methylation, chromatin accessibility and gene expression programs that govern the tissue adaptation of human skin T_reg cells.

The limitations of many experimental techniques make it difficult to obtain a clear picture of magnetic interactions in materials, leaving many important questions open. Yang et al. demonstrate that time-resolved two-magnon Raman scattering can probe the dynamics of antiferromagnetic YBa₂Cu₃O_6.1.

An expert-elicitation process identifies current methodological barriers for monitoring terrestrial biodiversity, and how technological and procedural development of robotic and autonomous systems may contribute to overcoming these challenges.

A brain-to-voice neuroprosthesis enables a man with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis to synthesize his voice in real time by decoding neural activity, demonstrating the potential of brain–computer interfaces to enable people with paralysis to speak intelligibly and expressively.

Viral pathogen load in cancer genomes is estimated through analysis of sequencing data from 2,656 tumors across 35 cancer types using multiple pathogen-detection pipelines, identifying viruses in 382 genomic and 68 transcriptome datasets.

The few options available for the measurement of in-plane and cross-plane thermal conductivity of covalent organic frameworks films limit their application for lightweight thermal management. Here, the authors measure both, the in-plane and cross-plane thermal conductivity of two dimensional covalent organic frameworks with different pore sizes using laser-based pump-probe techniques.

Analysis of cancer genome sequencing data has enabled the discovery of driver mutations. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium the authors present DriverPower, a software package that identifies coding and non-coding driver mutations within cancer whole genomes via consideration of mutational burden and functional impact evidence.

TGFβ signalling is reported to regulate hormone-responsive mammary epithelial progenitors that are associated with breast cancer risk. Here, the authors find that short-term TGFBR1 inhibition prevents tumour formation in rat breast cancer models and identify a TGFBR1 inhibition-responsive sub-population of mammary epithelial cells, which is associated with human breast cancer risk.

Understanding the physics of charge density waves in emerging superconductors may reveal insights into unconventional superconductivity mechanisms. Here, the authors study the temperature and magnetic-field dependence of charge-density-wave suppression in the unconventional superconductor UTe₂.

Bites by elapid snakes can result in life-threatening paralysis caused by α-neurotoxins blocking the neuromuscular nicotinic acetylcholine receptor. Here, the authors determine the cryo-EM structure of this receptor in complex with a short-chain α-neurotoxin.

Automated iterative small-molecule synthesis has generally been limited to around one carbon–carbon bond-forming step per day. Now, a next-generation automated synthesizer enables rapid, automated, iterative synthesis of a variety of small molecules. Improvements to chemistry and automation leads to a tenfold decrease in reaction time over previous automated platforms.

By studying cortical activity patterns during prey capture and spontaneous behavior in marmosets, the authors identify distinct subnetworks defined by reliable spike timing correlations. These subnetworks emerge during prey capture, with each potentially playing different roles in controlling reaching movements.

Mutational signature analysis of blood cells isolated from 23 chemotherapy-exposed samples and 9 nonexposed controls characterizes the effects of various drugs on mutational burden, signature exposure and cell types.

This Review summarizes clinical effectiveness, health economics and safety data on the parathyroid hormone receptor agonists teriparatide and abaloparatide, discussing potential strategies and drug combinations to achieve best outcomes in patients with osteoporosis.

Using a spatial reasoning task in mice, the authors show that retrosplenial cortex encodes spatial hypotheses with well-behaved recurrent dynamics, which can combine these hypotheses with incoming information to resolve ambiguities.

Multi-omics datasets pose major challenges to data interpretation and hypothesis generation owing to their high-dimensional molecular profiles. Here, the authors develop ActivePathways method, which uses data fusion techniques for integrative pathway analysis of multi-omics data and candidate gene discovery.

The chromatin-remodelling enzyme ATRX and the transcription factor HNF4A are identified as pivotal regulators of colonic epithelial identity, with roles in metastasis in colorectal cancer.

Timothy Frayling, Joel Hirschhorn, Peter Visscher and colleagues report a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies for adult height in 253,288 individuals. They identify 697 variants in 423 loci significantly associated with adult height and find that these variants cluster in pathways involved in growth and together explain one-fifth of the heritability for this trait.

This study reveals that Holocene warming and glacial retreat in West Antarctica reduced carbon sequestration but enhanced mercury burial in Ross Sea sediments, suggesting future warming could further accelerate carbon loss and mercury accumulation.

In this study, Aggarwal and colleagues perform prospective sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 isolates derived from asymptomatic student screening and symptomatic testing of students and staff at the University of Cambridge. They identify important factors that contributed to within university transmission and onward spread into the wider community.

The role of vascular plasticity in brain function remains poorly understood. Here, the authors demonstrate that a significant portion of blood vessels in the adult brain periodically occlude and regress, a process that is associated with a reduction in neuronal activity.

Stable microRNAs (miRNAs) can undergo turnover via target-directed miRNA degradation (TDMD). Here, the authors show that TDMD triggers in non-coding regions degrade miRNAs more effectively than those in coding regions, where translation interferes with this process.

An analysis of 24,202 critical cases of COVID-19 identifies potentially druggable targets in inflammatory signalling (JAK1), monocyte–macrophage activation and endothelial permeability (PDE4A), immunometabolism (SLC2A5 and AK5), and host factors required for viral entry and replication (TMPRSS2 and RAB2A).

A genome-wide study by the Long COVID Host Genetics Initiative identifies an association between the FOXP4 locus and long COVID, implicating altered lung function in its pathophysiology.

Cosmic rays flying through superconducting quantum devices create bursts of excitations that destroy qubit coherence. Rapid, spatially resolved measurements of qubit error rates make it possible to observe the evolution of the bursts across a chip.

A liquid-crystal-in-oil emulsion system exhibits bistable opacity or transparency, with rapid switching between the two, faster than, for example, electrochromics that can be found in smart windows.

Lauer and colleagues examine CD8⁺ T cells following cure of human hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. CD8⁺ T cells exposed to chronic HCV-specific activation show durable functional, phenotypic and transcriptional exhaustion that is maintained even after antigen stimulus is removed.

Green spaces are known to help cool cities, but they contribute humidity while reducing heat—and both matter. Using smart sensors mounted on bicycles, this study finds that daytime temperature reductions in urban green spaces are largely offset by humidity increases but that urban vegetation causes a net reduction in humid heat at night.

Polio remains a public health concern in Pakistan and Afghanistan and continuous surveillance is essential. Here, the authors analyse genetic sequence data collected from 2012-2023 and perform phylogeographic analyses to investigate virus spread, transmission routes, and trends in viral diversity and persistence.

Trees come in all shapes and size, but what drives this incredible variation in tree form remains poorly understood. Using a global dataset, the authors show that a combination of climate, competition, disturbance and evolutionary history shape the crown architecture of the world’s trees and thereby constrain the 3D structure of woody ecosystems.

A large outbreak of shigellosis occurred in Albuquerque, New Mexico in 2021–2023 and affected non-human primates at a local zoo as well as humans. Here, the authors describe the outbreak investigation and demonstrate that cases in non-human primates were caused by the same strain of Shigella flexneri as those causing human cases.