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Müller glia are a type of retinal glial cell important for maintaining retinal structure and implicated in response to retinal damage. Here the authors identify Brevican, a chondroitin sulfate proteoglycan, as a microRNA-modulated regulator of Müller glia function.

Inhibition of histone deacetylation allows the transcription factor Ascl1 to bind to key gene loci in Müller glia and drive the functional generation of retinal neurons in adult mice.

Using inbred medaka strains, the authors mapped 59 genetic loci linked to heart rate. Gene editing validated conserved genes affecting heart rate and morphology, highlighting the power of isogenic strains in uncovering mechanisms of cardiac traits and disease.

A new version of nanorate DNA sequencing, with an error rate lower than five errors per billion base pairs and compatible with whole-exome and targeted capture, enables epidemiological-scale studies of somatic mutation and selection and the generation of high-resolution selection maps across coding and non-coding sites for many genes.

Small cell lung cancer cells form functional synapses with glutamatergic neurons, receiving synaptic transmissions and deriving a proliferative advantage from these interactions.

The products and dynamics in mutual neutralisation of \({{{{\rm{O}}}}_{2}}^{+}\) with O⁻ occurring in atmospheric sprites are unknown. Here, the authors reveal a dissociative two-step mechanism via intermediate Rydberg states and a dependence on the \({{{{\rm{O}}}}_{2}}^{+}\) vibrational state.

Using two wavelengths to activate different photoreactions in a resin system has attracted attention in the scientific community. Here, the authors use wavelength orthogonal photochemistry to spatially control the curing kinetics of a thiol-ene photopolymerization reaction.

Diabetic retinal disease describes the spectrum of pathophysiological retinal changes due to diabetes mellitus. In this Primer, Sivaprasad et al. review the epidemiology, mechanisms, diagnosis and management of diabetic retinal disease, and highlight patient quality of life and future research areas.

The quark structure of the f₀(980) hadron is still unknown after 50 years of its discovery. Here, the CMS Collaboration reports a measurement of the elliptic flow of the f₀(980) state in proton-lead collisions at a nucleon-nucleon centre-of-mass energy of 8.16 TeV, providing strong evidence that the state is an ordinary meson.

Seismological and geodetic data are used together with a machine learning earthquake catalogue to reconstruct magma migration before and during the 2025 volcano–tectonic crisis at Santorini volcano, indicating a coupling between Santorini and Kolumbo.

CELLFIE, a CRISPR platform for optimizing cell-based immunotherapies, identifies gene knockouts that enhance CAR T cell efficacy using in vitro and in vivo screens.

CD123 expression on leukemic stem and progenitor cells (LSPCs) and leukemic blasts representing a promising therapeutic target. However previous CD123-targeting approaches had limited efficacy and safety concerns. The authors here evaluate the bispecific CD123/CD16A innate cell engager AFM28 and manifest its efficacy both in vitro and in vivo, which is mediated by NK cells.

Complex neuropathologies, like macular degeneration, are common but incompletely understood. Here the authors report a complex human retina pathology organoid model induced by HBEGF-TNF, causing PIEZO1-mediated photoreceptor degeneration by cell extrusion.

Analysis of soundscape data from 139 globally distributed sites reveals that sounds of biological origin exhibit predictable rhythms depending on location and season, whereas sounds of anthropogenic origin are less predictable. Comparisons between paired urban–rural sites show that urban green spaces are noisier and dominated by sounds of technological origin.

Here the authors present an approach that can reveal the full complement of mRNA isoforms encoded by individual genes, and they identify a major isoform of the retinal degeneration gene CRB1 which functions at the cell-cell junctions of the outer limiting membrane to promote photoreceptor survival.

Peer review information: Nature Communications thanks Shiqing Deng, and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. A peer review file is available.

R-loops formed by RNA hybridization to DNA template strand during transcription influence HIV-1 integration into the CD4⁺ T cell genome. The unwinding of R-loops by splicing helicase Aquarius facilitates integration into speckle-associated domains.

Microporous hydrogels have potential in 3D tissue culture, but precise control over pore formation is challenging. Here, the authors report the use of photopolymerization-induced phase separation to prepare hydrogels suitable for 3D cell culture and bioprinting.

Despite their differences, the rarer sarcoma CIC::DUX4 sarcoma (CDS) is typically treated with therapies developed for Ewing Sarcoma (EwS) with limited success. Here, the authors develop a co-clinical drug response profiling platform to establish patient-derived CDS and EwS tumoroids, identifying MCL1 inhibition as a promising therapeutic approach in CDS.

Prions are infectious agents that initiate transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. The study demonstrates that Prion proteins lower cellular oxidative stress via GPX8, remodel membrane lipids, and together with RAC3, sensitize cells to ferroptotic death, highlighting new therapeutic targets in prion diseases.

Reconstruction of super resolution structured illumination microscopy (SR-SIM) datasets typically relies upon commercial software. Here Müller et al.present an open-source ImageJ plugin to facilitate reconstruction of SR-SIM data from a broad range of microscopy platforms.

Achieving phosphorus circularity is a key challenge to realizing sustainable phosphorus use, and recycling is a major route to accomplish this goal. This Review explores global barriers to phosphorus recycling and discusses approaches to overcome the technical, economic and societal challenges in attaining sustainable phosphorus management.

The Li lab mapped molecularly distinct Purkinje cell (PC) subtypes in 3D and linked them to adult cerebellar architecture. They found that Foxp1/Foxp2 are essential for PC diversity and that Foxp1⁺ PCs are required for the formation of the cerebellar hemisphere.

As proof of principle, an analysis using a suite of human-aligned immunocompetent mouse models of hepatocellular carcinoma identifies a promising therapeutic candidate, cladribine, which acts in a highly effective subtype-specific manner in combination with standard-of-care therapy.

This study used fine-mapping to analyze genetic regions associated with bipolar disorder, identifying specific risk genes and providing new insights into the biology of the condition that may guide future research and treatment approaches.

The Connectome 2.0 MRI scanner reconstructs the fine fibres in the human brain and determines cellular and axonal size at an ultra-high resolution.

A global network of researchers was formed to investigate the role of human genetics in SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 severity; this paper reports 13 genome-wide significant loci and potentially actionable mechanisms in response to infection.

Significant process has been made in using one carbon sources toward biomanufacturing. Here, the authors explore how to strength its competitiveness, and highlight latest technologies and the released patents.

Using multi-ancestry genome-wide association study and fine-mapping, 298 loci and 36 credible genes are identified in the aetiology of bipolar disorder.

Melanie Bahlo and colleagues perform the first genome-wide association analysis for macular telangiectasia type 2. They identify three significant loci and report on a potential connection to the glycine/serine metabolism pathway.

Segmentation and classification of microstructures are required by quality control and materials development. The authors apply deep learning for the segmentation of complex phase steel microstructures, providing a bridge between experimental and computational methods for materials analysis.

Natural products have historically made a major contribution to pharmacotherapy, but also present challenges for drug discovery, such as technical barriers to screening, isolation, characterization and optimization. This Review discusses recent technological developments — including improved analytical tools, genome mining and engineering strategies, and microbial culturing advances — that are enabling a revitalization of natural product-based drug discovery.

Autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD) is characterized by progressive cyst formation and loss of kidney function, yet prognostic biomarkers remain limited. Here, the authors show that serum proteomics identifies protein signatures associated with disease severity, enabling improved risk prediction and stratified management.

Existing solutions based Advanced Encryption Standard to address the security issues of nonvolatile memories incurs significant performance and power overhead. Here, the authors propose a lightweight XOR-gate based encryption/decryption technique by exploiting in-situ array operations, which achieves significant area/latency/power reduction compared to conventional designs.

Bifunctional methyltransferase–cyclases both transfer a methyl group to alkenes and induce cyclization—a process called methylcyclization. Now a non-enzymatic silver(I)-mediated electrophilic methylcyclization has been reported. The reaction uses commercial reagents, is applicable to a wide range of substrates and affords structures that are difficult to access by conventional synthetic methods.

Observations of the formation of individual stripes in a mixed-dimensional cold-atom Fermi–Hubbard quantum simulator are described, enhancing understanding of the phase diagram of high-temperature superconducting materials and the relationship between charge pairs and stripes.

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.

Cloning an unknown quantum state is challenging and the limit on the quality of clones is set by the no-cloning theorem. Here, the authors demonstrated the surpassing of such a limit using an effective quantum cloner based on a hybrid probabilistic-deterministic linear amplifier.

Hegazy and colleagues demonstrate that epithelial oncostatin M receptor expression drives gut inflammation and tumor formation.