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A new artificial intelligence model, DeepSeek-R1, is introduced, demonstrating that the reasoning abilities of large language models can be incentivized through pure reinforcement learning, removing the need for human-annotated demonstrations.

The authors report suspended Lamb-wave resonators using sub-100 nm ultrathin lithium niobate, achieving resonant frequencies of nearly 220 GHz-doubling prior records and holding exciting prospects for terahertz nanomechanics.

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.

Ferromagnetic systems produced by the transition metal doping of semiconductors may be used as components of spintronic devices. Here, a new ferromagnet, Li_1+y(Zn_1-xMn_x)As, is prepared in bulk quantities and shown to have a critical temperature approaching 50 K.

A new methodology for the discovery of chalcogenides by tuning the temperature and flux ratios of systems using mixed fluxes is demonstrated, leading to the synthesis of 30 new and unreported compounds or compositions.

Battery recyclability presents a sustainability challenge in materials design. Now it has been shown that aramid amphiphile self-assembly yields solid-state electrolytes with fast ion conductivity and electrochemical stability, which disassemble to the monomeric state upon solvent exposure, enabling inherently recyclable, molecularly engineered battery designs.

Layered positive electrode materials inevitably face air exposure during manufacturing. Here, authors show that single-crystalline Ni-rich layered oxides suffer greater performance degradation upon air exposure due to the defects and strain caused by surface lattice distortion and phase transition.

The Einstein Probe has discovered a fast X-ray transient, EP240414a, associated with a broad-lined type Ic supernova. Its unusually soft spectrum and weak jet add to the diversity of stellar deaths and suggest a previously unknown Wolf–Rayet star explosion mechanism.

Zinc-ion batteries face challenges like dendrite formation, limiting their performance. Here, authors reveal that high-current deposition forms (002) textured Zn, enhancing cycling life, and propose guidelines for optimizing battery cycling protocols based on advanced in situ XRD analysis.

Ion exchange is a powerful method to access metastable materials for energy storage, but identifying lithium and sodium interchange in layered oxides remains challenging. Using such model materials, vacancy level and corresponding lithium preference are shown to be crucial for ion exchange pathway accessibility.

Intercalation-type metal oxides are promising anodes for Li-ion batteries but suffer from low energy and power density together with cycling instability. A nanostructured rock-salt Nb₂O₅ formed via amorphous-to-crystalline transformation during cycling with Li⁺ is shown to exhibit enhanced performance.

Water has a role to play in the future of cooling but is currently limited by the lack of meaningful control methods. Here, authors demonstrate the ability of electrostatic fields to act as a catalyst for water-based evaporative cooling, paving the way for widescale adoption of evaporative cooling.

The interfaces in perovskite solar cells are critical to the device performance. Li et al. tune the bond strength of the interfacial molecule with the perovskite and the electron transport layer, increasing the power conversion efficiency of the cells.

Standard approaches for identifying pleiotropic genetic variants may lead to spurious results. Here the authors present a new statistical method and show that it uncovers five genes linked to metabolites in METSIM participants, which were previously undetected by existing methods.

In situ liquid-cell electrochemical transmission electron microscopy allows the direct visualization of the transformation of lithium polysulfides over electrode surfaces at the atomic scale, leading to a new energy-storage mechanism in lithium–sulfur batteries.

Designing electrode architectures for Li-ion batteries that can be reversibly accessible for ion storage can be challenging. Using operando techniques the mechanistic origin of lithiation-induced phase transformations in a V₂O₅ model cathode is now clarified.

A combination of adenovirus-vectored and subunit protein intranasal vaccine enhances immune response against SARS-CoV-2 variants in animal models and humans.

Lithium-rich layered oxides are promising cathode materials for next-generation batteries, but they suffer from long-standing problems such as voltage decay during cycling. Here the authors analyse the root cause of voltage decay and present a structure engineering strategy to mitigate the issue for a cobalt-free, lithium-rich layered oxide.

Preparing two-dimensional heterolayers by vertically stacking chemically different layers with multiple anions remains challenging. Now, a general approach for the synthesis of heterolayered oxychalcogenides using molten hydroxides as unconventional solutions for the rapid stacking of oxide and chalcogenide layers with precise composition control is demonstrated.

The calorimetric determination of enthalpies of mixing in multi-component molten salt systems often relies on empirical models that lack physically interpretable parameters. Here, the authors use the molecular interaction volume model (MIVM) to integrate experimentally measured enthalpies and solvation structures from ab initio molecular dynamics simulations to extrapolate excess Gibbs energy and determine the compositional dependence of La³⁺ activity in the LaCl₃-(LiCl-KCl) system.

Red light- or ultrasound-controlled proximity labelling is engineered to stimulate clustering-induced receptor activation and downstream signalling amplification to promote antitumour immune responses.

This study introduces the Cattle Cell Atlas, a single-cell expression resource including 1,793,854 cells from 59 tissues. Integrative analyses leveraging this atlas provide insights into the biology underlying bovine monogenic and complex traits.

Long-lasting oxygen catalysts are crucial for rechargeable zinc-air batteries. Here, the authors report that placing tungsten atoms next to iron atoms within N₄ units creates durable Fe-N₄/W-N₄ diatomic sites, enabling a zinc-air battery to cycle reliably for more than 10,000 h.

Olivine iron phosphate (FePO₄) is widely proposed for electrochemical lithium extraction, but particles with different physical attributes demonstrate varying Li preferences. Here, the authors characterize the electrochemical lithiation and sodiation behavior of a series of FePO₄ particles with different morphology to identify critical features that enhance Li selectivity.

Diluted magnetic semiconductors are promising spintronic materials, however the simultaneous doping of charge and magnetic moment has prevented synthesis of bulk samples. This work reports the synthesis of a bulk magnetic semiconductor (Ba_1−xK_x)(Zn_1−yMn_y)₂As₂with Curie temperatures up to 180 K.

Enhancing the superconducting temperature is often the main driver of synthetic studies of novel superconducting materials. Now, an approach yielding an air-stable iron selenide system that superconducts up to 40 K is reported.

Zinc batteries are receiving growing attention due to their sustainability merits not shared by lithium-ion technologies. Here the aqueous electrolyte design features unique solvation structures that render Zn–air pouch cell excellent cycling stability in a wide temperature range from −60 to 80 °C.

Metal-fluoride-based lithium-ion battery cathodes are typically classified as conversion materials because reconstructive phase transitions are presumed to occur upon lithiation. Metal fluoride lithiation is now shown to be dominated instead by diffusion-controlled displacement mechanisms.

Analysis of samples from the asteroid Ryugu provide evidence of late fluid flow in a carbonaceous asteroid, indicating that such bodies may have retained two to three times more water than previously thought.

While Bell inequalities have been violated several times—mostly in photonic systems—their violations within particle physics experiments are less explored. Here, the BESIII Collaboration showcases Bell-violating nonlocal correlations between entangled hyperon pairs.

Earth-abundant TiO₂ is a promising negative electrode material for low-cost sodium-ion batteries. Here, authors show that ordered rocksalt NaTiO₂ nanograins are in situ formed by electrochemically cycling with Na⁺ ions in anatase TiO₂, which determines the pseudocapacitive high-rate capability.

The authors present SVclone, a computational method for inferring the cancer cell fraction of structural variants from whole-genome sequencing data.

It is challenging to decipher electrochemical processes, especially at the molecular scale, inside a working battery. Here Tarascon and colleagues develop a technique that pairs optical fibre sensors with operando infrared spectroscopy to reveal the dynamic mechanisms of key processes in commercial Li-ion and Na-ion batteries.

The death of massive stars has traditionally been discovered by explosive events in the gamma-ray band. Liu et al. show that the sensitive wide-field monitor on board Einstein Probe can reveal a weak soft-X-ray signal much earlier than gamma rays.

A vanadium-based lithium-rich disordered rock salt oxide is shown to work as a low-potential anode with rapid intercalation kinetics for lithium-ion batteries.

Voltage fade is a major obstacle for the efficient use of lithium-rich layered oxide materials in batteries. Here, the authors reveal the link between voltage fade and nucleation of a mobile dislocation network in the oxide nanoparticles, offering design ideas to restore the voltage.

Cooperative paramagnetism refers to a strongly correlated state without long range magnetic order that occurs in frustrated magnetic systems between the Neel temperature and Curie-Weiss temperature. Here, using resonant elastic magnetic and inelastic x-ray scattering, Terilli et al find a spectrally sharp gapped magnetic excitations that persists above the Neel temperature in Y₂Ir₂O₇, implying a cooperative paramagnetic phase.

The study of isotopes away from the beta stability valley is crucial for the understanding of nuclear structure, especially for neutron-deficient heavy nuclei. Here, the authors report the observation of the alpha-decay isotope 210-protactinium (Pa), extending the alpha-decay systematics of underexplored regions of the nuclides chart.

An ex vivo model and pre-clinical study in a brain-dead recipient provide enzyme-converted O organs to avoid hyperacute rejection in ABO-incompatible kidney transplant patients.

A hybrid analogue–digital quantum simulator is used to demonstrate beyond-classical performance in benchmarking experiments and to study thermalization phenomena in an XY quantum magnet, including the breakdown of Kibble–Zurek scaling predictions and signatures of the Kosterlitz–Thouless phase transition.

Diffractive imaging of an important class of battery electrodes during cycling shows that lattice strain is a crucial yet overlooked factor that contributes to voltage fade over time.

Micrometre-sized particles of two niobium tungsten oxides have high volumetric capacities and rate performances, enabled by very high lithium-ion diffusion coefficients.

Using extended-gate capacitive coupling and diode connection, stretchable biosensors with a built-in differential circuit design can be created that can offer low signal distortion under bias stress instability, uniaxial strain, compression and temperature variations.

Replacing animal feathers and wool with synthetic materials can ameliorate the ethical and environmental issues associated with the production of clothing designed to retain warmth. Here the authors present synthetic nanofibre textiles that combine wearability, comfort, lightness and thermal insulation.

Li-dendrite growth is an inherent problem for the application of Li-metal anodes in batteries. Here the authors coat the separator with functionalized nanocarbon with immobilized Li ions, regulating the dendrite growth direction and thereby improving the battery performance.

Vanadium pentoxide is considered a promising lithium battery electrode, but suffers from poor rate capability and cyclability. Here, the authors synthesize graphene-modified nanostructured vanadium pentoxide and show significant improvement in rate performance and cycle life.

Layered oxide cathode materials for sodium-ion batteries often experience irreversible phase transitions and structural instability. Now researchers have developed a P2-type oxide containing earth-abundant elements, featuring an intergrowth phase structure that enables long-cycle, high-energy sodium-ion batteries.

In Li-ion batteries, single crystalline cobalt-free lithium transition metal oxides are less understood than their polycrystalline counterparts. Here, authors show that the absence of cobalt in single crystalline oxides results in structural degradation that ultimately degrades battery performance.

Through the sonochemical exfoliation of grown black phosphorus crystals, high-quality, narrow and clean black phosphorus nanoribbons with smooth edges and defined edge chirality are achieved, enabling the realization of high-performance transistors and photodetectors.

The shuttling effect in Li–S batteries can be drastically suppressed by using a single-atom Co catalyst and polar ZnS nanoparticles embedded in a macroporous conductive matrix as a cathode. Using this strategy, Li–S pouch cells show stable cycling and high energy performances.