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The study finds elevated CO₂ reduces methylmercury production across 45 freshwater lakes spanning 1200 longitudinal kilometers, specifically 54–96% in eutrophic ones, by shifting methanogenic pathways, highlighting the need to integrate climate drivers for methylmercury risk predictions.

Cutaneous tuberculosis is an infectious disease associated with extracellular matrix remodeling and granuloma-driven fibrosis. Here, the authors present an in vitro model of this disease using skin organoids infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, and describe infection-induced alterations in specific pathways and cell populations.

Cao et al. provide a comprehensive immune landscape of sepsis, delineating anatomical-specific and age-dependent programs.

Climate change is expected to release carbon stored in permafrost soils. Sampling of sites across the Tibetan Plateau in the early 2000s and early 2010s reveals increased carbon stocks in shallow soils, which may offset losses from deeper soils.

Zhao et al. find that a macrophage subset migrates from the dura matter to reshape the cerebrospinal fluid microenvironment and promote metastasis and show that the secreted phosphoprotein 1–matrix metallopeptidase 14 axis can be targeted to inhibit this.

Soft porous crystals combine high crystallinity with structural transformability, potentially enabling applications. Here, an atropisomeric covalent organic framework is reported, which demonstrates different structural transformations upon exposure to different gases.

Natural antimicrobial peptides and enzymes are good candidates for application but suffer from low stability. Here, the authors report on biomimetic self-assembling peptides which mimic both antimicrobial peptide and enzyme functionality, demonstrating application against fungal infection.

Understanding how global changes affect both aboveground plants and belowground soil organisms is essential for preserving ecosystem functions and biodiversity. This study synthesizes extensive data, revealing decoupled responses in plant and soil biota to global changes across different biomes.

Genome assemblies of 13 domesticated and wild rice relatives reveal salient features of genome evolution across the genus Oryza, especially rapid species diversification and turnover of transposons. This study also releases a complete long-read assembly of IR 8 ‘Miracle Rice’.

Direct transformation of methanol into two- or multi-carbon compounds is extremely attractive but remains a challenge. Here, the authors report an efficient photocatalytic route to the transformation of methanol into ethylene glycol and hydrogen over a molybdenum disulfide nanofoam-modified cadmium sulfide nanorod catalyst.

Antigenic variants from human H1N1 and H3N2 influenza virus libraries possessing random mutations in the haemagglutinin protein, selected by incubation with human and/or ferret convalescent sera, identify escape variants similar to those that have emerged in nature.

Nickel-rich Li-ion positive electrodes face challenges such as high cost and poor cycling stability. Here, authors show that quenching heat treatment can lead to more stable performance at high voltages, with synchrotron analyses revealing the roles of surface chemistry and bulk charge distribution.

Nitrogen–nitrogen bond formation is crucial in the biosynthesis of various classes of natural products with significant biological activities, yet the catalytic mechanisms remain largely unknown. Here, the authors elucidate the dimeric structure of the heme-iron-dependent enzyme LnzB, revealing key residues for N-N bond formation and suggesting evolutionary links to transcriptional regulators, advancing our understanding of enzymatic catalysis.

Atomic force microscopy allows for the imaging of molecules at a nanometre resolution. Here the authors combine AFM with self-assembling DNA origami structures to detect single-nucleotide polymorphisms and determine haplotypes.

Analysis of high-quality genomes and transcriptomes of 13 closely related Oryza species coupled with proteomics finds about 50 de novo genes per million years.

Here, by performing multi-omics microbiome analyses in a cohort of children with new-onset T1D, the authors characterize altered microbial functional and metabolic traits involved in T1D, which they validate in animal experiments, together providing potential avenues for microbiome-based interventions.

This study uncovers how seasonal temperature variations influence organic carbon burial in lake sediments. The authors predict that a decline in temperature seasonality will significantly slow or reduce organic carbon burial in lake sediments, leading to carbon emissions and amplified global warming.

Efficiently separating high-value targets with small structural differences in liquids is important to the chemical industry. Here the authors develop a metal–organic framework-based membrane with engineered topologic defects for accurate and prolonged sieving of species with molecular weights below 350 g mol⁻¹.

An immunocompetent liver-on-a-chip platform with a targeted cell depletion strategy identifies cell-type-specific contributions to drug-induced hepatotoxicity, advancing predictive toxicology.

Achieving efficient photoelectrochemical cells requires insights into the ion kinetics at the surface of photoelectrode. Here, the authors show a new platform for investigating strong coupling between hydroxide ions and surface charge carriers by using monolayer InSe as the anode with high photocurrent density.

Guest clusters within confined nanospaces have a significant impact on molecular recognition. Here authors highlight the potential to systematically control gas-cluster rearrangement, leading to tunable sorption and separation behaviour in a MOF.

There is an intensive effort to develop Li-ion batteries that rely on sustainable materials. Here the authors employ a complex doping approach to synthesize low-Ni, Co-free cathode materials that display promising electrochemical performances.

Massive stores of carbon and nutrients in permafrost could be released by global warming. Here the authors show that though warming across the Tibetan alpine permafrost region accelerates nitrogen liberation, contrary to expectations the elevated nutrients do not alleviate plant nitrogen limitation.

The Yersinia outer protein J (YopJ) family of effectors, which are present in many plant and animal pathogens are non-canonical acetyltransferases that are activated by the eukaryote-specific cofactor inositol hexaphosphate (InsP6). Here, the authors combine X-ray crystallography, biochemical and functional analyses to characterise the structure and activation mechanism of the YopJ family effector PopP2 from the plant pathogen Ralstonia solanacearum and observe that InsP6 binding induces major conformational changes in PopP2 with a helix-to-strand fold-switching in its catalytic core.

Reversibly modulating the structure of supported metals in response to dynamic working conditions is a desirable feature for catalysts. Now, the reversible transformation between single atoms and subnanometre clusters of Pd on CeO₂ is demonstrated during automotive exhaust aftertreatment, achieving high methane oxidation activity and stability.

Resolving single-crystal structures of two-dimensional covalent organic frameworks (2D COFs) is a great challenge. Here, the authors identify two different growth mechanisms of COFs, enabling the growth and structure determination of micron-sized 2D single-crystalline COFs.

The study reconstructed Holocene seasonal temperatures using 1,310 pollen records covering the Northern Hemisphere landmass, and show that both summer and winter temperatures peaked at ~7 ka BP, but with significant spatial variability.

Reliable estimates of the total forest carbon (C) pool are lacking due to insufficient information on dead organic matter (DOM). Here, the authors estimate that the current DOM C stock in China is 925 ± 54 Tg and that it grew by 6.7 ± 2.2 Tg C/yr over the past two decades primarily due to increasing forest area

Water plays a key role in electrocatalytic CO₂ reduction, but the role of catalyst in water management is unknown. Here, the authors report the importance of catalyst in determining the function of water and demonstrate that the catalyst containing Cu⁺ promotes water activation and C₂₊ formation.

Understanding the effect of the space charge layer (SCL) in all-solid-state lithium-ion batteries is challenging due to lack of direct experimental observations. Here the authors visualize the SCL using an in-situ DPC-STEM imaging technique, based on which they further introduce a built-in electric field to suppress its formation.

Lignin-first approaches, which prioritize lignin upgrade over cellulose, can open the way to full biomass valorization, but are still hampered by the need of harsh reaction conditions and difficulties in catalyst recovery. Now, a photocatalytic strategy based on the use of cadmium sulfide quantum dots is reported that overcomes these limitations.

Electrocatalytic reduction of CO₂ into multicarbon (C₂₊) products is a highly attractive route for CO₂ utilization. Now, a fluorine-modified copper catalyst is shown to achieve current densities of 1.6 A cm⁻² with a C₂₊ Faradaic efficiency of 80% for electrocatalytic CO₂ reduction in a flow cell.

A deep learning framework (NMRNet) is developed to model atomic environments for predicting NMR chemical shifts. A benchmark dataset, nmrshiftdb2-2024, is also established to provide a standardized source for evaluating NMR models.