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RNA polymerase II (RNAPII) is typically considered as an essential enzyme. Here the authors show that natural degradation of RNAPII drives chromatin reorganization in growing oocytes, preparing the chromatin for genome activation after fertilization.

Japonica subspecies has a lower nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) than that of indica rice. Here, the authors show that natural variations in the NIN-like protein 4 (OsNLP4) encoding gene are responsible for the divergence and introgression of the indica OsNLP4 allele into elite japonica cultivar can increase NUE and grain yield.

The study develops a printable concrete using cellulose nanofibers and limestone filler, enhancing rheological and mechanical properties while reducing cement content. It demonstrates improved buildability and sustainability, with potential for large-scale 3D printing applications in construction.

Protected areas (PAs) are central to China’s forest conservation strategy, yet their carbon storage effectiveness under different governance and management contexts remains uncertain. Here, authors show that stronger protection enables substantially greater forest carbon gains in China’s PAs, both now and in the future.

Most kiwifruit species are vulnerable to high levels of heat stress. Here, the authors report natural variation at the GATA transcription factor binding site of EGY3 gene mediates chloroplastic ROS homeostasis to confer kiwifruit thermotolerance.

Large-effect variants in autism remain elusive. Here, the authors use long-read sequencing to assemble phased genomes for 189 individuals, identifying pathogenic variants in TBL1XR1, MECP2, and SYNGAP1, plus nine candidate structural variants missed by short-read methods.

OSCA/TMEM63 proteins act as both ion channels and mechanically activated lipid scramblases. They translocate lipids through open pores, with cholesterol inhibiting scrambling, aiding membrane remodeling and cell resilience under mechanical stress.

This study shows that promoter and enhancer functions are often linked within the same DNA sequences. Using a dual-reporter assay, the authors reveal shared sequence features and co-dependent activities supporting a unified model of gene regulation.

Producing valuable hydrocarbons electrochemically from carbon monoxide (CO) is an energy-efficient pathway, but reliance on costly pure CO as a feedstock limits its economic viability. This article shows that abundant CO-rich syngas can be directly used to synthesize ethylene.

Humanity’s Last Exam, a multi-modal benchmark at the frontier of human knowledge, is designed to be an expert-level closed-ended academic benchmark with broad subject coverage.

A lab-scale proof-of-principle demonstration of a quantum network comprising one server chip and 20 client photonic chips implementing twin-field quantum key distribution shows excellent scalability and reliability and yields a pathway towards future large-scale networks.

Photocatalytic water splitting using a single particulate photocatalyst is a cost-efficient approach for sustainable hydrogen production. Here, the authors report a nanoscale Ba_xSr_1-xTaO₂N solid-solution photocatalyst exhibits an apparent quantum efficiency of 13.5% for H₂ evolution at 420 nm.

A general protocol for high-dimensional entangling gates is developed and applied for two four-dimensional qudits encoded in orbital angular momentum (OAM). The phase-locking technique stabilizes OAM sorters, leading to a process fidelity within a range from 0.71 to 0.85.

The STAR experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory demonstrates evidence of spin correlations in \(\Lambda \bar{\Lambda }\) hyperon pairs inherited from virtual spin-correlated strange quark–antiquark pairs during QCD confinement.

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.

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.

Acute-on-chronic liver failure is a complex condition with varied definitions. Using unbiased clustering, the study identifies two distinct subtypes with markedly different 30-day mortality risks and highlights key determinants.

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.

Wafer bonding has allowed the synthesis of twisted interfaces which support polar discontinuities in ferroelectric lithium niobate. Two-dimensional sheet conductivity arises but is suppressed when twist angles lead to interfacial lattice aperiodicity.

Mouse models demonstrate that vagal sensory neurons transmit signals from lung adenocarcinoma to the brain, increasing sympathetic efferent activity in the tumour microenvironment and thereby creating a immunologically permissive environment for tumour growth.

While excitonic semiconductors offer appealing optical properties, their application for competitive optoelectronic devices has remained limited. Here, the authors report the realization of broadband exciton-polariton photodiodes based on a layered excitonic semiconductor, WS₂, contacted by tin-doped indium oxide in an open optical cavity design, showing ~MHz bandwidth at room temperature.

How the brain supports speaking and listening during conversation of its natural form remains poorly understood. Here, by combining intracranial EEG recordings with Natural Language Processing, the authors show broadly distributed frontotemporal neural signals that encode context-dependent linguistic information during both speaking and listening..

A multiancestry phenome-wide analysis of copy number variants in the UK Biobank genomes increases power to detect genetic associations with complex traits across human populations.

Hepatic glycogenolysis is essential for protein glycosylation and rhythmic secretion by the liver. Disruptions to hepatic glycogenolysis, caused by congenital diseases or physiological factors such as obesity, caloric restriction and changes to meal timing, alter hepatic protein secretion.

Here, the authors develop AMPLiT a tool for screening antimicrobial peptides in metagenomic datasets, and apply it to human coprolite metagenomes, finding that Segatella copri, an ancient prevalent human gut bacterium declined in modern populations, harbors unexplored antimicrobial reservoir, offering an alternative approach against modern pathogenic infections.

EuCo₂Al₉ is identified as a metallic spin supersolid with high thermal conductivity, exhibiting coexisting spin orders, strong quantum fluctuations and a giant magnetocaloric effect enabling efficient sub-Kelvin refrigeration.

Climate change is altering how plants balance carbon gain and water loss. This study maps global leaf-level water-use efficiency over the past two decades, showing it is highest in regions that are cold or dry, increasing worldwide, and strongly influenced by atmospheric dryness.

The growing market demand for peptides is drawing more attention to their industrial synthetic procedures, which rely on large amounts of toxic solvents. Here the authors suggest practical steps that bring fully water-based peptide synthesis closer to reality.

Silicon anodes promise much higher battery capacity but are limited by poor storage life. This work identifies key ageing mechanisms and suggests ways to improve long-term stability.

This study demonstrates a low-energy photon device based on the kagome metal RbV₃Sb₅. It demonstrates that Fermi surface reconstruction, driven by a phase transition, leads to the emergence of van Hove singularities near the Fermi level.

Mapping global alluvial channel patterns reveals a hidden dominance of anabranching channels, constituting nearly half of the total reach length globally.

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.

Donahue et al. show that ageing is associated with changes in ER morphology. ER-phagy drives age-associated ER remodelling through tissue-specific factors.

Using artificial neural networks applied to human data, Eckstein et al. show that good models of reinforcement learning require memory components that track representations of the past.

Glucose deprivation triggers the secretion of the cytokine LIF, which promotes angiogenesis and immune suppression in lung cancer models.

Liu et al. report Chinese normative lifespan brain charts showing later neurodevelopmental milestones than those detected in Western cohorts. Individual deviations from these norms are valuable in assessing clinical risk and outcomes.

A wearable that continuously measures the concentration of a drug is demonstrated in humans.

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.

Here, the authors identify distinct, autism-specific diet microbiome interactions, showing how unhealthy diets and synthetic emulsifiers drive dysbiosis. The findings pave the way for microbiome-aware dietary strategies for autism.

Optical switching of a moiré Chern ferromagnet is demonstrated in twisted molybdenum ditelluride bilayers using continuous-wave circularly polarized light, paving the way for dissipationless spintronics and quantized Chern junction devices.

Genome-wide association analyses using data from 19 biobanks identify variants influencing risk of thyroid diseases and yield polygenic risk scores associated with features of aggressive thyroid cancer.

This study elucidates a mechanism in amyloid aggregates mediated by scarce β-strands that bridge adjacent β-sheets. This cross-β-strand linker shapes molecular packing and structural diversity, enabling aggregates to balance order and disorder.

The role of normally silenced transposable elements (TEs) in tumorigenesis remains unclear. Here, the authors show that increased expression of TEs in both patients and mice with colitis or by DNA hypomethylating drugs elicits a viral mimicry response that suppresses tumorigenesis. This viral mimicry response inhibits the stemness of cancer initiating cells in a cell autonomous manner.

When senescent cells accumulate during adulthood they negatively influence lifespan and promote age-dependent changes in several organs; clearance of these cells delayed tumorigenesis in mice and attenuated age-related deterioration of several organs without overt side effects, suggesting that the therapeutic removal of senescent cells may be able to extend healthy lifespan.

To humanize models of liver metabolic disease research, authors develop a microfluidic platform leveraging human hepatic spheroids integrated with microvasculature and circulating monocytes to model hepatic insulin resistance.

This study of magic-angle twisted trilayer graphene moiré superconductors using scanning tunnelling microscopy and spectroscopy identifies two energy gaps that develop from many-body resonance in this highly tunable class of materials.

Antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 continue to evolve 6 to 12 months after infection in patients who have recovered from COVID-19, increasing in potency and breadth with time.

Functional and structural characterization of PtmA2 reveals that it is an unusual non-adenylating acyl-CoA ligase and part of a system wherein the canonical acyl-CoA ligase reaction is separated into two half-reactions performed by distinct enzymes.