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Thymoproteasomes expressed in cortical thymic epithelial cells are essential for the generation of CD8⁺ T cells, but the mechanism requires further exploration. By engineering a mouse strain ectopically expressing thymoproteasomes in various antigen-presenting cells including medullary TECs, the authors identify that thymoproteasomes specifically expressed in cortical TECs but not hematopoietic cells facilitate positive selection of CD8⁺ T cells.

Psychedelic-assisted therapy shows promise for psychiatric disorders, but therapeutic responses vary widely. Here a survey of therapists’ experience aimed to identify key predictors of successful outcomes, highlighting the importance of therapeutic alliance, social support, openness and active engagement, which could inform future screening and preparation practices to enhance therapeutic efficacy.

Given rising diabetes prevalence globally, access to diabetes treatments is gaining urgency. Here, the authors show patterns of glucose-lowering medication use for diabetes across 62 low- and middle-income countries.

Global Burden of Disease analysis found that in 2023, suboptimal diet was estimated to be responsible for 4 million deaths and 97 million morbidity burdens from ischemic heart disease.

Genome-wide analyses identify genetic loci and plasma proteins associated with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). This study highlights the hormonal and metabolic foundations of the disease and explores the impact of polygenic risk for PCOS in both sexes.

A large-scale proteomics analysis of the dark proteome by the TransCODE Consortium reveals many translated non-canonical open reading frames to encode microproteins and peptideins.

Combining magnetic materials with superconductors in heterostructures is a promising pathway for realizing topological superconductivity. Here, Zahner et al show that the boundary formed between monolayer and bilayer manganese deposited on top of superconducting Tantalum can host spin polarized edge modes, the result of different topological superconducting phases of the monolayer and bilayer regions.

Clusia species exhibit diverse photosynthetic physiotypes. The authors present genome assemblies for C. major (weak CAM), C. minor s.l. (facultative CAM), and C. rosea (strong CAM), and speculate that polyploidization and subsequent diploidization could have shaped the emergence of extant C3 + CAM physiotypes.

Robustness checks and reproduction of analyses with existing and updated data based on 110 articles in economics and political science journals with data and code-sharing requirements found high levels of robustness and reproducibility and determined that robustness was not dependent on author characteristics or data availability.

Aptamers, single-stranded oligonucleotides capable of binding to specific targets, are composed of only four similar nucleobases, limiting their therapeutic potential. Now, alenomers—DNA-barcoded, chemically diverse aptamer-like molecules that integrate amino acids, lipids and sugars at precise sites—have been developed. This modular platform enables the rapid discovery of high-affinity, stable aptamers.

Authors investigate ancient DNA from animal remains and identify multiple signatures of ancient zoonotic pathogens. They find ancient pathogen genomics from archaeological animal remains may inform zoonotic disease emergence.

When 100 social and behavioural science claims were examined, 34% of reanalyses closely matched the original results, with 74% reaching the same conclusion, revealing limited robustness of single-path analyses and the need to address analytical uncertainty.

Cooperation in group lending declines over time due to shifting behavioural motivations, briefly rebounds after loan restarts, then declines faster again, revealing systematic deviations from rational behaviour driving long-term cooperation loss.

Exfoliated flakes of van der Waals materials embedded in tailored electromagnetic environments can form intrinsic optical self-cavities, but the influence of this effect on their nonlinear optoelectronic properties at THz frequencies remains unexplored. Here, the authors report self-cavity-induced Purcell enhancement of directional edge photocurrents in WTe₂.

Leigh syndrome is a severe, currently untreatable mitochondrial neurological disorder. Menacho, Okawa et al. developed a deep-learning drug screening pipeline in brain organoids, identifying azole compounds as promising therapeutic candidates.

Analysis combining multiple global tree databases reveals that whether a location is invaded by non-native tree species depends on anthropogenic factors, but the severity of the invasion depends on the native species diversity.

DNA-sequencing data from primary tumours and paired metastases from participants in the TRACERx lung study and PEACE autopsy programme are used to analyse the metastatic diversity of advanced non-small cell lung cancer and the seeding patterns that underpin it.

Sulfur allotropes are proposed to be an important sulfur reservoir in molecular clouds, but spectroscopic data to test this hypothesis are limited. Here the authors measure laboratory far-infrared spectra of cold isolated S₈ molecules, which show a near-perfect match with calculations, and examine their fragmentation pathways.

The authors characterized the spatial origin of Drosophila medulla neurons, completing their previous characterization of the temporal and Notch origins of these neurons and allowing them to correlate patterning of progenitors and neuronal type-specific features.

A transient grey matter microgliosis is required for remyelination, the failure of which results in a chronic neuroinflammatory state seen in neurodegenerative disorders.

During development, cells acquire their identity—a process that depends on epigenetic modifications such as methylation. Now, a statistical physics analysis of methylation helps explain embryonic symmetry breaking.

Machine-learning analyses in UK Biobank show that lifetime exposures predict brain health, with cardiovascular and metabolic factors emerging as key drivers of brain ageing. It further highlights the importance of early prevention.

Analysis of neuroimaging datasets across five major psychedelics revealed a shared brain signature and provides a comprehensive insight into how these drugs reorganize brain architecture.

A study of reproducibility in a stratified random sample of 600 papers published from 2009 to 2018 in 62 journals spanning the social and behavioural sciences finds higher reproducibility among more recent papers and papers from journals that require data sharing.

Control of the interaction between atoms and their neighbours is important to quantum information processing and has been studied using two states. Here the authors demonstrate a more flexible control using a three-state superposition of donors in silicon using THz quantum beat spectroscopy.

This study explores the EU’s 2040 climate target. Analysis of over 300 scenarios shows that an 80–93% emissions cut by 2040 (central estimate 86%) is cost efficient, requiring rapid wind and solar expansion, electrification, and limited carbon capture.

Whole-genome phylogenetic analyses have identified a case of monkeypox virus clade IIb lineage in the Republic of the Congo and co-circulation of three clade lineages, emphasizing the importance of improved surveillance given the risk of possible recombination events in the future.

Czernilofsky et al. identified factors that reprogram stromal cells into an inflammatory, dysfunctional state, leading to the structural disorganization of lymph nodes in B cell lymphoma at single-cell and spatial resolutions.

This paper uses multiomics to profile a large cohort of meningioma samples to highlight the role of the tumor microenvironment in driving the epigenetic changes underpinning tumor classification and prediction of outcome.

DDK kinase not only acts on the core replication machinery but also regulates the INO80 chromatin remodeler, shaping chromatin at replication origins and supporting replication and genome stability.

Artificial intelligence (AI) could help improve risk predictions in acute leukaemia and reduce systemic health disparities in the diagnostic process. Here, the authors assemble a diverse, international cohort of 6,206 patients with acute leukaemias and deploy an AI tool to support diagnosis based on standard laboratory results, with refinements for both adult and peadiatric leukaemias.

Researchers reveal that naturally emerging epsilon-near-zero conditions in BaTiO₃ can be exploited to drive permanent all-optical switching of ferroelectric polarization. The general nature of the epsilon-near-zero regime means that the approach could be used to switch spontaneous order parameters in other systems.

ATF6α activation in human and preclinical models of hepatocellular carcinoma is significantly associated with an aggressive tumour phenotype characterized by reduced survival, glycolytic reprogramming and local immunosuppression.

Here the authors compare genetic testing strategies in rare movement disorders, improve diagnostic yield with genome analysis, and establish CD99L2 as an X-linked spastic ataxia gene, showing that CD99L2–CAPN1 signaling disruption likely drives neurodegeneration.

A monolithic cryptographic sensor, which integrates a sensor device with a hashing unit and a cryptographic signature unit, can be used to create a recording system that provides a cryptographic link between a physical process and an immutable digital entity.

A dispersive sensing technique, termed the radiofrequency electron cascade, can perform singlet-triplet readout of two exchange-coupled electron spins in a natural silicon planar metal–oxide–semiconductor quantum-dot array.

Estimates from the Global Burden of Disease study reveal declines in chronic respiratory disease mortality between 1990 and 2023—especially during the COVID-19 pandemic—but the burdens on people affected remain substantial.

Integration of mosquito and non-human primate surveillance and viral metagenomics reveals yellow fever virus outbreak dynamics at an urban–forest interface in Brazil.

This Review compares the structure–function relationships of the apoptosome, inflammasomes and PIDDosome, which are the three main platforms activating the CARD-containing caspases caspase-9, caspase-1 and caspase-2, respectively. It highlights the consequences of genetic perturbations of these platforms and their therapeutic potential in humans.

The CCTG PA.7 randomized phase II trial compared chemotherapy with and without dual immune checkpoint inhibition in patients with metastatic pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. Here, the authors report long-term survival and exploratory analysis of the CCTG PA.7 trial, identifying a pattern of mutations linked to improved immunotherapy response.

High-level electronic structure calculations reveal unusually strong interactions between Cu(I) sites and helium, enabling selective separation of helium isotopes at practical, technologically relevant temperatures.

In the adrenal cortex, cholesterol used for steroid production is stored in lipid droplets. The authors demonstrate here the importance of the transcription factor HHEX in maintaining glucocorticoid levels and protecting lipid droplets from androgen-induced lipid depletion.

Performance of solid-state triplet fusion upconversion films is enhanced by surface plasmons, intensity threshold is reduced by a factor of 17 and external quantum efficiency is enhanced by a factor of 19. A white-emitting organic light-emitting diode featuring upconverted blue emission—rather than blue electroluminescence—is demonstrated, with a colour rendering index of up to 86.2.

Impurity spins in silicon can be controlled with microwaves and then read-out electrically, offering a promising platform for quantum information applications. Here, the authors show that terahertz pulses can be used to address the orbital degree of freedom as well, which can also be detected electrically.

A cluster-randomized trial in rural Lesotho showed that uncontrolled hypertension diagnosis and management delivered by minimally trained lay persons in the community using a mobile decision support tool was superior to facility referral for improving clinical outcomes.

Recent availability of the 13 keV at the SACLA XFEL has enabled us to obtain true atomic resolution structures of ~1 Å for CuNiR from three organisms. These have been combined with cryogenic single-crystal optical spectroscopy to provide unprecedented insight into enzyme mechanism.

Although widely used, television is underexplored in climate communication. Here analysis of German television programmes and audience perceptions shows that climate change coverage is concentrated in news formats and engages climate supporters, but misses climate-distant audiences drawn to entertainment.

By measuring charge exchange in a sphere/plate pair composed of identical amorphous silicon dioxide and controlling charging polarity using baking or plasma treatment, adventitious carbon is shown to break symmetry in oxide contact electrification.