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Dysregulated CD59 drives uncontrolled complement activation in neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorders (NMOSD). Here, the authors show in a mouse NMOSD model that endothelial SPARC suppresses astrocytic CD59 by blocking the VEGFA/VEGFR2 axis, promoting astrocytopathy, that might offer a potential therapeutic strategy.

Valine metabolism disruption is linked to heart disease, but the mechanisms are unclear. Here, the authors show that ACAD8 deficiency drives isobutyryl-CoA accumulation and histone isobutyrylation, increasing chromatin accessibility and gene expression to promote cardiac hypertrophy, while ACAD8 overexpression reverses these effects.

USP30, a negative regulator of mitophagy, is identified as a potential therapeutic target for lung fibrosis and viral pneumonia. Inhibition of USP30 protects alveolar epithelial cells from apoptosis and enhances alveolar regeneration.

Copy number variants linked to brain disorders and cancer are caused by replication stress. Here, the authors show that recurrent DNA-break clusters act as common initiating lesions that drive these variants, causing permanent structural genome diversification.

Sulfation helps shape cartilage, bone and other biological functions. Here, the authors identify MESH1 as the 3′-phosphoadenosine-5′-phosphosulfate-degrading enzyme that controls sulfation in animals and show that blocking MESH1 restores sulfation-linked defects, revealing a potential therapeutic target.

Measurement-based quantum computing implements quantum algorithms by performing sequences of measurements on special classes of entangled states, such as cluster states. This approach has now been demonstrated on a superconducting quantum processor.

The authors from the ALICE collaboration identify multiple species of mesons and baryons and measure the anisotropic flow with non-flow removal techniques in pp and p-Pb collisions at the LHC, identifying the hallmark of quark flow associated with an expanding quark-gluon plasma.

Stone tools illustrate behavioural complexities in Middle Pleistocene hominin populations. Here, the authors present small dimensional flakes and hafted tools from Xigou, central China, dated to ~160–72 thousand years ago that demonstrate early, complex technological advancements.

The authors strengthen the elasticity of Ag₂Se by microstructure engineering approach, realizing bendability of the thermoelectric generator for at least 1,000,000 times at a tiny bending radius of 3 mm with a high power density.

Scalable routes towards porous graphene are useful for developing materials for mass transfer applications. Here, the authors report the fabrication of porous graphene with controllable pore size and nitrogen content via the carbothermal reaction of graphene and (poly)oxometallates.

It is uncertain how much life expectancy of the Chinese population would improve under current and greater policy targets on lifestyle-based risk factors for chronic diseases and mortality behaviours. Here we report a simulation of how improvements in four risk factors, namely smoking, alcohol use, physical activity and diet, could affect mortality. We show that in the ideal scenario, that is, all people who currently smokers quit smoking, excessive alcohol userswas reduced to moderate intake, people under 65 increased moderate physical activity by one hour and those aged 65 and older increased by half an hour per day, and all participants ate 200 g more fresh fruits and 50 g more fish/seafood per day, life expectancy at age 30 would increase by 4.83 and 5.39 years for men and women, respectively. In a more moderate risk reduction scenario referred to as the practical scenario, where improvements in each lifestyle factor were approximately halved, the gains in life expectancy at age 30 could be half those of the ideal scenario. However, the validity of these estimates in practise may be influenced by population-wide adherence to lifestyle recommendations. Our findings suggest that the current policy targets set by the Healthy China Initiative could be adjusted dynamically, and a greater increase in life expectancy would be achieved.

Single-atom catalysts (SACs) offer high atom utilization and efficiency, but their synthesis is challenging. This work realizes the mass production of sustainable SACs and demonstrates their application in vascular healing.

With the generation of large pan-cancer whole-exome and whole-genome sequencing projects, a question remains about how comparable these datasets are. Here, using The Cancer Genome Atlas samples analysed as part of the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes project, the authors explore the concordance of mutations called by whole exome sequencing and whole genome sequencing techniques.

The flagship paper of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes Consortium describes the generation of the integrative analyses of 2,658 cancer whole genomes and their matching normal tissues across 38 tumour types, the structures for international data sharing and standardized analyses, and the main scientific findings from across the consortium studies.

Direct visualization of chiral effects in topological chiral semimetals remains elusive. Here, Sessi et al. demonstrate that quasiparticle scattering at impurities in the two enantiomers of PdGa gives rise to handedness dependent quantum interference patterns.

Here, the authors sample air and surfaces in hospital rooms of COVID-19 patients, detect SARS-CoV-2 RNA in air samples of two of three tested airborne infection isolation rooms, and find surface contamination in 66.7% of tested rooms during the first week of illness and 20% beyond the first week of illness.

Incorporating carbon-carbon triple bonds into conjugated chains typically requires acetylenic precursors. Here, the authors synthesize poly(p-phenylene ethynylene) molecular wires on Cu(111) by directly coupling trichloromethyl-containing precursors, forming C-C triple bonds in situ

Emerging applications of steam electrolysis and electrochemical synthesis for future hydrogen technologies at intermediate temperatures set stringent requirements on the stability of protonic ceramic cells. Now a sintering approach enables densified Ce-free protonic zirconate cells with enhanced Faradaic efficiency and exceptional stability under harsh operating conditions.

Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy of superconducting magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene reveals flat-band replicas that are indicative of strong electron–phonon coupling; these replicas are absent in non-superconducting twisted bilayer graphene.

Skeletal muscle is central to whole-body energy balance. Here, Yang et al. show that MLL4-dependent enhancer activation is a key regulatory node for the governance of muscle metabolic efficiency and systemic metabolism via the control of muscle AMPK.

The ALICE Collaboration provides details on the microscopic mechanism that ends up creating antideuteron in high-energy proton–proton collisions at the Large Hadron Collider.

A facile light-triggered doping strategy involving a series of inactive photoactivable dopants is described that facilitates tunable regionally controlled n-doping of organic semiconductors, resulting in stable patterning of the doping profile at record high resolutions.

Field-effect transistors fabricated from carbon nanotubes have been investigated extensively over the past two decades. This study demonstrates a nanotube-based integrated circuit design that substantially improves the speed and power consumption with respect to silicon-based integrated circuits.

In this study, Yang et al. compile a global dataset to uncover the degree to which plants coordinate root and seed traits. They report a global positive correlation between root diameter and seed size, driven by dual roles of arbuscular mycorrhiza in phosphorus uptake and pathogen defence.

Previous surveys of global ocean microbial diversity have focused on planktonic microbes. Here, Zhang et al. use metagenomics to study biofilm-forming marine microbes, increasing the known microbial diversity in the oceans by more than 20% and revealing new biosynthetic gene clusters and CRISPR-Cas systems.

A review on long non-coding RNAs as double-edged regulators in viral infection, on the molecular mechanisms of their dynamic antiviral-proviral role switching, and their therapeutic potential for novel RNA-based antivirals.

Analysis of antigen-specific B cells in lymph nodes of individuals vaccinated with BNT162b2 reveals lasting germinal centre responses, explaining the robust humoral immunity induced by SARS-CoV-2 mRNA-based vaccines.

Converting methane to hydrogen and aromatics is a route to upgrading natural gas into high value products. Here the authors report a high-performing synergistic trimetallic thermochemical catalyst, along with mechanistic insights into the process.

Maintenance of NADPH levels during environmental stress can prolong cell survival. Ding et al. identify MESH1 as a cytosolic NADPH phosphatase that is required for the metabolic commitment to ferroptosis in cancer cell lines.

The growth of wafer-scale single-crystalline 2D semiconductors on sapphire is important for their electronic applications, but the underlying mechanisms are not yet fully understood. Here, the authors study the influence of air-induced sapphire surface hydrolysis on the growth process of 2D WS₂ and propose an ultraviolet light healing method to repair the degraded substrates.

Few-layer-thick 2D materials offer desirable electronic, thermal and mechanical properties, but their large-scale layer-controlled synthesis is still challenging. Here, the authors report an edge-feeding synchronous epitaxial growth method to synthesize homogeneous A3-sized graphene films with controlled thickness between 2 and 7 layers.

Chen et al. employed ecological momentary assessment in two different sample populations from the United States and China to develop proxy measures for emotion regulation flexibility.

An asymmetric self-assembled monolayer improves the efficiency of perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells compared with symmetric self-assembled monolayers, resulting in a certified power conversion efficiency of up to 34.58%.

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.

Cervical cancer remains a significant public health problem in many regions. Here, the authors perform a proteogenomic analysis of cervical cancer in Chinese patients; they reveal proteomic subgroups associated with clinical and biological features, and a potential biomarker of response to radiotherapy.

Despite being a promising treatment for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), resistance to tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI) present a major obstacle. Here, the authors demonstrate that lipid metabolism reprogramming via URI mediated stearoyl-CoA desaturase 1 upregulation present a targetable driver of sorafenib resistance in HCC.

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.

Reduced glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) is a hallmark of chronic kidney disease. Here, Pattaro et al. conduct a meta-analysis to discover several new loci associated with variation in eGFR and find that genes associated with eGFR loci often encode proteins potentially related to kidney development.

Understanding deregulation of biological pathways in cancer can provide insight into disease etiology and potential therapies. Here, as part of the PanCancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) consortium, the authors present pathway and network analysis of 2583 whole cancer genomes from 27 tumour types.

There’s an emerging body of evidence to show how biological sex impacts cancer incidence, treatment and underlying biology. Here, using a large pan-cancer dataset, the authors further highlight how sex differences shape the cancer genome.

Analyses of 2,658 whole genomes across 38 types of cancer identify the contribution of non-coding point mutations and structural variants to driving cancer.

In somatic cells the mechanisms maintaining the chromosome ends are normally inactivated; however, cancer cells can re-activate these pathways to support continuous growth. Here, the authors characterize the telomeric landscapes across tumour types and identify genomic alterations associated with different telomere maintenance mechanisms.

Integrative analyses of transcriptome and whole-genome sequencing data for 1,188 tumours across 27 types of cancer are used to provide a comprehensive catalogue of RNA-level alterations in cancer.

Whole-genome sequencing data from more than 2,500 cancers of 38 tumour types reveal 16 signatures that can be used to classify somatic structural variants, highlighting the diversity of genomic rearrangements in cancer.

Viral pathogen load in cancer genomes is estimated through analysis of sequencing data from 2,656 tumors across 35 cancer types using multiple pathogen-detection pipelines, identifying viruses in 382 genomic and 68 transcriptome datasets.

Analysis of cancer genome sequencing data has enabled the discovery of driver mutations. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium the authors present DriverPower, a software package that identifies coding and non-coding driver mutations within cancer whole genomes via consideration of mutational burden and functional impact evidence.