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Exciton condensation may emerge at room temperature in topological materials with strong Coulomb interactions and vanishing electron effective mass. Here, Hou et al. report the formation of excitons in Bi_2-xSb_xSe₃ nanoribbons, which can transport over hundreds of micrometres before recombination up to 40 K, further implying exciton condensation.

Electrochemical synthesis typically occurs in coupled systems, in which anodic and cathodic half-reactions proceed simultaneously in the same cell. This Comment discusses strategies that can decouple half-reactions to achieve modular electrochemical synthesis for flexible chemical manufacturing.

While neoadjuvant chemotherapy can improve outcomes in patients with esophageal squamous carcinoma, resistance often develops. Here, the authors identify elevated INCENP and CDCA8 via YTHDF3 mediated translation as markers of poor response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in esophageal squamous carcinoma.

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.

Lithium metal offers high specific capacity but suffers from dendrite growth and poor cycling stability. Here, authors develop a 3D Li-Zn-Li3N/CNT composite combining ductile Li-Zn alloy and a mechanically robust Li3N-CNTs network, enabling thin, durable electrodes with uniform lithium deposition, demonstrating a pouch-cell with a specific energy of 553 Wh kg-1.

Researchers develop an adaptive polymer that switches between insulating and conductive states, enabling ultra-efficient electrostatic protection for next-generation electronics at record-low additive content.

The efficiency of perovskite/Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ tandem solar cells is limited by halide segregation in the perovskite layer. Zhang et al. use 2-pyrrolidinone to slow the crystallization of halide intermediates, ensuring a homogeneous distribution and achieving a power conversion efficiency of 27.3%.

A molecular interfacial layer optimizes hole transport in tin-based perovskite solar cells, improving energy-level alignment and enhancing hole extraction efficiency.

Ethanol electrosynthesis from CO reduction is achieved using an oxygen-affinity-engineered copper alloy catalyst. Unlike conventional CO dimerization pathways, which yield diverse products, this catalyst selectively promotes the CO–CH_x coupling route, enabling selective ethanol production.

The residual methylammonium cation from additives compromises the operational stability of formamidinium lead iodide-based solar cells under thermal/light stress. Here, authors introduce MASCN to enhance film formation in ethyl acetate antisolvent and achieve efficiency of 26.1% for stable devices.

MnBi2Te4 is an antiferromagnetic topological insulator. This combination of magnetic ordering and topological properties has resulted in intense interest, however, like many van der Waals materials, experimental results are hampered by fabrication difficulties. Here, Li, Wang, Lian et al. show that the fabrication process itself can result in mismatched thickness dependence of magneto-transport measurements. ‘

The electrochemical reduction of nitrogen to ammonia represents a challenge of major interest that would substantially decrease the burden of the energy-consuming Haber–Bosch process. Now, Yin, Yan, Zhang, Si and colleagues achieve high ammonia yield and Faradaic efficiency over 66% using bismuth nanocatalysts promoted by alkali cations.

Ohmic contacts to n-type molybdenum disulfide can be created over a temperature range from millikelvins to 300 K using a window-contacted technique, which leads to evidence for fractional quantum Hall states at filling fractions of 4/5 and 2/5 in the lowest Landau levels of bilayer molybdenum disulfide devices.

It is challenging to activate the flexible printed metal circuit to approach the intrinsic conductivity with minimal damage to the substrate. Here, the authors report a large-scale pressure-constrained sonication activation method for various metals and non-metallic inks.

Li-metal batteries suffer from sluggish kinetics at low temperatures. Here, authors propose a guideline for rational electrolyte solvent screening and design a class of asymmetric ethers, which bestows the Li metal pouch cell with a high specific energy of 345.3 Wh kg⁻¹ over 40 cycles at −40 °C.

The solar conversion efficiencies of photoelectrochemical catalysis are hindered by the light harvesting range. Here, the authors use near-infrared-active photoanodes that feature lattice-matched morphological hetero-nanostructures to realize efficient photoelectrochemical hydrogen production.

Despite the development of inhibitors targeting active GTP-bound (ON) KRAS(G12C) for the treatment of KRAS G12C-driven non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), resistance remains an issue. Here, the authors show that despite inhibition of KRAS G12C ON, there is residual mTOR activity driving resistance, which was successfully targeted by combining with a selective mTOR inhibitor.

Both open-circuit voltage and fill factor of organic solar cells are affected by the metal-organic semiconductor interface. Here, the authors demonstrate that the voltage can continue to rise when the Fermi level is forced up to the semiconductor density-of-states tail.

Hiʻiaka is the largest moon of the distant dwarf planet Haumea. Here, the authors report the first multi-chord stellar occultations of Hiʻiaka, revealing its size, shape, and density, suggesting an origin from Haumea’s icy mantle.

Understanding cuprate superconductors requires better knowledge of the microscopic structure of their charge-density waves (CDW). Here, the authors report evidence that the long-range CDW order in YBa₂Cu₃O_y has a local commensurate period of three unit cells.

An electrostatic-repulsion-enabled advanced transfer technique based on ammonia solution is introduced for separating van der Waals thin-film materials from their substrates, demonstrating suitability for its use in the complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) industry.

The process of CH₄ cracking into H₂ and carbon has garnered significant attention for hydrogen production, but traditional catalytic methods are hampered by severe carbon deposition. Here, a machine-learning model has been developed to expedite the screening of CH₄ cracking catalysts from 10,950 types of single-atom alloy surfaces.

In the carbon dioxide (CO₂) to multicarbon electrolysis, the crossover CO₂ to the oxygen-rich anodic gas stream add a further energy-intensive chemical separation step. Here, the authors demonstrate a bipolar membrane-based electrolyzer design that eliminates the crossover CO2.

The importance of ohmic contacts for organic solar cells has been recognized, but how the transition to ohmic behavior occurs is unknown. Tan et al. show that this transition happens separately beyond Fermi-level pinning, when the interfacial contact resistivity becomes sufficiently low.

Multiferroic materials exhibiting ferromagnetism (FM) and ferroeletricity (FE) at room temperature (RT) are promising for applications. Here, the authors demonstrate by inducing strain in SmMnO3 via introducing vertically aligned nanocomposites that exchange coupling can be modified tuning the system from anti-FM to FM and simultaneously inducing FE at RT.

The performance of flexible all-perovskite tandem solar cells remains limited by interfacial losses in narrow-bandgap subcells. Here, authors incorporate Triton X-100 to disrupt the vertical phase segregation in PEDOT:PSS films, achieving maximum cell and mini-module efficiencies of 25.4% and 19.7%.

Electrosynthesis of n-propanol from CO has been limited by poor selectivity and low product concentration. Here a Sn–Cu catalyst/carbon/ionomer heterojunction is prepared where the adjacent atomic active sites favour the coupling of C₁ and C₂ intermediates to C₃ product with 47% Faradaic efficiency and the reversal of electro-osmotic drag concentrates the product to 30 wt%.

The mainstream passivation strategies routinely rely on crystalline materials for perovskite photovoltaics. Here, authors utilize a solid phase reaction to prepare an amorphous (lysine)₂PbI₂ layer to neutralize surface and interface defects, achieving device efficiency of over 26% for solar cells.

Addressing the stability challenges from metal electrodes/perovskite components chemical interactions is essential for high-performance perovskite solar cells. Here, authors design a bilayer polymer buffer to mitigate metal/ion interdiffusion, realizing a certified efficiency of 26.46%.

Biobanks of genetic data have been primarily in European populations, which gives us an incomplete understanding of complex traits across populations. Here, the authors initiate the Westlake BioBank for Chinese (WBBC) pilot project with 4,535 whole genome sequences and 5,841 high-density genotypes from China, characterizing large-scale genomic variation in Chinese populations.

Charge transport and extraction in polycrystalline perovskite films are often hindered by inefficient carrier transfer across grain domain boundaries (GDBs). Here, authors employ supramolecular assisted Rb+ delivery for in-situ GDB bridging, achieving efficiency of 26.02% for perovskite solar cells.

Low-dimensional perovskites afford high efficiencies in solar cells but at the expense of stability. Rao et al. develop a template growth approach to form low-dimensional perovskites from low-reactivity and hence more stable organic cations.

The authors propose that screw or edge dislocations can trap Majorana zero modes in the absence of an external magnetic field. They predict that the Majoranas will appear as second-order topological modes on the four corners of an embedded 2D subsystem defined by the cutting plane of the dislocation.

The partial replacement of the A-site by divalent methylenediammonium cations inhibits ion migration and photoinduced halide segregation in wide-bandgap perovskites. Single-junction devices achieve a certified power conversion efficiency of 22.71%, whereas perovskite/Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ tandem devices exhibit an efficiency of 30.13% in a four-terminal architecture.

Conventional alkaline and neutral CO₂-to-CH₄ systems suffer carbon loss, and recovering the lost carbon requires input energy exceeding the heating value of CH₄. Here, the authors report a chelating strategy to obtain Cu-N/O single sites decorated Cu clusters, which enables energy- and carbon-efficient CH₄ electroproduction in an acidic system.

Upgrading methane to more valuable chemicals such as methanol is highly appealing but remains challenging. Here the authors show how edge-rich MoS₂ can be used to oxidize methane to C1 oxygenates at room temperature using oxygen as the oxidant.

Acoustic black hole metamaterials are conventionally based on thickness engineering. Here, authors develop a density-power law approach for the fabrication of a composite material that achieves deep-subwavelength wave absorption operations, at ultralow frequencies (25–1200 Hz) and with a 24.5 Hz threshold frequency.

A combined cryo-electron tomography and cryo-electron microscopy pipeline was developed to inflict axonal damage and monitor the cellular response induced by epothilone B, revealing that microtubule polymerization at and beyond the lesion site promote axon regeneration.

Hydrogels containing nanoparticles have enhanced mechanical properties that can be limited if the size of the crosslinking nanoparticles is too large. Here, Zhang and others have produced non-aggregated spherulite nanoparticles with diameters of less than 5 nm and investigated their effect on hydrogels.

Ferroelectric RAM is considered a promising candidate on the quest for a universal memory, but the concept is still problem prone. Here, the authors use the ferroelectric photovoltaic effect as a non-destructive read-out method for a new prototype memory, which shows good data retention and fatigue resistance.

By increasing the number of degrees of freedom one can reduce overall number of devices required to perform logic operations. Here, Zhao, Zheng, Wang et al demonstrate a device using current direction, a vector property, allowing for the implementation of Boolean logic, including IMPLY in a single device, and further enabling the construction of a full adder with only two devices.

Wide-bandgap perovskite solar cells often suffer from phase segregation under continuous illumination. Here, authors combine light soaking with small-molecule surface passivation to suppress halide segregation, achieving efficiency of 28.64% in stable two-terminal all-perovskite tandem solar cells.

A new type of Hall effect—the layer Hall effect—is produced in a 2D antiferromagnet that does not exhibit any net magnetization.

Commercial live attenuated influenza vaccines (LAIVs), usually contain a high proportion of defective interfering particles (DIPs), are not sufficiently protective. With mice models, the authors here reveal that LAIV with low DIPs replicates better, enhances immune response and facilitates cross-neutralization protection against lethal challenge of influenza strains.

The morphology and structure of polymer blends is central to charge-carrier, exciton and photon management in organic light-emitting diodes, transistors and solar cells. A broadly applicable approach, based on mixing a photocrosslinkable moiety into semiconducting polymers, enables the simple formation of heterostructured blends with control of morphology and structure for use in all types of device.