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A comparative analysis of trait data combined with a mathematical model suggests that dietary specialization drives selection towards the smallest and largest body sizes in terrestrial mammals, as generalists outcompete specialists at intermediate sizes.

Luppi et al. identify transcriptomic and connectomic controllers of information integration and its breakdown induced by anaesthesia in humans, macaques, marmosets and mice.

Viral ribonucleoprotein–viral protein networks form pre-replication centres that nucleate viral factories and drive respiratory syncytial virus replication.

Flooding threatens urban economies via direct damages and supply-chain disruptions. Losses grow nonlinearly: wealthier cities incur larger absolute losses, while poorer cities face higher relative impacts, highlighting tailored resilience measures.

Using chemical photoswitchable reagents to exert purely wavelength-dependent control over biological systems in deep tissue and in vivo requires a concentration-independent design paradigm. Here, such photoswitchable ligands are realized by ensuring that E/Z isomers have opposing efficacies yet similarly high affinity, allowing them to probe transient receptor potential C4 and C5 channel functions up to the tissue level.

High-resolution flare footpoint observations in the extreme ultraviolet and X-rays were taken by Solar Orbiter. Combined with simulations, the results reveal that the dominant mechanism carrying flare energy through the Sun’s atmosphere can vary on small spatial scales.

Global post-fire soil erosion accounts for approximately 8.1 ± 0.72 Pg per year, or 19%, of total global soil erosion, and Africa is the most impacted continent given its larger burned area, according to a global assessment of soil erosion produced by wildfires over the last 18 years.

Large-scale molecular dynamics simulations show that the crystal–melt interfacial energies of MgSiO₃ bridgmanite increase substantially with pressure, potentially forming unusually large bridgmanite crystals and suggesting a new physical mechanism driving magma ocean segregation.

Zygnematophycean algae are the closest algal relatives of land plants. This study compares the osmatic stress response of two of these species, finding a core set of molecular protective components and providing insights into the toolkit needed for plant terrestrialization.

Kim, Wang, Clow and colleagues show that long-range chromatin loops bringing distal enhancers or super-enhancers together with promoters are cohesin dependent and cell type specific, whereas most short-range and promoter-centric transcriptional loops are cohesin independent and constitutive.

Multimodal fusion of digital pathology and transcriptomics can improve cancer diagnosis, but remains impractical in clinical settings. Here, the authors develop a crossmodal generative model, PathGen, to synthesise transcriptomic data from histopathology slides, and show how the combination of these multimodal data improves cancer diagnosis and prognosis prediction.

Screening methods to predict the development of type 1 diabetes (T1D) prior to pancreatic β-cell disruption are currently lacking. Here, the authors perform proteomics analysis of cord serum samples obtained from a Swedish birth cohort and identify an inflammatory signature predictive of disease development with good accuracy, suggesting that an inflammatory stage during pregnancy predisposes to T1D.

Observations of multi-temperature stellar eruptions from EK Draconis reveal a solar-like yet complex view of stellar coronal mass ejections. Such frequent, powerful events on the young Sun may have shaped Earth’s early atmosphere.

Scientists must provide free online access to their papers by depositing them in institutional repositories.

The emergent electric field induced by pinned magnetic solitons remains poorly understood. Now the dissipative motion of magnetic domain walls under an alternating current in Weyl magnet NdAlSi devices is shown to induce a large emergent electric field.

Powerful pulse a milepost on the way to fusion energy.

Methyl-CpG-binding protein 2 (MeCP2) is a chromatin regulator whose loss of function causes Rett syndrome. It has been unclear how the gene-expression changes caused by loss of MeCP2 relate to the protein’s DNA-binding sites. New work uses the ‘CUT&RUN’ technique to identify DNA-binding sites that are largely devoid of methylation — a modification known to recruit MeCP2 to DNA.

In social settings, people need to establish how much they contribute to shared outcomes. Here, the authors show that people strategically alter their actions to establish their level of control and identify neural activity underlying this process.

Short-wave infrared photothermal microscopy enables deep-tissue vibrational imaging at millimetre depth with high sensitivity and sub-cellular spatial resolution, offering potential for applications in biological and medical fields.

Glitches in video calls can have a negative effect on the judgement of the people involved and correspond to worse outcomes in major areas of life such as job interviews and parole hearings.

Marine spatial planning (MSP) and ecosystem restoration are effective approaches to address marine and coastal biodiversity loss and meet Global Biodiversity Framework targets, but have been applied separately to date. This Perspective outlines how ecoscape restoration and climate-smart MSP can be aligned to deliver reciprocal benefits and accelerate biodiversity recovery.

An antisense RNA may contribute to Alzheimer's disease by upregulating β-secretase (pages 723–730).

Scientists disagree about area-based conservation’s role in addressing biodiversity loss. This Perspective examines how conservation scientists, land systems scientists and political ecologists approach these debates differently and argues that environmental data justice frameworks can bridge epistemic divides, helping researchers to develop more effective and equitable conservation interventions.

HIV epidemic trends among female sex workers in sub-Saharan Africa are rarely known. The authors analyse HIV prevalence trends among female sex workers based in Zimbabwe and report a significant decline between 2016-2017 and 2021-2023, which may be due to increased treatment coverage among the male population.

A high-resolution transcriptomic and epigenomic cell-type atlas of the developing mouse visual cortex from embryonic to postnatal development is presented, providing a real-time dynamic molecular map associated with individual cell types and specific developmental events.

Exceptionally high secret key generation rates of 64 Mbits^–1 and 115.8 Mbits^–1 over a 10 km optical fibre link have been achieved, thanks to custom-built 14-pixel and 16-pixel superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors, respectively, and the use of fast quantum key distribution transmitters.

In this study, the authors use a combination of experimental and modeling approaches to show that a human gut bacterial community can exist in different states under the same conditions. The mechanism behind these alternative states is likely based on metabolic change in response to nutrient depletion.

Inhibitor-induced kinase degradation is a common event that positions supercharging of endogenous degradation circuits as an alternative to classical proximity-inducing degraders.

Synaptic vesicle protein SV2A is a target for antiseizure drugs. Here cryo-EM structures of human SV2A in its apo state or with antiseizure medications reveal the conformational changes upon ligand binding and an allosteric site that modulates ligand engagement to the orthosteric site.

Pending auction raises eyebrows but few objections.

APOBEC3 restriction, known to inhibit retroviruses by interfering with genome replication and hypermutating viral DNA, targets the γ-herpesvirus Epstein–Barr virus and is antagonized by the viral BORF2 protein.

Standard control sequences aim to make genetic engineering more predictable.

The role of structural variants (SVs) in Mycobacterium tuberculosis has been understudied. In this study, the authors leverage 859 high-quality, diverse, long-read assemblies to construct pangenome reference graphs (PRGs).

Genomic analyses applied to 14 childhood- and adult-onset psychiatric disorders identifies five underlying genomic factors that explain the majority of the genetic variance of the individual disorders.

Specific forms of nitrogen doping can endow carbon-based metal-free materials with electrocatalytic activity. Now, introducing sp-hybridized nitrogen atoms into some acetylenic sites of ultra-thin graphdiyne — a highly π-conjugated lamellar carbon allotrope — has led to excellent oxygen reduction reaction activity.

Long-term follow-up data reinforce the curative potential of hematopoietic stem-cell gene therapy for this rare primary immunodeficiency disorder.

Reliably probing rejuvenation and memory effects in spin glasses by means of simulations is difficult. Now, a state-of-the-art numerical study shows that at least three different length scales play a crucial role in aging dynamics of spin glasses.

Drug transport by ABC exporters has been associated with multidrug resistance in cancer and bacterial infections. Here, we describe structures of an ABC heterodimer that illuminate drug transporter interactions and the role of lipids in facilitating drug expulsion across membranes.

Roles of of viruses in ocean subsurface oxygen maxima are unclear. Here, the authors analyse Bermuda Atlantic Time Series data to show that viruses may drive SOM in stratified oceans by boosting nutrient recycling and phytoplankton productivity linking virus activity to oxygen buildup and a stronger microbial loop.

Diffusion models are reframed by developing a generative blood cell classifier that performs reliably in low-data regimes, adapts to domain shifts, detects anomalies with robustness and provides uncertainty estimates that surpass clinical expert benchmarks.

A combination of automated screening and next-generation sequencing makes it possible to identify Caenorhabditis elegans mutants at unprecedented speed and scale.