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These ancient whittled logs could be the earliest known wooden structure
Stacked timbers dated to roughly 476,000 years ago show that ancient hominins worked with wood.
- Ewen Callaway
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Article |
Multistable sheets with rewritable patterns for switchable shape-morphing
To demonstrate the power of multistability, a specific class of groovy metasheets is introduced as a new shape-morphing platform that allows repeated switching from the flat state to multiple, precisely selected and stable three-dimensional shapes.
- A. S. Meeussen
- & M. van Hecke
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News Explainer |
Why was the Morocco earthquake so deadly?
The quake, which has killed thousands, was unusually large for Morocco and struck a region where most buildings are not earthquake-resilient.
- Michael Marshall
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Article |
Turbulence suppression by cardiac-cycle-inspired driving of pipe flow
Turbulence can be reduced by more than 25% in ordinary pipe flow by unsteady, pulsatile driving specifically mimicking the cardiac cycle and extending this method to large Reynolds numbers.
- D. Scarselli
- , J. M. Lopez
- & B. Hof
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Nature Video |
AI finally beats humans at a real-life sport — drone racing
The new system combines simulation with onboard sensing and computation.
- Dan Fox
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Article
| Open AccessChampion-level drone racing using deep reinforcement learning
An autonomous system is described that combines deep reinforcement learning with onboard sensors collecting data from the physical world, enabling it to fly faster than human world champion drone pilots around a race track.
- Elia Kaufmann
- , Leonard Bauersfeld
- & Davide Scaramuzza
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News & Views |
Drone-racing champions outpaced by AI
An autonomous drone has competed against human drone-racing champions — and won. The victory can be attributed to savvy engineering and a type of artificial intelligence that learns mostly through trial and error.
- Guido C. H. E. de Croon
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Article
| Open AccessA microscale soft ionic power source modulates neuronal network activity
A study describes the development of a miniaturized hydrogel-based soft power source capable of modulating the activity of networks of neuronal cells without the need for metal electrodes.
- Yujia Zhang
- , Jorin Riexinger
- & Hagan Bayley
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News & Views |
Analog chip paves the way for sustainable AI
As the resources required by artificial intelligence increase unsustainably, an analog design provides an energy-efficient alternative to digital computer chips — and one that is ideally suited to neural-network computations.
- Hechen Wang
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News & Views |
Brain implants that enable speech pass performance milestones
Two brain–computer interfaces have been developed that bring unprecedented capabilities for translating brain signals into sentences — at speeds close to that of normal speech, and with vocabularies exceeding 1,000 words.
- Nick F. Ramsey
- & Nathan E. Crone
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Article
| Open AccessAn analog-AI chip for energy-efficient speech recognition and transcription
A low-power chip that runs AI models using analog rather than digital computation shows comparable accuracy on speech-recognition tasks but is more than 14 times as energy efficient.
- S. Ambrogio
- , P. Narayanan
- & G. W. Burr
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Article |
A high-performance neuroprosthesis for speech decoding and avatar control
A study using high-density surface recordings of the speech cortex in a person with limb and vocal paralysis demonstrates real-time decoding of brain activity into text, speech sounds and orofacial movements.
- Sean L. Metzger
- , Kaylo T. Littlejohn
- & Edward F. Chang
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Career Q&A |
The Indigenous rocketeer
Nicole McGaa combined Indigenous knowledge with engineering to build a rocket for the First Nations Launch competition.
- Abdullahi Tsanni
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Perspective |
The future transistors
The challenges and opportunities for the design of field-effect transistors are discussed and a vision of future transistors and potential innovation opportunities is provided.
- Wei Cao
- , Huiming Bu
- & Kaustav Banerjee
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News & Views |
From the archive: a prize for the design of a helicopter, and a venomous caterpillar
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Nature Video |
These shapes roll in peculiar ways thanks to new mathematics
An algorithm can design a shape to follow almost any repeating path downhill.
- Shamini Bundell
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Article |
Solid-body trajectoids shaped to roll along desired pathways
An algorithm is developed to design a shape, a trajectoid, that can trace any given infinite periodic trajectory when rolling down a slope, finding unexpected implications for quantum and classical optics.
- Yaroslav I. Sobolev
- , Ruoyu Dong
- & Bartosz A. Grzybowski
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Where I Work |
Feeding bacteria seaweed to make compostable plastic
Bioprocess engineer Jesús E. Rodríguez’s team dreams of replacing all synthetic plastics with biodegradable products.
- Patricia Maia Noronha
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News |
How Beijing’s deadly floods could be avoided
The floods that have swept China in the past week were exacerbated by poor planning for drainage.
- Gemma Conroy
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News & Views |
Heat-assisted imaging enables day-like visibility at night
An imaging technique that uses a neural-network model to obtain physical information from infrared radiation improves on existing techniques in low-visibility situations, and could be deployed immediately in autonomous vehicles.
- Manish Bhattarai
- & Sophia Thompson
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Article |
Heat-assisted detection and ranging
Heat-assisted detection and ranging is experimentally shown to see texture and depth through darkness as if it were day, and also perceives decluttered physical attributes beyond RGB or thermal vision.
- Fanglin Bao
- , Xueji Wang
- & Zubin Jacob
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Technology Feature |
A pink rover tackles the red planet — and barriers for women in science
An Australian team designed the eye-catching robot to spark conversations about diversity in engineering and robotics.
- Amanda Heidt
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Article |
Fluidic self-assembly for MicroLED displays by controlled viscosity
A MicroLED lighting panel, assembled in 60 s by a surface-tension-driven fluidic self-assembly technique, gave a yield as high as 99.90% through the addition of a small amount of poloxamer to the assembly solution.
- Daewon Lee
- , Seongkyu Cho
- & Sunghoon Kwon
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Nature Video |
A robotic raspberry teaches machines how to pick fruit
This fake raspberry allows researchers to train fruit-picking robots in the lab before field tests.
- Shamini Bundell
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Outlook |
Robots need better batteries
As mobile machines travel farther from the grid, they’ll need lightweight and efficient power sources.
- Jeff Hecht
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Nature Video |
The bio-inspired ‘transformer’ that crawls, rolls and flies
A ‘multimodal’ robot gains efficiencies by tailoring itself to the needs of the task.
- Dan Fox
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Career Q&A |
Women in engineering: using hydrology to manage Jordan’s scarce water
Esraa Tarawneh says research and data gathering can improve her country’s resilience to droughts and rare flash floods.
- Jacqui Thornton
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Career Q&A |
Women in engineering: giving Porsche 911s the ‘ultimate’ makeover
As a child, Imogen Howarth enjoyed solving problems and playing with cars. Now, she helps to redesign a classic and acts as a role model for aspiring female engineers.
- Jacqui Thornton
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News Q&A |
Lost Titanic sub: an ocean scientist talks about dive safety
Oceanographer Peter Girguis offers an insider view of deep-sea exploration.
- Katharine Sanderson
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News Explainer |
Ukraine dam collapse: what scientists are watching
Extensive flooding could have severe consequences for farming, health and the environment.
- Miryam Naddaf
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News Explainer |
China’s mysterious spaceplane returns to Earth — what we know
Specialists speculate that it might be similar to a US spaceplane, and it could have research or military uses.
- Yvaine Ye
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Article |
Mapping internal temperatures during high-rate battery applications
The state of charge, mechanical strain and temperature within lithium-ion 18650 cells operated at high rates are characterized and operando temperature rise is observed to be due to heat accumulation, strongly influenced by cell design and charging protocol.
- T. M. M. Heenan
- , I. Mombrini
- & P. R. Shearing
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Research Highlight |
Claws like a tardigrade’s give swimming microrobots a grip
Miniature robots can cling to blood-vessel walls when kitted out with claws inspired by the water bear’s pincers.
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Article
| Open AccessHigh-throughput printing of combinatorial materials from aerosols
The authors report a high-throughput combinatorial printing method capable of fabricating materials with compositional gradients at microscale spatial resolution, demonstrating a variety of high-throughput printing strategies and applications in combinatorial doping, functional grading and chemical reaction.
- Minxiang Zeng
- , Yipu Du
- & Yanliang Zhang
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Article |
Helical polymers for dissymmetric circularly polarized light imaging
We report a simple method to fabricate chiroptical flexible layers via supramolecular helical ordering of conjugated polymer chains, providing direct, scalable realization of on-chip detection of the spin degree of freedom of photons.
- Inho Song
- , Jaeyong Ahn
- & Joon Hak Oh
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News & Views |
5G networks enable automated control of train traffic
Key tasks for ensuring railway safety have been performed automatically using fifth-generation (5G) mobile networks. The trial forms part of a Europe-wide scheme to test the feasibility of automating transport.
- Toktam Mahmoodi
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Research Highlight |
Airborne sonar spies on what lies beneath the waves
An aerial system can image objects submerged in either still or moving water.
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Article |
Near-frictionless ion transport within triazine framework membranes
The authors develop a strategy that allows the diffusion limit of ions in water to be approached for large-area, free-standing, synthetic membranes using covalently bonded polymer frameworks with rigidity-confined ion channels.
- Peipei Zuo
- , Chunchun Ye
- & Tongwen Xu
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Book Review |
Diving deep: the centuries-long quest to explore the deepest ocean
Schemes to dive to the bottom of the sea have a surprisingly long history — but a book shows how science has rarely been the motivation.
- Alexandra Witze
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News & Views |
Human–AI team halves cost of designing step in microchip fabrication
Engineers and algorithms have competed in a virtual test to design a step in the process of manufacturing computer chips. Pairing human expertise with computational efficiency proves most cost-effective, but only when the timing is right.
- Ying-Lang Wang
- & Mao-Chih Huang
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Research Briefing |
Plastic polymers split into reusable monomers using an electrical heating method
An innovative approach has been developed to break down plastic polymers into their monomer building blocks. It uses a continuous melting, wicking, vaporization and reaction process in a porous carbon-bilayer structure, and can convert two model plastic polymers to their monomers at high yields without a catalyst.
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Article |
Depolymerization of plastics by means of electrified spatiotemporal heating
A depolymerization method is described that uses electrified spatiotemporal heating to selectively generate monomers from the commodity plastics polypropylene and poly(ethylene terephthalate), allowing control over the pyrolysis of plastic waste and reducing the formation of side products.
- Qi Dong
- , Aditya Dilip Lele
- & Liangbing Hu
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Research Briefing |
Memristor devices denoised to achieve thousands of conductance levels
The number of distinguishable conductance levels in memristor devices — electronic components that store information without power — has been limited by noise. An understanding of the source of the noise, and development of an effective denoising process, have now enabled 2,048 conductance levels to be achieved in memristors in large arrays fabricated in a chip factory.
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Article |
Thousands of conductance levels in memristors integrated on CMOS
Chips with 256 × 256 memristor arrays that were monolithically integrated on complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) circuits in a commercial foundry achieved 2,048 conductance levels in individual memristors.
- Mingyi Rao
- , Hao Tang
- & J. Joshua Yang
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News & Views |
From the archive: the Channel tunnel, and a phantom island
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Article
| Open AccessHybrid 2D–CMOS microchips for memristive applications
High-integration-density 2D–CMOS hybrid microchips for memristive applications are made demonstrating in-memory computation and electrical response suitable for the implementation of spiking neural networks representing an advance towards integration of 2D materials in microelectronic products and memristive applications.
- Kaichen Zhu
- , Sebastian Pazos
- & Mario Lanza
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News & Views |
Hazards help autonomous cars to drive safely
Collecting training data by focusing on dangerous scenarios offers an efficient way for artificial intelligence to improve the safety of autonomous vehicles. Augmented reality allows the approach to be tested without risking lives.
- Colin Paterson
- & Chiara Picardi