Featured
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Article
| Open Access
FSC-certified forest management benefits large mammals compared to non-FSC
Camera-trap images of 55 mammal species in 14 logging concessions in western equatorial Africa reveal greater animal encounter rates in FSC-certified than in non-certified forests, especially for large mammals and species of high conservation priority.
- Joeri A. Zwerts
- , E. H. M. Sterck
- & Marijke van Kuijk
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Article
| Open Access
Ghost roads and the destruction of Asia-Pacific tropical forests
An effort to map roads in the Asia-Pacific region finds that there are 3.0–6.6 times more roads than other sources suggest, and that unmapped ‘ghost roads’ are a major contributor to tropical forest loss.
- Jayden E. Engert
- , Mason J. Campbell
- & William F. Laurance
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Where I Work |
Digging in: last chance to save a native forest
Dario Sandrini hikes, plants and digs to save a threatened and diminishing ecosystem.
- James Mitchell Crow
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Book Review |
Survival of the nicest: have we got evolution the wrong way round?
How humans, animals and even single-celled organisms cooperate to survive suggests there’s more to life than just competition, argues a cheering study of evolutionary biology.
- Jonathan R. Goodman
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News |
Brazil budget cuts could leave science labs without power and water
The Lula administration is trying to reverse lawmakers’ reductions, which are hitting scientists in the Amazon especially hard.
- Rodrigo de Oliveira Andrade
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Article |
Fossils document evolutionary changes of jaw joint to mammalian middle ear
A new morganucodontan-like species from the Jurassic in China shows evidence of a loss of load-bearing function in the articular–quadrate jaw joint, which probably had a role in the evolution of the mammalian middle ear.
- Fangyuan Mao
- , Chi Zhang
- & Jin Meng
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Article |
Jurassic shuotheriids show earliest dental diversification of mammaliaforms
A newly described fossil mammaliaform from the Jurassic period of China shows that the shuotheriids are allied to the docodonts, and provides details on the processes of tooth evolution in early mammals.
- Fangyuan Mao
- , Zhiyu Li
- & Jin Meng
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News & Views |
Why hand-operated front brakes were set to be the future of motoring
The complexity of fitting brakes to all four wheels of a car and the simplicity of John Maynard Smith’s ecological models, in the weekly dip into Nature’s archive.
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News & Views |
Climate change predicted to exacerbate declines in bee populations
What effects will climate change have on insect communities? Analyses of data collected over decades robustly document consequences specific to bee populations, and this evidence might aid future conservation efforts.
- Nicole E. Miller-Struttmann
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Article
| Open Access
Revealing uncertainty in the status of biodiversity change
This study presents an approach to deal with spatial, temporal and phylogenetic non-independence in large-scale analyses of biodiversity change, improving trend estimation and inference across scales.
- T. F. Johnson
- , A. P. Beckerman
- & R. P. Freckleton
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Article |
Heat and desiccation tolerances predict bee abundance under climate change
A 16-year dataset of abundance patterns of a diverse assemblage of bees in New Mexico, USA predicts declines for many bee species and indicates that drought-tolerant taxa will prevail in a warming and drying climate.
- Melanie R. Kazenel
- , Karen W. Wright
- & Jennifer A. Rudgers
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Article
| Open Access
Climate velocities and species tracking in global mountain regions
An analysis of the rate at which isotherms are shifting in mountain regions worldwide identifies 17 key regions with particularly high vertical isotherm shift velocities, and provides insight into how these shifts affect species ranges.
- Wei-Ping Chan
- , Jonathan Lenoir
- & Sheng-Feng Shen
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Comment |
How a tree-hugging protest transformed Indian environmentalism
Fifty years ago, a group of women from the villages of the Western Himalayas sparked Chipko, a green movement that remains relevant in the age of climate change.
- Seema Mundoli
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Editorial |
Deep-sea mining plans should not be rushed
Why are companies and governments determined to start commercial-scale mining for rare metals, when so little is known about its wider impacts?
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Obituary |
Estella Bergere Leopold (1927–2024), passionate environmentalist who traced changing ecosystems
The trailblazing palaeobotanist investigated how climate change affected Earth in the past — and firmly believed science should be used in its defence now.
- Cathy Whitlock
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News Feature |
The ‘Mother Tree’ idea is everywhere — but how much of it is real?
A popular theory about how trees cooperate has enchanted the public and raised the profile of forest conservation. But some ecologists think its scientific basis has been oversold.
- Aisling Irwin
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News |
Ditching ‘Anthropocene’: why ecologists say the term still matters
Beyond stratigraphic definitions, the name has broader significance for understanding humans’ place on Earth.
- David Adam
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Nature Podcast |
Killer whales have menopause. Now scientists think they know why
Data suggest menopause evolved to enable older female whales to help younger generations survive, and how researchers made a cellular map of the developing human heart.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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Article
| Open Access
Anoxygenic phototroph of the Chloroflexota uses a type I reaction centre
Cultivation of a new anoxygenic phototrophic bacterium from Boreal Shield lake water—representing a transition form in the evolution of photosynthesis—offers insights into how the major modes of phototrophy diversified.
- J. M. Tsuji
- , N. A. Shaw
- & J. D. Neufeld
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Article |
Drought triggers and sustains overnight fires in North America
By examining the hourly diurnal cycle of 23,557 fires in North America during 2017–2020, 1,095 overnight burning events were identified, mostly associated with extreme fires and driven by long-term drought conditions.
- Kaiwei Luo
- , Xianli Wang
- & Mike Flannigan
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News |
Indigenous Australian fire-stick farming began at least 11,000 years ago
Analysis of a sediment core dating back 150,000 years showed that fire patterns in Australia changed with the rise of Indigenous people’s use of fire.
- Bianca Nogrady
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Matters Arising |
Reply to: Model uncertainty obscures major driver of soil carbon
- Feng Tao
- , Benjamin Z. Houlton
- & Yiqi Luo
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Article
| Open Access
Bumblebees socially learn behaviour too complex to innovate alone
Bumblebees can learn how to open a two-step puzzle box by observing another trained bee, indicating that these insects can use social learning to acquire a behaviour too complex to otherwise be learnt through individual trial and error.
- Alice D. Bridges
- , Amanda Royka
- & Lars Chittka
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Technology Feature |
Five tips for digitizing handwritten data
Need to digitize field notes or historical documents? Researchers share their best practices.
- Alla Katsnelson
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Obituary |
Christophe Boesch (1951–2024), primatologist and chimpanzee champion
Zoologist whose understanding of chimpanzee behaviours has helped to assure their survival.
- Kathelijne Koops
- & Richard Wrangham
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Article
| Open Access
Latitudinal patterns in stabilizing density dependence of forest communities
An analysis of tree survival data from forest sites worldwide shows that in the tropics, rare tree species experience stronger stabilizing density dependence than common species, wheras no correlation of stabilizing density dependence and abundance exists in the temperate zone.
- Lisa Hülsmann
- , Ryan A. Chisholm
- & Florian Hartig
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Article
| Open Access
Mutualisms weaken the latitudinal diversity gradient among oceanic islands
The effect of the latitudinal diversity gradient on plants on oceanic islands is weakened by classical abiotic physical drivers of island biogeography and, to a greater extent, by mutualism with other species.
- Camille S. Delavaux
- , Thomas W. Crowther
- & Evan M. Gora
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Correspondence |
Train young scientists in taxonomy to help solve the biodiversity crisis
- Dasheng Liu
- , Julian R. Thompson
- & Henglun Shen
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Nature Podcast |
Audio long read: Chimpanzees are dying from our colds — these scientists are trying to save them
Endangered apes are increasingly being put at risk by human diseases.
- Rachel Nuwer
- & Benjamin Thompson
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Nature Podcast |
How whales sing without drowning, an anatomical mystery solved
Baleen whales sing using a modified larynx, but this leaves them them unable to escape human noise.
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News |
Why citizen scientists are gathering DNA from hundreds of lakes — on the same day
Massive environmental DNA project will take a record-setting snapshot of biodiversity worldwide.
- Lydia Larsen
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Editorial |
It’s time for countries to honour their million-dollar biodiversity pledges
Promises to safeguard biodiversity need to be translated into money in the bank.
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Article
| Open Access
Rainforest transformation reallocates energy from green to brown food webs
Conversion of rainforest to plantations in Sumatra leads to higher energetic losses in animal food webs aboveground than belowground, with the belowground energy being reallocated from diverse arthropod communities to invasive earthworms.
- Anton M. Potapov
- , Jochen Drescher
- & Stefan Scheu
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Analysis
| Open Access
Critical transitions in the Amazon forest system
Analyses of drivers of water stress are used to predict likely trajectories of the Amazon forest system and suggests potential actions that could prevent system collapse.
- Bernardo M. Flores
- , Encarni Montoya
- & Marina Hirota
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Correspondence |
Build global collaborations to protect marine migration routes
- Jianguo Du
- , Bin Chen
- & Wenjia Hu
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News & Views |
From the archive: river pollution, and a minister for science
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Where I Work |
I listen to the sounds this remote wetland makes to learn its rhythms
Peter Chatanga uses weeks-long audio recordings to build a picture of biodiversity in Lesotho’s crucial wetlands.
- Linda Nordling
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Career Q&A |
I took my case to Nepal’s highest court to improve conservation
After seeing an endangered-animal pelt displayed on television, Kumar Paudel embarked on a five-year legal battle, advocating for equitable enforcement of wildlife laws.
- Saugat Bolakhe
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Nature Podcast |
Cancer’s power harnessed — lymphoma mutations supercharge T cells
Genetic changes that help tumour cells thrive can be co-opted to improve immunotherapy’s effectiveness, and looking at the electric vehicle batteries of the future.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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News |
How do otters protect salt marshes from erosion? Shellfishly
Sea otters inadvertently protect the vegetation that binds sandy shorelines together.
- Jude Coleman
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News & Views |
Ecosystem effects of sea otters limit coastal erosion
Conservation is bringing back certain predators that are high in the food chain, but how this affects an ecosystem overall is debated. Rigorous fieldwork provides strong evidence that sea otters help to mitigate coastal erosion.
- Johan S. Eklöf
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Article |
Top-predator recovery abates geomorphic decline of a coastal ecosystem
Sea otters recolonizing an estuary in California indirectly reduce erosion by reducing burrowing crab abundance, suggesting that restoring predators could be a key mechanism to improve the stability of coastal wetlands and other ecosystems.
- Brent B. Hughes
- , Kathryn M. Beheshti
- & Brian R. Silliman
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Nature Video |
‘Like a moth to a flame’ — this strange insect behaviour is finally explained
Many explanations have been put forward for insects’ attraction to light, but high tech cameras now suggest a different answer.
- Dan Fox
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News |
Indian forest act faces challenge in Supreme Court
Ecologists, bureaucrats and conservationists say India’s amended Forest Conservation Act will reduce biodiversity and harm livelihoods.
- Gayathri Vaidyanathan
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Research Briefing |
Predator die-off reshapes ecosystems in expected and unexpected ways
Mass-mortality events of predators are becoming more common, but their precise effects on food webs remain unclear. Experimentally induced predator die-offs led both to reduced predation and to fertilization from the bottom up. Together, these effects stabilized food webs.
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Article |
Predator mass mortality events restructure food webs through trophic decoupling
Predator mass-mortality events lead to the proliferation of diverse consumer and producer communities resulting from weakened top-down predator control and stronger bottom-up effects through predator decomposition.
- Simon P. Tye
- , Samuel B. Fey
- & Adam M. Siepielski
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Nature Podcast |
This AI just figured out geometry — is this a step towards artificial reasoning?
How ‘AlphaGeometry’ solves Mathematical Olympiad-level problems, and what happens to an ecosystem after a mass predator die-off.
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News |
Largest genetic database of marine microbes could aid drug discovery
A trove of more than 300 million gene groups from ocean bacteria, fungi and viruses has been made freely available online.
- Carissa Wong
Wildlife boost in African forests certified for sustainable loggingBrowse broader subjects
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