News & Views |
Featured
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Article |
Giant energy storage and power density negative capacitance superlattices
Using a three-pronged approach — spanning field-driven negative capacitance stabilization to increase intrinsic energy storage, antiferroelectric superlattice engineering to increase total energy storage, and conformal three-dimensional deposition to increase areal energy storage density — very high electrostatic energy storage density and power density are reported in HfO2–ZrO2-based thin film microcapacitors integrated into silicon.
- Suraj S. Cheema
- , Nirmaan Shanker
- & Sayeef Salahuddin
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News |
Exclusive: official investigation reveals how superconductivity physicist faked blockbuster results
The confidential 124-page report from the University of Rochester, disclosed in a lawsuit, details the extent of Ranga Dias’s scientific misconduct.
- Dan Garisto
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Research Highlight |
Smallest known starquakes are detected with a subtle shift of colour
An unusual technique picks up the slow vibration of a faint star.
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News & Views |
Trio of radicals choreographed for versatile chemical reaction
The idea that three different free radicals could be used together to carry out specific steps in a chemical reaction has long been implausible. A ‘radical sorting’ strategy now achieves this feat to make organic molecules.
- Kenneth F. Clark
- & John A. Murphy
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News & Views |
A quirky fluid that has robotic capabilities
Scientists have designed a liquid that behaves as both a solid and a fluid owing to the presence of tiny gas-filled capsules. An unusual relationship between pressure and volume enables this material to grasp fragile objects.
- P.-T. Brun
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Article |
Phase-change memory via a phase-changeable self-confined nano-filament
We present a device that can reduce the phase-change memory reset current while maintaining a high on/off ratio, fast speed and small variations, representing advances for neuromorphic computing systems.
- See-On Park
- , Seokman Hong
- & Shinhyun Choi
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News |
Total solar eclipse 2024: how it will help scientists to study the Sun
The Sun’s mysterious outer atmosphere, the corona, will become easier to view from Earth on 8 April.
- Sumeet Kulkarni
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Article
| Open AccessHeat flows enrich prebiotic building blocks and enhance their reactivity
Heat flows through thin, crack-like geo-compartments are shown to purify previously mixed compounds and enhance their reactivity, providing a selective mechanism for separating molecules relevant to the chemical origins of life.
- Thomas Matreux
- , Paula Aikkila
- & Christof B. Mast
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Article |
An optical tweezer array of ultracold polyatomic molecules
An optical tweezer array of individual polyatomic molecules is created, revealing the obvious state control in the tweezer array and enabling further research on polyatomic molecules with diverse spatial arrangements.
- Nathaniel B. Vilas
- , Paige Robichaud
- & John M. Doyle
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Article |
Shell buckling for programmable metafluids
A metafluid with programmable compressibility, optical behaviour and viscosity is realized by mixing deformable spherical shells that undergo buckling within an incompressible fluid; the versatility of these metafluids opens up numerous opportunities for functionality.
- Adel Djellouli
- , Bert Van Raemdonck
- & Katia Bertoldi
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Article |
Metal telluride nanosheets by scalable solid lithiation and exfoliation
Fast and scalable synthesis of a variety of transition metal telluride nanosheets by solid lithiation and hydrolysis is demonstrated and several interesting quantum phenomena were observed, such as quantum oscillations and giant magnetoresistance.
- Liangzhu Zhang
- , Zixuan Yang
- & Hui-Ming Cheng
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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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Book Review |
Cosmologist Claudia de Rham on falling for gravity
The aspiring astronaut turned theoretical physicist talks travelling, the accelerating expansion of the Universe, thinking beyond three dimensions and detecting gravitational waves.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Technology Feature |
How synthetic biologists are building better biofactories
Artificial electron donors and acceptors expand researchers’ metabolic engineering options — if only cells would cooperate.
- Sara Reardon
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Career Feature |
How scientists are making the most of Reddit
As X wanes, researchers are turning to Reddit for insights and data, and to better connect with the public.
- Hannah Docter-Loeb
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Article |
Copper-catalysed dehydrogenation or lactonization of C(sp3)–H bonds
Use of N-methoxyamides as oxidants enables controllable, redox-neutral, green catalysis of bimodal dehydrogenation/lactonization reactions with methanol as the only by-product.
- Shupeng Zhou
- , Zi-Jun Zhang
- & Jin-Quan Yu
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News |
This super-Earth is the first planet confirmed to have a permanent dark side
Convincing evidence of 1:1 tidal locking had been absent until a new analysis of the exoplanet LHS 3844b.
- Joseph Howlett
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News & Views |
Electrons flip a switch on optical communications
Clever manipulation of electrons has enabled scientists to change a key property of light emitted by a device using electrically controlled magnetization. The method could lead to stable and energy-efficient information transfer.
- Satoshi Hiura
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Article |
Thermonuclear explosions on neutron stars reveal the speed of their jets
Relativistic jets observed from transient neutron stars throughout the Universe produce bright flares for minutes after each X-ray burst, helping to determine the role individual system properties have on the speed and revealing the dominant launching mechanism.
- Thomas D. Russell
- , Nathalie Degenaar
- & Melania Del Santo
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Article |
A global timekeeping problem postponed by global warming
Increased melting of ice in Greenland and Antarctica, measured by satellite gravity, has decreased the angular velocity of Earth more rapidly than before and has already affected global timekeeping.
- Duncan Carr Agnew
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Article |
A three-dimensional liquid diode for soft, integrated permeable electronics
Incorporation of a ‘liquid diode’ into a wearable electronic platform enhances comfort and stability by shunting away sweat as it accumulates.
- Binbin Zhang
- , Jiyu Li
- & Xinge Yu
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Article |
Interchain-expanded extra-large-pore zeolites
We report a strategy that yields thermally and hydrothermally stable silicates by expansion of a one-dimensional silicate chain with an intercalated silylating agent that separates and connects the chains.
- Zihao Rei Gao
- , Huajian Yu
- & Miguel A. Camblor
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Nature Podcast |
How climate change is affecting global timekeeping
Melting polar ice could delay major time adjustment, and the strange connection between brain inflammation and memory.
- Elizabeth Gibney
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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News & Views |
The wearable electronic patch that’s impervious to sweat
A smart adhesive patch that wicks sweat away from electronics embedded in its centre offers comfortable and reliable sensing of the wearer’s biometrics or environment without the risk of perspiration damaging the devices.
- Yifan Rao
- & Nanshu Lu
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Article |
Optomechanical realization of the bosonic Kitaev chain
We report the experimental realization of a bosonic Kitaev chain in a nano-optomechanical network.
- Jesse J. Slim
- , Clara C. Wanjura
- & Ewold Verhagen
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Article
| Open AccessHigh-fidelity spin qubit operation and algorithmic initialization above 1 K
Initialization and operation of spin qubits in silicon above 1 K reach fidelities sufficient for fault-tolerant operations at these temperatures.
- Jonathan Y. Huang
- , Rocky Y. Su
- & Chih Hwan Yang
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Analysis
| Open AccessA figure of merit for efficiency roll-off in TADF-based organic LEDs
Efficiency roll-off in a wide range of TADF OLEDs is analysed and a figure of merit proposed for materials design to improve efficiency at high brightness, potentially expanding the range of applications of TADF materials.
- S. Diesing
- , L. Zhang
- & I. D. W. Samuel
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Article |
Evidence for chiral graviton modes in fractional quantum Hall liquids
Through inelastic light scattering chiral spin-2 long-wavelength magnetorotons are observed, revealing chiral graviton modes in fractional quantum Hall states and aiding in understanding the quantum metric impacts in topological correlated systems.
- Jiehui Liang
- , Ziyu Liu
- & Aron Pinczuk
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Article
| Open AccessHigh-threshold and low-overhead fault-tolerant quantum memory
An end-to-end quantum error correction protocol that implements fault-tolerant memory on the basis of a family of low-density parity-check codes shows the possibility of low-overhead fault-tolerant quantum memory within the reach of near-term quantum processors.
- Sergey Bravyi
- , Andrew W. Cross
- & Theodore J. Yoder
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News |
Climate change has slowed Earth’s rotation — and could affect how we keep time
The effect of melting polar ice could delay the need for a ‘leap second’ by three years.
- Elizabeth Gibney
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News Explainer |
Divisive Sun-dimming study at Harvard cancelled: what’s next?
As the climate crisis rages on, advocacy for testing controversial solar geoengineering technology is ramping up.
- Jeff Tollefson
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Article |
Controlling the helicity of light by electrical magnetization switching
The helicity of light from a light-emitting diode can be electrically controlled by spin–orbit torque effects, enabling a seamless integration of magnetization dynamics with photonics.
- Pambiang Abel Dainone
- , Nicholas Figueiredo Prestes
- & Yuan Lu
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Article |
Graphene nanoribbons grown in hBN stacks for high-performance electronics
A strategy for the transfer-free direct growth of ultralong, high-quality graphene nanoribbons, which have desirable electronic properties, between layers of a boron nitride insulator is reported.
- Bosai Lyu
- , Jiajun Chen
- & Zhiwen Shi
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Article |
The complex circumstellar environment of supernova 2023ixf
Using ultraviolet data as well as a comprehensive set of further multiwavelength observations of the supernova 2023ixf, a reliable bolometric light curve is derived that indicates the heating nature of the early emission.
- E. A. Zimmerman
- , I. Irani
- & K. Zhang
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News & Views |
How Sydney Harbour Bridge was shaping up 100 years ago
Plans for Sydney’s iconic landmark become concrete, plus a ‘Michelin Guide’ to superconductive tunnelling, in the weekly dip into Nature’s archive.
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Correspondence |
Don’t underestimate the rising threat of groundwater to coastal cities
- Daniel J. Rozell
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Research Highlight |
These levitating bubbles are long-lived and puncture-proof
Soap bubbles bombarded with ultrasonic waves rise into mid-air and can survive being stabbed with a needle.
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Research Highlight |
A glowing glass transmits X-rays with ease
Copper-containing ‘nanoclusters’ form glasses with an orderly structure and unusual properties.
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Research Briefing |
A delay that makes wireless communication faster
Cutting-edge communication (6G and beyond) will rely on precise time control of large amounts of wirelessly transferred information. To achieve this precision, a ‘quasi-true time delay’ chip has been designed that packs as much time delay as possible into a tiny area using 3D waveguides whose length can be varied as required.
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Essay |
How did the Big Bang get its name? Here’s the real story
Astronomer Fred Hoyle supposedly coined the catchy term to ridicule the theory of the Universe’s origins — 75 years on, it’s time to set the record straight.
- Helge Kragh
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News |
Weird new electron behaviour in stacked graphene thrills physicists
This 2D material is only the second to exhibit the fractional quantum anomalous Hall effect, and theorists are still debating how it works.
- Dan Garisto
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News |
‘Best view ever’: observatory will map Big Bang’s afterglow in new detail
The Simons Observatory will search for signs of gravitational waves that originated from the Big Bang.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Research Highlight |
A supercollider glimpses a gathering of three particles never seen together before
Data from billions of proton collisions reveal that subatomic particles called W+ and W− bosons keep company with a photon.
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Research Highlight |
Squeeze, freeze, bake: how to make 3D-printed wood that mimics the real thing
Scientists turn waste wood into an ‘ink’ that can be printed into a variety of structures.
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Research Highlight |
A view of wind turbines drives down home values — but only briefly
House prices drop by 1% if wind turbines are close and visible, but they rebound quickly.
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News & Views |
Magnetic whirlpools offer improved data storage
Complex magnetic structures called skyrmions have been generated on a nanometre scale and controlled electrically — a promising step for fast, energy-efficient computer hardware systems that can store large amounts of data.
- Qiming Shao
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News & Views |
Complex motions emerge from robot interactions
An array of robots has been set up so that pushes between them produce movements that do not conform to the usual laws of motion. Fascinating behaviour emerges from these interactions: wave phenomena known as solitons.
- Sebastian D. Huber
- & Kukka-Emilia Huhtinen
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Article |
Dual quantum spin Hall insulator by density-tuned correlations in TaIrTe4
A study reports a dual quantum spin Hall insulator in monolayer TaIrTe4, arising from the interplay of its single-particle topology and density-tuned electron correlations.
- Jian Tang
- , Thomas Siyuan Ding
- & Qiong Ma
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Article |
All-electrical skyrmionic magnetic tunnel junction
Wafer-scale realization of a nanoscale magnetic tunnel junction hosting a single, ambient skyrmion enables its large readout, efficient switching, and compatibility with lateral manipulation, and thereby provides the backbone for all-electrical skyrmionic device architectures.
- Shaohai Chen
- , James Lourembam
- & Anjan Soumyanarayanan