Editorials

A quota-trading scheme could end conflict between whalers and conservationists.

A refreshingly frank and forward-looking report on the safety of French nuclear power plants in the wake of Fukushima should spur other countries to take a hard look at regulation of their own reactors.

Where political leadership on climate change is lacking, scientists must be prepared to stick their heads above the parapet.

As the year ends, Nature highlights individuals who rose to prominence — or fell from grace.

Brazilian lawmakers should not weaken their stance on deforestation to appease landowners.

President Barack Obama's stance on an emergency contraceptive betrays his promised principles of scientific integrity and sets a troubling precedent for political interference in 'inconvenient' science.

The Durban meeting shows that climate policy and climate science inhabit parallel worlds.

The European Court of Justice was wrong to weigh in on the definition of a human embryo.

Even Japan's political leaders struggle to get answers regarding the Fukushima disaster. It is just the latest example of the government's lack of independent scientific advice.

There are bigger things in the Universe than our earthly worries. Much bigger.

Protected areas are only the start of the road to reforming our relationship with the seas.

With the Leveson inquiry scrutinizing journalistic practice in the United Kingdom, scientists should take the opportunity to fight back against agenda-driven reporting.

Muted media response to the release of more climate e-mails shows science's strength.

The Danish government's plan to axe technology assessment is ill-conceived.

Spain, Italy and Greece all have new governments and new research laws. Despite the pressures of economic austerity, investing in science now could bring disproportionate benefits.

Egypt and Libya can look to the past to help build a more stable future.

By failing to explain why a moratorium on breeding chimpanzees seems not to have been enforced, the US National Institutes of Health risks a further loss of public support for chimp research.

Latest mission to Mars promises close-up view of planet's surface.

US refusal to collaborate with China on space science is short-sighted and misguided, from both a scientific and a pragmatic standpoint.

Demise of snails in a New Zealand freezer is a sign of the times.