Reviews & Analysis

A silicon-based quantum-computing platform has met key standards for reducing error — setting the stage for quantum devices that could benefit from established semiconductor microchip technologies.

Nature’s pages feature an example of how science aided the turkey industry, and report observations of a solar eclipse.

Excessive rainfall can cause catastrophic socio-economic losses to a community or nation. An analysis of changes in gross regional product identifies ways in which extreme precipitation affects global economic productivity.

Genomic regions that are crucial for the viability and reproduction of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana are enriched with molecular features that are associated with a reduced rate of mutation.

The curious electrical resistance that gives strange metals their name has been seen in a failed superconductor, in which disorder interferes with the material’s ability to achieve zero resistance below a critical temperature.

Nature’s pages consider decision making during conflicts about planning permission, and feature an exhibition of scientific instruments.

The nervous and immune systems interact in a bidirectional manner. It emerges that inflammation in the body activates brain cells that, when later reactivated, can trigger a recapitulation of the inflammatory response.

A comparison of the charge-to-mass ratio for the proton and the antiproton has been performed with record-breaking precision — the best such test yet for a mirror-like symmetry that relates matter and antimatter.

A combination of standard and new observational techniques has been used to detect the magnetic field of a molecular cloud — a region of the interstellar medium that collapses during star formation. The results suggest that such clouds are primed for collapse earlier than was typically assumed.

Cell-free RNA transcripts in maternal blood can be analysed to monitor the progression of pregnancy and to predict a potentially harmful pregnancy-specific condition called pre‑eclampsia.

The progress and the outstanding issues in understanding the correlated phases in the unconventional iron-based superconductors is reviewed.

Efforts to prove Fermat’s last theorem, and a bewildered translator tackles a book about birds.