Featured
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News & Views |
Layered ferroelectric materials make waves — and vortices
By combining materials-synthesis techniques, researchers have come up with a way of building layered structures that display intriguing wave-like patterns of electric polarization, and could be useful for next-generation electronics.
- Berit H. Goodge
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News |
This new map of the Universe suggests dark matter shaped the cosmos
The eROSITA telescope’s detailed pictures are among the most precise cosmological measurements ever made.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Article |
Rapid spin changes around a magnetar fast radio burst
X-ray observations of two large glitches bracketing a fast radio burst in the active Galactic magnetar SGR 1935+2154 reveal a connection between rapid spin change and radiative behaviours of the magnetar.
- Chin-Ping Hu
- , Takuto Narita
- & Keith C. Gendreau
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News & Views |
New type of magnetism splits from convention
Magnetic materials with zero net magnetization fall into two classes: conventional antiferromagnets and altermagnets. Physicists have identified a property in altermagnets that widens the divide between the two groups.
- Carmine Autieri
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Article |
Observation of plaid-like spin splitting in a noncoplanar antiferromagnet
Examining the in-plane spin components of the noncoplanar antiferromagnet manganese ditelluride provides spectroscopic and computational evidence of materials with a new type of plaid-like spin splitting in the antiferromagnetic ground state.
- Yu-Peng Zhu
- , Xiaobing Chen
- & Chang Liu
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Article
| Open AccessRoom-temperature quantum optomechanics using an ultralow noise cavity
A room-temperature demonstration of optomechanical squeezing of light and measurement of mechanical motion approaching the Heisenberg limit using a phononic-engineered membrane-in-the-middle cavity with ultralow noise.
- Guanhao Huang
- , Alberto Beccari
- & Tobias J. Kippenberg
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Editorial |
Calling all engineers: Nature wants to publish your research
Papers in engineering are under-represented, even neglected, in the journal. We want to change that.
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Article
| Open AccessA 2D ferroelectric vortex pattern in twisted BaTiO3 freestanding layers
The stacking of freestanding ferroelectric perovskite layers with controlled twist angles results in a peculiar pattern of polarization vortices and antivortices that emerges from the flexoelectric coupling of polarization to strain gradients.
- G. Sánchez-Santolino
- , V. Rouco
- & J. Santamaria
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News & Views |
Gender bias is more exaggerated in online images than in text
A big-data analysis shows that men are starkly over-represented in online images, and that gender bias is stronger in images compared with text. Such images could influence enduring gender biases in our offline lives.
- Bas Hofstra
- & Anne Maaike Mulders
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Nature Podcast |
Smoking changes your immune system, even years after quitting
The lingering effect of cigarettes on T cell responses, and the Solar System's new ocean.
- Shamini Bundell
- & Nick Petrić Howe
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Article
| Open AccessAltermagnetic lifting of Kramers spin degeneracy
Using photoemission spectroscopy and ab initio calculations, evidence is given of two distinct unconventional mechanisms of lifted Kramers spin degeneracy generated by the altermagnetic phase of centrosymmetric MnTe with vanishing net magnetization.
- J. Krempaský
- , L. Šmejkal
- & T. Jungwirth
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Article |
A high black-hole-to-host mass ratio in a lensed AGN in the early Universe
JWST/NIRSpec observations of Abell2744-QSO1 show a high black-hole-to-host mass ratio in the early Universe, which indicates that we are seeing the black hole in a phase of rapid growth, accreting at 30% of the Eddington limit.
- Lukas J. Furtak
- , Ivo Labbé
- & Christina C. Williams
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Article |
A massive galaxy that formed its stars at z ≈ 11
A massive galaxy observed with the JWST indicates that the bulk of its stars formed within the first 500 million years of the Universe.
- Karl Glazebrook
- , Themiya Nanayakkara
- & Angel Chandro-Gomez
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Article |
Non-Abelian topological order and anyons on a trapped-ion processor
A trapped-ion quantum processor is used to create ground-states and excitations of non-Abelian topological order on a kagome lattice of 27 qubits with high fidelity.
- Mohsin Iqbal
- , Nathanan Tantivasadakarn
- & Henrik Dreyer
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Correspondence |
Deep-sea mining opponents: there’s no free lunch when it comes to clean energy
- Saleem H. Ali
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Research Briefing |
Solitary light pulses on a chip-sized laser open up analytical applications
Self-reinforcing light pulses known as solitons are fundamental structures in wave dynamics. Previously, solitons could be produced only by bench-top lasers, but they can now also be generated using chip-sized mid-infrared lasers. This innovation enables the development of portable, efficient tools for use in spectroscopy, environmental sensing and medical diagnostics.
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Editorial |
EU climate policy is dangerously reliant on untested carbon-capture technology
Europe’s ambition for emissions reductions is to be welcomed — but look at the detail, and significant hazards emerge.
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Article |
Alkene dialkylation by triple radical sorting
We use bimolecular homolytic substitution catalysis to sort an electrophilic radical and a nucleophilic radical across an unactivated alkene, accelerating access to pharmaceutically relevant C(sp3)-rich molecules and defining a mechanistic approach for alkene dialkylation.
- Johnny Z. Wang
- , William L. Lyon
- & David W. C. MacMillan
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News |
Private Moon launch a success! But will the craft land safely on the lunar surface?
Anxiety is high as the company Intuitive Machines takes its first crack at a touchdown.
- Alexandra Witze
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Career Feature |
I run a physics lab — and thousands of kilometres a year
In 2023, Jenny Hoffman ran across the United States in 47 days, smashing the women’s world record. But she still found time to lead a research team.
- Sara Reardon
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News Explainer |
How journals are fighting back against a wave of questionable images
Publishers are deploying AI-based tools to detect suspicious images, but generative AI threatens their efforts.
- Nicola Jones
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News Q&A |
‘Geometry can be very simple, but totally deep’: meet top maths prizewinner Claire Voisin
Voisin won this year’s Crafoord Prize in Mathematics for research inspired by string theory, and work on a million-dollar unsolved problem.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Research Highlight |
Why an ancient gold-based explosive makes purple smoke
Gold nanoparticles are confirmed as the source of the flamboyant colour of the smoke produced by fulminating gold.
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News |
Mirror-image molecules separated using workhorse of chemistry
The ability to distinguish between left- and right-handed molecules using mass spectrometry could streamline a laborious part of drug discovery.
- Katharine Sanderson
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News Explainer |
How to test a Moon landing from Earth
The world is racing to land on the Moon. How do space agencies and commercial companies test their landers ahead of time?
- Jatan Mehta
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Editorial |
Cyberattacks on knowledge institutions are increasing: what can be done?
For months, ransomware attacks have debilitated research at the British Library in London and Berlin’s natural history museum. They show how vulnerable scientific and educational institutions are to this kind of crime.
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News Feature |
The new car batteries that could power the electric vehicle revolution
Researchers are experimenting with different designs that could lower costs, extend vehicle ranges and offer other improvements.
- Nicola Jones
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News & Views |
Resting restores performance of discharged lithium-metal batteries
In lithium-metal batteries, grains of lithium can become electrically isolated from the anode, lowering battery performance. Experiments reveal that rest periods after battery discharge might help to solve this problem.
- Laura C. Merrill
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Article
| Open AccessLight-driven nanoscale vectorial currents
Vectorial optoelectronic metasurfaces are described, showing that light pulses can be used to drive and direct local charge flows around symmetry-broken plasmonic nanostructures, leading to tunable responses in terahertz emission.
- Jacob Pettine
- , Prashant Padmanabhan
- & Hou-Tong Chen
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Article |
A rechargeable calcium–oxygen battery that operates at room temperature
A Ca–O2 battery that relies on a highly reversible two-electron redox to form chemically reactive calcium peroxide as the discharge product is reported to be stable in air and rechargeable for 700 cycles at room temperature.
- Lei Ye
- , Meng Liao
- & Huisheng Peng
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Article |
Observation and quantification of the pseudogap in unitary Fermi gases
This study describes experiments with ultracold lithium Fermi gases in which many-body pairing leads to the emergence of a pseudogap, and it confirms theoretical predictions relevant to cuprate superconductivity.
- Xi Li
- , Shuai Wang
- & Jian-Wei Pan
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News |
The Solar System has a new ocean — it’s buried in a small Saturn moon
The sea inside Saturn’s satellite Mimas formed in the past 25 million years, a blink of the eye in geological terms.
- Alexandra Witze
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Article
| Open AccessEvidence of superconducting Fermi arcs
We provide evidence for superconducting topological Fermi arcs in PbBi2—a Weyl semimetal previously studied mostly for its bulk properties—from which Marjorama fermions could be derived for research in quantum computers.
- Andrii Kuibarov
- , Oleksandr Suvorov
- & Sergey Borisenko
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Article |
A recently formed ocean inside Saturn’s moon Mimas
An analysis of the orbital motion of Saturn’s moon Mimas shows that a recently formed global subsurface ocean lies beneath its cratered icy shell and that this ocean is probably still evolving.
- V. Lainey
- , N. Rambaux
- & K. Baillié
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Article
| Open AccessSignatures of a surface spin–orbital chiral metal
A spin–orbital- and angular-momentum-sensitive methodology used to study Sr2RuO4 reveals subtle spectroscopic signatures that are consistent with the formation of spin–orbital chiral currents at the surface of the material.
- Federico Mazzola
- , Wojciech Brzezicki
- & Antonio Vecchione
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Article |
Recovery of isolated lithium through discharged state calendar ageing
Calendar ageing of lithium metal batteries in the discharged state improves capacity retention through isolated lithium recovery, which is in contrast with the capacity degradation observed during charged state calendar ageing.
- Wenbo Zhang
- , Philaphon Sayavong
- & Yi Cui
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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 & Views |
Active fluids navigate networks by solving sudoku-like problems
Networks filled with self-propelled fluids display meandering patterns that have been shown to follow rules similar to those of sudoku puzzles — offering design principles for microfluidic devices, and the possibility of ‘active fluid’ logic.
- Mathieu Le Verge-Serandour
- & Karen Alim
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News |
CERN’s supercollider plan: $17-billion ‘Higgs factory’ would dwarf LHC
A feasibility study on the Future Circular Collider identifies where and how the machine could be built — but its construction is far from a done deal.
- Elizabeth Gibney
- & Davide Castelvecchi
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News |
AI chatbot shows surprising talent for predicting chemical properties and reactions
Researchers lightly tweak ChatGPT-like system to offer chemistry insight.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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News |
EU unveils controversial climate target: what scientists think
The goal leans heavily on the largely unproven approach of carbon removal, concerning researchers.
- Katharine Sanderson
- & Carissa Wong
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News |
JWST is most in-demand telescope ever — leaving many astronomers in the cold
Reviewers will probably approve only one in every nine research proposals submitted in latest application cycle.
- Rahul Rao
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Research Highlight |
The mystery of Feynman’s sprinkler is solved at last
A puzzle named after the Nobel-prizewinning physicist has been solved by experiments with a submerged sprinkler.
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News |
Israel is flooding Gaza’s tunnel network: scientists assess the risks
The plan to target Hamas involves filling parts of a 500-kilometre-long network of underground tunnels. Researchers warn this could affect Gaza’s water supplies.
- Josie Glausiusz
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News |
Building used by Marie Curie will be dismantled to erect cancer centre
The disused and formerly radioactive Pavillon des Sources in Paris will be rebuilt nearby, after an agreement between scientists and the French culture ministry.
- Nisha Gaind
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Research Briefing |
Bendy silicon solar cells pack a powerful punch
Crystalline silicon solar cells have been brittle, heavy and fragile until now. Highly flexible versions with high power-to-weight ratios and power conversion efficiencies of 26.06–26.81% were produced by improving manufacturing and design technologies and by using thin wafer substrates.
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News & Views |
Flexible fibres take fabrics into the information age
A technique for embedding fibres with semiconductor devices produces defect-free strands that are hundreds of metres long. Garments woven with these threads offer a tantalizing glimpse of the wearable electronics of the future.
- Xiaoting Jia
- & Alex Parrott
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Article |
Establishing reaction networks in the 16-electron sulfur reduction reaction
We investigate the mechanism underlying the sulfur reduction reaction that plays a central role in high-capacity lithium sulfur batteries, highlighting the electrocatalytic approach as a promising strategy for tackling the fundamental challenges associated with these batteries.
- Rongli Liu
- , Ziyang Wei
- & Xiangfeng Duan
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Article |
Durable CO2 conversion in the proton-exchange membrane system
We develop a proton-exchange membrane system that reduces CO2 to formic acid at a catalyst that is derived from waste lead–acid batteries and in which a lattice carbon activation mechanism contributes.
- Wensheng Fang
- , Wei Guo
- & Bao Yu Xia