Featured
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The scales of human mobility
A model shows that human mobility is organized within hierarchical containers that coincide with familiar scales and that a power-law distribution emerges when movements between different containers are combined.
- Laura Alessandretti
- , Ulf Aslak
- & Sune Lehmann
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Article |
The growth equation of cities
A theoretical model in the form of a stochastic differential equation is proposed that describes, more accurately than previous models, the population evolution of cities, revealing that rare but very large interurban migration is a dominant factor.
- Vincent Verbavatz
- & Marc Barthelemy
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News |
Quantum computer race intensifies as alternative technology gains steam
Trapped-ion systems are gaining momentum in the quest to make a commercial quantum computer.
- Elizabeth Gibney
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News & Views |
Primordial element production studied beneath a mountain
Experiments conducted deep beneath a mountain have provided the most precise measurements yet of a key nuclear reaction that occurred seconds after the Big Bang — refining our knowledge of the constituents of the Universe.
- Brian D. Fields
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Article |
Correlated insulating states at fractional fillings of moiré superlattices
An optical sensing technique reveals an abundance of correlated insulating states at fractional fillings of moiré superlattices that are proposed to arise from a series of charge-ordered states.
- Yang Xu
- , Song Liu
- & Jie Shan
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Article |
The baryon density of the Universe from an improved rate of deuterium burning
High-precision cross-sections of the nuclear reaction that burns deuterium to create helium-3 are used to produce theoretical estimates of the primordial baryon density that are in agreement with recent astronomical observations.
- V. Mossa
- , K. Stöckel
- & S. Zavatarelli
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Article |
Anatomy of cage formation in a two-dimensional glass-forming liquid
The onset of rigidity in a two-dimensional colloidal glass-forming system is identified by the formation and merging of locally rigid domains in which particles move in a cooperative manner.
- Bo Li
- , Kai Lou
- & Steve Granick
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News & Views |
Competition at nuclear extremes explains why neutrons drip off nuclei
The neutron drip line refers to the maximum number of neutrons that can be packed into the atomic nuclei of each chemical element. A mechanism has been proposed that could explain the long-debated origin of this drip line.
- Calvin W. Johnson
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Article |
The impact of nuclear shape on the emergence of the neutron dripline
A mechanistic explanation for the origin of the neutron dripline shows that nuclei accommodate the addition of neutrons by becoming increasingly ellipsoidal, up to a maximum number of neutrons, reconciling theory and experiments.
- Naofumi Tsunoda
- , Takaharu Otsuka
- & Hideki Ueno
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News |
Astronauts have conducted nearly 3,000 science experiments aboard the ISS
A graphical guide to the research carried out on the International Space Station — and who did it.
- Alexandra Witze
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News |
What 50 gravitational-wave events reveal about the Universe
Astrophysicists now have enough black-hole mergers to map their frequency over the cosmos’s history.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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News Q&A |
Quantum-computing pioneer warns of complacency over Internet security
Nature talks to Peter Shor 25 years after he showed how to make quantum computations feasible — and how they could endanger our data.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Article |
The Philae lander reveals low-strength primitive ice inside cometary boulders
When the Philae lander bounced on the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, it exposed primitive icy-dust material within cometary boulders; the intrinsic strength and porosity of this material is reported.
- Laurence O’Rourke
- , Philip Heinisch
- & Holger Sierks
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Article |
Integrated multi-wavelength control of an ion qubit
A surface-electrode ion-trap chip is demonstrated, which delivers all the wavelengths of light required for the preparation and operation of ion qubits.
- R. J. Niffenegger
- , J. Stuart
- & J. Chiaverini
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Article |
Integrated optical multi-ion quantum logic
Scalable optics co-fabricated with a cryogenic surface-electrode ion trap are used to drive high-fidelity multi-ion quantum logic gates, demonstrating a route to simultaneously scale and reduce errors in quantum processors.
- Karan K. Mehta
- , Chi Zhang
- & Jonathan P. Home
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News |
First room-temperature superconductor excites — and baffles — scientists
A compound of hydrogen, carbon and sulfur has broken a symbolic barrier — but its high pressure conditions make it difficult to analyse.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Article |
H i 21-centimetre emission from an ensemble of galaxies at an average redshift of one
Emission from atomic hydrogen at a wavelength of 21 centimetres had been observed from galaxies at a maximum redshift of 0.4, but is now reported at a redshift of about 1.
- Aditya Chowdhury
- , Nissim Kanekar
- & K. S. Dwarakanath
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Article |
RETRACTED ARTICLE: Room-temperature superconductivity in a carbonaceous sulfur hydride
Room-temperature superconductivity is observed in a photochemically synthesized ternary carbonaceous sulfur hydride system at 15 °C and 267 GPa.
- Elliot Snider
- , Nathan Dasenbrock-Gammon
- & Ranga P. Dias
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Nature Podcast |
Superconductivity gets heated
A high pressure experiment reveals the world’s first room-temperature superconductor, and a method to target ecosystem restoration.
- Nick Howe
- & Shamini Bundell
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Article |
Efficient and stable blue quantum dot light-emitting diode
Cadmium-free blue quantum dot light-emitting diodes are constructed with a quantum yield of unity, an efficiency at the theoretical limit, high brightness and long operational lifetime.
- Taehyung Kim
- , Kwang-Hee Kim
- & Eunjoo Jang
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Article |
A system hierarchy for brain-inspired computing
The concept of neuromorphic completeness and a system hierarchy for neuromorphic computing are presented, which could improve programming-language portability, hardware completeness and compilation feasibility of brain-inspired computing systems
- Youhui Zhang
- , Peng Qu
- & Luping Shi
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Obituary |
Berni Alder (1925–2020)
Theoretical physicist who pioneered the computer modelling of matter.
- David Ceperley
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News & Views |
Inductors enter the world of quantum mechanics
Electronic devices called inductors are hard to miniaturize because their effectiveness is proportional to their size. An approach based on quantum mechanics could overcome this issue, offering many potential applications.
- Seonghoon Woo
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Article |
Emergent electromagnetic induction in a helical-spin magnet
Microscale magnetic devices containing nanoscale spin helices produce an inductance comparable in magnitude to that of a commercial inductor, in a volume about a million times smaller.
- Tomoyuki Yokouchi
- , Fumitaka Kagawa
- & Yoshinori Tokura
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News Feature |
Face masks: what the data say
The science supports that face coverings are saving lives during the coronavirus pandemic, and yet the debate trundles on. How much evidence is enough?
- Lynne Peeples
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Article |
Bolometer operating at the threshold for circuit quantum electrodynamics
A thermal detector based on a graphene monolayer operates at the threshold for circuit quantum electrodynamics applications, achieving a minimum time constant of 200 ns.
- R. Kokkoniemi
- , J.-P. Girard
- & M. Möttönen
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Nature Podcast |
Greenland's ice will melt faster than any time in the past 12,000 years
How current and future ice loss in Greenland compares to the past, and using graphene to make ultra-sensitive radiation detectors.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Shamini Bundell
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Article |
Concentric liquid reactors for chemical synthesis and separation
In a rotating reactor, immiscible or pairwise-immiscible liquids organize into stable but internally agitated concentric layers, enabling multistep syntheses and separations of reaction mixtures.
- Olgierd Cybulski
- , Miroslaw Dygas
- & Bartosz A. Grzybowski
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Article |
Graphene-based Josephson junction microwave bolometer
An ultimately thin microwave bolometric sensor based on a superconductor–graphene–superconductor Josephson junction with monolayer graphene has a sensitivity approaching the fundamental limit imposed by intrinsic thermal fluctuations.
- Gil-Ho Lee
- , Dmitri K. Efetov
- & Kin Chung Fong
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Obituary |
Vaughan Jones (1952–2020)
Mathematician whose invention connected knots to quantum physics.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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News |
The first-ever image of a black hole is now a movie
Pictures created from old observations show the void’s stormy evolution over the past decade.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Article |
Fractional antiferromagnetic skyrmion lattice induced by anisotropic couplings
Theoretically predicted fractional antiferromagnetic skyrmions are experimentally realized in MnSc2S4 and are found to originate from anisotropic couplings over nearest neighbours in the crystal lattice.
- Shang Gao
- , H. Diego Rosales
- & Oksana Zaharko
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Article |
Plasmonic enhancement of stability and brightness in organic light-emitting devices
Plasmonic effects in organic light-emitting devices, which are normally considered a source of energy loss, are harnessed to enhance the stability of these devices while maintaining operational efficiency.
- Michael A. Fusella
- , Renata Saramak
- & Julia J. Brown
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Article |
The superconducting quasicharge qubit
A fundamental superconducting qubit is introduced: ‘blochnium’ is dual to the transmon, relies on a circuit element called hyperinductance, and its fundamental physical variable is the quasicharge of the Josephson junction.
- Ivan V. Pechenezhskiy
- , Raymond A. Mencia
- & Vladimir E. Manucharyan
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Nature Podcast |
Genes chart Vikings’ spread across Europe
Mapping the migration of the Vikings, and the world’s smallest ultrasound device.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Nick Howe
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News |
Discoverer of neural circuits for parenting wins US$3-million Breakthrough Prize
Biologist Catherine Dulac netted one of four big life-sciences awards. Also announced were one for mathematics and two for physics.
- Zeeya Merali
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Article |
Experimental deterministic correction of qubit loss
A deterministic correction of errors caused by qubit loss or leakage outside the computational space is demonstrated in a trapped-ion experiment by using a minimal instance of the topological surface code.
- Roman Stricker
- , Davide Vodola
- & Rainer Blatt
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Article |
Evidence for supercritical behaviour of high-pressure liquid hydrogen
Simulations using machine-learning-based interatomic potentials in dense hydrogen overcome system size and timescale limitations, providing evidence of a supercritical behaviour of high-pressure liquid hydrogen and reconciling theoretical and experimental discrepancies.
- Bingqing Cheng
- , Guglielmo Mazzola
- & Michele Ceriotti
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Nature Video |
The weird physics of levitating liquids and upside-down buoyancy
Video shows model boats floating on an upside-down sea, demonstrating a peculiar new phenomenon.
- Shamini Bundell
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News & Views |
Precise measurement of deuteron mass raises hopes of solving the nuclear-mass puzzle
Contradictory values for the masses of atomic nuclei have cast doubt on the reliability of these widely used quantities. A new mass measurement of the deuteron, the second-simplest atomic nucleus, clarifies the situation.
- Jeroen C. J. Koelemeij
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News & Views |
Vibration overcomes gravity on a levitating fluid
Volumes of fluid have previously been made to float above air by vibrating the air–fluid system vertically. It now emerges that an ‘antigravity’ effect enables objects to float upside down on the air–fluid interface.
- Vladislav Sorokin
- & Iliya I. Blekhman
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Article |
Floating under a levitating liquid
Manipulation of the effective gravity of an oscillating liquid creates stable buoyancy in the lower surface of a liquid layer levitating above air, allowing bodies to float upside down.
- Benjamin Apffel
- , Filip Novkoski
- & Emmanuel Fort
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News |
‘It’s mindboggling!’: astronomers detect most powerful black-hole collision yet
Gravitational-wave detections suggest merging black holes fell into ‘forbidden’ range of masses.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Article |
Penning trap mass measurements of the deuteron and the HD+ molecular ion
Penning trap mass spectrometry is used to measure the masses of the deuteron and the HD+ ion with unprecedented precision, reducing the uncertainty of the proton mass reference value.
- Sascha Rau
- , Fabian Heiße
- & Klaus Blaum
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Article |
Universal structure of dark matter haloes over a mass range of 20 orders of magnitude
Simulations of formation of dark matter haloes ranging in size from Earth mass to clusters of galaxies find a universal halo density structure spanning 20 orders of magnitude in mass.
- J. Wang
- , S. Bose
- & S. D. M. White
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Article |
Impact of ionizing radiation on superconducting qubit coherence
Ionizing radiation from environmental radioactivity and cosmic rays increases the density of broken Cooper pairs in superconducting qubits, reducing their coherence times, but can be partially mitigated by lead shielding.
- Antti P. Vepsäläinen
- , Amir H. Karamlou
- & William D. Oliver
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Book Review |
When quantum physics met psychiatry
Carl Jung and Wolfgang Pauli bounced ideas off each other, Paul Halpern’s book shows.
- Anil Ananthaswamy
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Nature Podcast |
The challenge of reproducing results from ten-year-old code
Protecting delicate quantum bits, and a competition to replicate findings from ancient computer code.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Nick Howe
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Arts Review |
Tesla biopic, starring Ethan Hawke: eccentric portrayal
The inventor of alternating current, motors and more is back — and this time, he sings.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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