Featured
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Correspondence |
Interpersonal therapy can be an effective tool against the devastating effects of loneliness
- Myrna M. Weissman
- & Jennifer J. Mootz
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News |
Is the Internet bad for you? Huge study reveals surprise effect on well-being
A survey of more than 2.4 million people finds that being online can have a positive effect on welfare.
- Carissa Wong
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Outlook |
How ignorance and gender inequality thwart treatment of a widespread illness
Tens of millions of people have female genital schistosomiasis, a neglected tropical disease that few physicians have even heard of. Efforts are under way to move it out of obscurity and empower women and girls to access sexual and reproductive health care.
- Claire Ainsworth
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News |
Bird flu in US cows: where will it end?
Scientists worry that the H5N1 strain of avian influenza will become endemic in cattle, which would aid its spread in people.
- Sara Reardon
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News |
US funders to tighten oversight of controversial ‘gain of function’ research
New policy on high-risk biology studies aims to address criticism that previous rules were too vague.
- Max Kozlov
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Comment |
We need more-nuanced approaches to exploring sex and gender in research
Some scientists are reluctant to investigate questions about sex and gender, particularly given today’s sociopolitical tensions around gender identity. But they should lean in and embrace the complexity.
- Stacey A. Ritz
- & Lorraine Greaves
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News |
Bird flu virus has been spreading among US cows for months, RNA reveals
Genomic analysis suggests that the outbreak probably began in December or January, but a shortage of data is hampering efforts to pin down the source.
- Smriti Mallapaty
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Arts Review |
Las Borinqueñas remembers the forgotten Puerto Rican women who tested the first pill
Clinical trials of the first oral contraceptive recalled in a bold theatre production.
- Mariana Lenharo
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News |
WHO redefines airborne transmission: what does that mean for future pandemics?
The World Health Organization was criticized for being too slow to classify COVID-19 as airborne. Will the new terminology help next time?
- Bianca Nogrady
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Correspondence |
More work is needed to take on the rural wastewater challenge
- Jinlou Huang
- , Duo Li
- & Xiao Jin Yang
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News |
Monkeypox virus: dangerous strain gains ability to spread through sex, new data suggest
A cluster of mpox cases in the Democratic Republic of the Congo sparks worries of a wider outbreak.
- Max Kozlov
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Editorial |
Any plan to make smoking obsolete is the right step
The United Kingdom is correct to attempt to end the single largest preventable cause of illness and death, as was New Zealand before its government changed its mind.
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Where I Work |
How ground glass might save crops from drought on a Caribbean island
In Grenada, public-health researcher Lindonne Telesford tests a soil additive made from recycled glass that could help farmers adapt to climate change.
- Kendall Powell
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News Feature |
What toilets can reveal about COVID, cancer and other health threats
Wastewater testing grew tremendously during the pandemic. But is it ready to tackle the opioid crisis, air pollution and antibiotic resistance?
- Betsy Ladyzhets
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News |
Smoking bans are coming: what does the evidence say?
Countries are cracking down on tobacco use and vaping — the laws could save thousands of lives and billions of dollars, say scientists.
- Carissa Wong
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Correspondence |
It’s time to talk about the hidden human cost of the green transition
- Manuel Prieto
- & Nicolás C. Zanetta-Colombo
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News |
Lethal dust storms blanket Asia every spring — now AI could help predict them
As the annual phenomenon once again strikes East Asia, scientists are hard at work to better predict how they will affect people.
- Xiaoying You
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News Explainer |
Bird flu outbreak in US cows: why scientists are concerned
A virus that has killed hundreds of millions of birds has now infected cattle in six US states, but the threat to humans is currently low.
- Max Kozlov
- & Smriti Mallapaty
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Nature Podcast |
Audio long read: Why are so many young people getting cancer? What the data say
Researchers are scrambling to explain why rates of multiple cancers are increasing among adults under the age of 50.
- Heidi Ledford
- & Benjamin Thompson
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Correspondence |
Adopt universal standards for study adaptation to boost health, education and social-science research
- Dragos Iliescu
- & Samuel Greiff
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Book Review |
The great rewiring: is social media really behind an epidemic of teenage mental illness?
The evidence is equivocal on whether screen time is to blame for rising levels of teen depression and anxiety — and rising hysteria could distract us from tackling the real causes.
- Candice L. Odgers
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News |
Abortion-pill challenge provokes doubt from US Supreme Court
Lawsuit could roll back access to mifepristone, a drug widely used to induce abortion in the United States.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Outlook |
The future of at-home molecular testing
The COVID-19 pandemic showed what was possible for gene-based diagnostics. Now comes the true test – economics.
- Elie Dolgin
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News |
Google AI could soon use a person’s cough to diagnose disease
Machine-learning system trained on millions of human audio clips shows promise for detecting COVID-19 and tuberculosis.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Career Q&A |
‘Woah, this is affecting me’: why I’m fighting racial inequality in prostate-cancer research
Olugbenga Samuel Oyeniyi sought a career with a stronger public-health focus after learning that Black men are twice as likely as white men to get prostate cancer.
- Jacqui Thornton
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Nature Podcast |
AI hears hidden X factor in zebra finch love songs
Machine learning detects song differences too subtle for humans to hear, and physicists harness the computing power of the strange skyrmion.
- Nick Petrić Howe
- & Benjamin Thompson
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Outlook |
Fungal diseases are spreading undetected
Low- and middle-income countries are grappling with widespread shortages of diagnostic tests for infections that kill millions.
- Charles Schmidt
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Research Highlight |
Pooling babies’ saliva helps catch grave infection in newborns
Cost-saving strategy increases early detection of congenital cytomegalovirus, which can cause developmental problems if left untreated.
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News |
Massive public-health experiment sends vaccination rates soaring
The rate of vaccination against COVID-19 rose sharply in villages in Sierra Leone where health officials held mobile vaccination clinics.
- Max Kozlov
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Nature Index |
Four change-makers seek impact in medical research
Bringing fresh perspectives to long-standing health challenges, these scientists are using techniques such as big-data analytics and AI to push the field.
- Amy Coombs
- & Sandy Ong
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News & Views |
Mobile delivery of COVID-19 vaccines improved uptake in rural Sierra Leone
A trial that took mobile health services to rural Sierra Leone finds that this initiative increased COVID-19 vaccine uptake. But more must be done to expand the coverage of health services in low-income countries.
- Alison Buttenheim
- & Harsha Thirumurthy
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News Feature |
Why are so many young people getting cancer? What the data say
Clues to a modern mystery could be lurking in information collected generations ago.
- Heidi Ledford
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News |
Trump versus Biden: what the rematch could mean for three key science issues
Depending on the winner of November’s election, researchers anticipate two completely different paths ahead for the environment, public health and more.
- Jeff Tollefson
- , Natasha Gilbert
- & Mariana Lenharo
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News |
Landmark study links microplastics to serious health problems
People who had tiny plastic particles lodged in a key blood vessel were more likely to experience heart attack, stroke or death during a three-year study.
- Max Kozlov
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Correspondence |
Personalized cancer care can’t rely on molecular testing alone
- James Larkin
- , Chloe Beland
- & Alexander R. Lyon
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Correspondence |
Forget lung, breast or prostate cancer? Why we shouldn’t abandon tumour names yet
- Albrecht Stenzinger
- & Frederick Klauschen
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News |
Meningitis could be behind ‘mystery illness’ reports in Nigeria
The WHO confirms three meningitis deaths, which it says might have triggered rumours of an outbreak of an unknown disease.
- Sarah Wild
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News |
Brazil’s record dengue surge: why a vaccine campaign is unlikely to stop it
A vaccine shortage and persistent sanitation problems threaten the success of the world’s first public vaccination campaign against dengue virus.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Career Q&A |
‘This is my calling’: building point-of-care diagnostic tools to fight tuberculosis
Mireille Kamariza talks about her journey from community college to biotech chief executive, and the uphill battle to stop the spread of the deadly lung disease.
- Abdullahi Tsanni
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Research Highlight |
Mpox’s surge was stopped by behaviour change — before vaccine rollout
Analysis of more than 1,000 viral genomes reveals patterns in how the disease circulated through various communities.
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Correspondence |
Speed up relief for long COVID through grassroots clinical trials
- Marc Jamoulle
- , Elena Louazon
- & Johan Van Weyenbergh
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News |
Influential abortion-pill studies retracted: the science behind the decision
Nature spoke to researchers about the flaws that triggered the retractions. They say these papers are just the tip of the iceberg.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Editorial |
Science can drive development and unity in Africa — as it does in the US and Europe
A plan to establish Africa’s first continent-wide science fund should not be delayed any longer.
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Analysis
| Open Access
Making cities mental health friendly for adolescents and young adults
A study examining how cities can foster well-being and positive mental health in young residents synthesizes opinions from researchers, practitioners, advocates and young people, highlighting factors that policymakers and urban planners should consider.
- Pamela Y. Collins
- , Moitreyee Sinha
- & Lian Zeitz
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News |
Smoking scars the immune system for years after quitting
A cigarette habit and previous infection with a common virus both have important effects on the immune system.
- Heidi Ledford
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Career Q&A |
A researcher-exchange programme made me a better doctor at home and abroad
Caleb Skipper describes how global health collaborations bring valuable transfers of knowledge to both sides of the Atlantic.
- Christopher Bendana
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Book Review |
The ‘Bill Gates problem’: do billionaire philanthropists skew global health research?
Personal priorities are often trumping real needs and skewing where charitable funding goes.
- Andy Stirling
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Nature Podcast |
Why we need to rethink how we talk about cancer
Naming metastatic cancers after parts of the body could be holding up research and preventing people from accessing the best treatment
- Lucy Odling-Smee
- & Noah Baker
Neglecting sex and gender in research is a public-health risk