Volume 635 Issue 8039, 21 November 2024

Chemistry that can break carbon–fluorine bonds in persistent molecules called PFAS could help to clean up the environment. Testing in real-world settings must come next.

Wealthy countries face a stark choice — pay poorer ones to help them decarbonize now or face escalating climate damages at home.

The US president-elect says he will pull the country out of international treaties and partnerships. That need not lead to disorder.

A chance disruption means that Voyager gave astronomers a distorted view of the planet’s magnetosphere.

Harvest records from Japan and China suggest that high night-time temperatures reduce the quality of rice, a staple food for billions of people.

Clinical trial in Malawi suggests that chewing gum sweetened with the natural compound xylitol is linked to a lower risk of preterm birth.

Newly analysed fossil came from what could be the biggest-known member of a family of apex avian predators.

Virologist Beata Halassy says self-treatment worked and was a positive experience — but researchers warn that it is not something others should try.

Proponents say that early diagnosis is beneficial. But opponents fear distress for people who might never develop symptoms.

The code underlying the Nobel-prize-winning tool for modelling protein structures can now be downloaded by academics.

Deleting just two genes that control sugar production makes a more succulent fruit.

The treatment, given to four people with damaged corneas, seems safe but needs to be tested in larger trials.

The sex and ancestry of five people who died in the eruption are revealed by genetic material embedded in the casts.

The popularity of private aeroplanes, the distance covered by flights and associated greenhouse-gas production are all on the rise.

Nanosecond-precision measurements from mobile devices could fill in gaps in satellite-navigation systems.

A levitating frog, a necrophiliac duck, taxi drivers’ brains — the Ig Nobel prizes have shined a spotlight on offbeat work. Here’s an inside look at how winners feel about this sometimes unwanted ‘honour’.

African researchers piloted a slew of innovative, low-cost programmes for addressing the troubling shortage of mental-health professionals on the continent. Now the rest of the world is taking notice.

A captivating examination of the biology that underlies behaviours often considered immoral raises questions about the existence of free will.

In a frank account, a former adviser spills the beans on how evidence shapes policy.

Compared with cross-border refugees, people who are internally displaced receive little attention — despite their dire health needs.

From demonstrating technical prowess to setting out future ambitions, learn how to beat rival candidates and land your dream job.

As the international effort reaches a ‘critical mass’ of achievements, Nature highlights seven tools that are poised to enable the next set of discoveries.

Albert Porcar Castell runs a small outdoor laboratory to draw connections between red-light fluorescence and gas exchange.

Compounds that contain carbon–fluorine bonds have various uses, but many are chemically inert, persisting in the environment as ‘forever chemicals’. Light-activated catalysts have been discovered that take them apart with ease.

How do mitochondria, the cell’s energy-producing organelles, perform competing metabolic processes? Segregation into distinct populations — one that makes energy-storing ATP molecules and one that does not — could explain it.

A genetic regulator of tomato sweetness has been identified through comparison of wild and domesticated varieties of the plant. Genetically engineering tomatoes to alter this gene increases sugar content without affecting fruit size.

An analysis has revealed that global temperatures were warmer in the early twentieth century than was inferred from existing data sets. Revising these estimates could improve our understanding of global temperature change.

The Human Cell Atlas is yielding detailed maps of human tissues and systems throughout life, along with methods to handle single-cell data. Four scientists reflect on how the project is transforming our understanding of human biology.

This article reviews evidence that has emerged over the past two decades indicating that herpes simplex encephalitis in children can result from monogenic defects of brain immunity to herpes simplex virus 1.

Observations of a 3-million-year-old pre-main-sequence star with a misaligned disk reveal a giant orbiting planet; the system is ideal for studying the early formation and migration of planets.

The bulk–edge correspondence is directly imaged in a fractional Chern insulator at zero magnetic field with exciton-resonant microwave impedance microscopy, revealing spatially resolved bulk and edge characteristics, and the evolution of topological states in twisted MoTe₂.

A nanoscale superconducting sensor used to map the magnetic fringe fields in twisted bilayers of MoTe₂ shows the formation of fractional Chern insulator states at zero magnetic field.

Using the unique valley properties of a twisted MoTe₂ bilayer, measurements of the degree of circular polarization of trion photoluminescence reveal optical signatures of a zero-field composite Fermi liquid.

A power conversion efficiency of 33.89% is achieved in perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells by using a bilayer passivation strategy to enhance electron extraction and suppress recombination.

We fabricated silicon heterojunction back-contact solar cells using laser patterning, producing cells that exceeded 27% power-conversion efficiency.

Photocatalysis at 40–60 °C is shown to be able to defluorinate perfluoroalkyl substances, known as ‘forever chemicals’, allowing the recycling of fluorine in polyfluoroalkyl and perfluoroalkyl substances as inorganic fluoride salt.

Independent statistical reconstructions of the global mean surface temperature from either ocean or land data show that existing estimates of early-twentieth-century ocean surface temperatures are too cold.

An analysis of the environmental footprints of consumption finds that planetary boundary transgressions can be mitigated by following an effective mitigation pathway focused on the food and services sectors and high-expenditure consumers.

Through their effects on soil hydraulic properties, soil texture and sand content are shown to have broad implications for the terrestrial water cycle and carbon sink, and specific implications for vital ecosystems that are vulnerable to drought, especially with changing climate.

Taste neurons of the mosquito Aedes albopictus regulate biting, feeding and egg-laying behaviours by responding to taste cues in human sweat, nectar and egg-laying sites via excitation or inhibition.

A study identifies two genes that act as brakes controlling the sugar content of tomatoes and demonstrates their manipulation to generate sweeter tomatoes without affecting the fruit size and yield.

A multiomic atlas of human embryonic joint and cranium development enables detailed analysis of bone and cartilage maturation.

Using single-cell and spatial transcriptomics, human embryonic limb development across space and time and the diversification and cross-species conservation of cells are demonstrated.

A comprehensive multi-omics reference atlas of prenatal human skin shows that innate immune cells crosstalk with non-immune cells to perform pivotal roles in skin morphogenesis, including the formation of hair follicles.

A human neural organoid cell atlas integrating 36 single-cell transcriptomic datasets shows cell types and states and estimates transcriptomic similarity between primary and organoid counterparts, showing potential to assess organoid fidelity and facilitate protocol development.

The study provides a comprehensive transcriptomic atlas of the human gastrointestinal tract across the lifespan, highlighting inflammation-induced changes in epithelial stem cells that alter mucosal architecture and promote further inflammation.

A quantitative morphological framework for the human thymus reveals the establishment of the lobular cytokine network, canonical thymocyte trajectories and thymic epithelial cell distributions in fetal and paediatric thymic development.

Phage Thoeris anti-defence proteins Tad1 and Tad2 both achieve anti-CBASS activity by simultaneously sequestering CBASS cyclic oligonucleotides.

The antiphage defence protein CapRel^SJ46 in Escherichia coli can directly bind and sense two completely unrelated and structurally different proteins using the same sensory domain, with overlapping but distinct interfaces.

GPR25 and its ligand define the core chemoaffinity axis GPR25–CXCL17 of the integrated extraintestinal mucosal immune system, regulating how immune responses disseminate to non-intestinal barrier tissues and with implications for understanding and manipulating immunity and inflammation.

Mitochondria are able to maintain two competing metabolic pathways—oxidative phosphorylation and the reductive synthesis of proline and ornithine—by generating two mitochondrial subpopulations that are enriched in either pyrroline-5-carboxylate synthase or ATP synthase.

AKT inhibitors synergize with agents that suppress the histone methyltransferase EZH2 and promote robust tumour regression in multiple triple-negative breast cancer models in vivo by triggering an involution-like process.

The structure of human TIP60-C uncovers a molecular machine that modifies and exchanges histones in the nucleosome, illustrating how vertebrates merge these activities, which are carried out by two independent assemblies in yeast.