Volume 649 Issue 8096, 8 January 2026

Tiny genetic variations between humans, Neanderthals and Denisovans might not be all they were cracked up to be.

It’s a mystery why TOI-561 b’s blanket of gases hasn’t boiled off.

Some cycads warm up their reproductive organs to attract specially equipped pollinating beetles in the dark.

A unique archaeological site at Pompeii, Italy, reveals the secrets of peculiarly durable Roman building materials.

The US administration is banking on public–private partnerships and an expanded workforce to deliver progress, but critics say that this strategy could be offset by other US policies.

Artificial-intelligence tools are boosting researchers’ productivity, but some worry about the effect of a growing reliance on them.

A survey of 1,600 academics found that more than 50% have used artificial-intelligence tools while peer reviewing manuscripts.

Researchers are devising creative ways to get together as Trump’s policies curb travel to US gatherings.

Agency staff members say that the changes are reasonable, but they are worried about the potential effects on review.

Testing in mice suggests that rejuvenating T cells could make vaccines and some cancer therapies more effective.

In the race to embrace new technologies, some ecologists fear their field is losing touch with nature.

Researchers are targeting dormant tumour cells that might explain why some cancers reappear long after successful treatment.

An astute book redresses our collective perception of a field that became known as ‘boys’ physics’.

Andrew Robinson reviews five of the best science picks.

Five early-career scientists from around the world share how lingering COVID-19 pandemic shadows and ripples from US academic disruptions have affected them.

In Gorongosa National Park in Mozambique, Rassina Farassi studies how humans came to walk on two legs.

Alterations in land use are found to leave bird communities with fewer backup species for key ecological roles, making ecosystems vulnerable to further species loss.

Measurements of the masses of exoplanets orbiting a young star have identified a system of low-density ‘super-puff’ planets.

Transposable elements can insert into genes, disrupting protein-coding potential. Researchers discover a mode of RNA processing, ‘SOS splicing’, that provides a quick fix.

Scientists have characterized the broad genetic patterns that are shared across 14 psychiatric disorders. Could it reframe how mental-health conditions are diagnosed?

A ‘photonic skin’ with controllable colour and texture brings materials science a step closer to the adaptive camouflage found in nature.

Devices made from certain materials can double the frequency of light. Programmable electrodes can tune this response to produce various light spectra.

A peek behind the scenes at the zoo reveals animal escapades, and a glow-worm shines in a mild midwinter, in our weekly dip into Nature’s archive.

This Perspective proposes a new framework to support the inclusion of Black, Indigenous and people of colour in conservation initiatives.

A nine-year transit-timing campaign has measured the extremely low masses and densities of four large planets orbiting the young star V1298 Tau, which are now predicted to contract and form a typical compact super-Earth and sub-Neptune system.

Analysis of the local branching geometries of several physical networks shows violations of predictions of length and volume minimization, leading to the hypothesis that estimating the material cost requires accounting for the full three-dimensional geometry.

This study reports coherent Aharonov–Bohm interference, including statistical phase contributions, in a Fabry–Pérot interferometer at two even-denominator fractional quantum Hall states in high-mobility bilayer-graphene van der Waals heterostructures is reported.

An optical slab waveguide with highly programmable nonlinear functionality is described, enabling the demonstration of versatile control over broadband second-harmonic generation across the spectral, spatial and spatio-spectral domains.

Germano-silicate used as a building material for integrated photonics circuits substantially reduces optical losses, approaching levels comparable to those in optical fibres.

Inspired by dynamic textural modulation in cephalopod skin, polymer films whose colour and surface texture can be dynamically and independently controlled are developed and demonstrated using standard electron-beam patterning tools.

A new architecture based on high-valence sulfur/sulfur tetrachloride cathode chemistry is described for manufacturing high-voltage anode-free sodium–sulfur batteries, demonstrating promise for applications in grid energy storage and wearable electronics.

A strategy based on the design of a composite coating that enables slip-enhanced close-contact melting inside sealed phase-change thermal batteries to improve charging rates enables high-performance thermal energy storage over a wide range of temperatures.

A soft, biodegradable, wireless sensing device can monitor pressure, temperature and strain over long distances (up to 16 cm), maintaining accuracy across varying positions and angles.

A bookkeeping approach shows that disturbed tropical humid forests experienced net aboveground carbon loss during 1990–2020, primarily driven by small but persistent deforestation clearings owing to persistent land-use conversion without forest regrowth.

Large-scale analyses of bird species traits reveal that land-use change reduces resilience of key ecological functions more than previously thought.

The discovery of an unusual protist named Solarion arienae, which has a mitochondrial genome with some intriguing features, provides insight into the early radiation of eukaryotic groups.

A catalogue of nucleotide-binding leucine-rich repeat (NLR) genes in wild and cultivated potato genomes enables the identification of genes that confer protection against late blight, and provides a transgene-free strategy for engineering disease resistance in potato.

Genomic analyses applied to 14 childhood- and adult-onset psychiatric disorders identifies five underlying genomic factors that explain the majority of the genetic variance of the individual disorders.

All-optical mapping of neural connectivity in motor cortex links network topology to network dynamics and computation underlying naturalistic goal-directed behaviour.

Adenosine signalling is identified as the central mechanism of action of the antidepressant effects of ketamine and electroconvulsive therapy, and newly developed analogues of ketamine exhibit improved antidepressant efficacy with reduced side effects.

The panzootic of highly pathogenic H5N1 since 2021 was driven by around nine introductions into the Atlantic and Pacific flyways, followed by rapid dissemination through wild migratory birds, primarily Anseriformes.

Engineering of local Anopheles gambiae under containment enables the generation of a transgenic strain equipped with non-autonomous gene drive capabilities that robustly inhibits genetically diverse Plasmodium falciparum isolates obtained from naturally infected children.

Parity induces an accumulation of CD8⁺ T cells, including cells with a tissue-resident-memory-like phenotype within human normal breast tissue, offering long-term protection against triple-negative breast cancer.

CRISPR–Cas9-based genome-wide screening shows that SIGLEC12 mediates plasma membrane rupture in cells undergoing necroptosis, possibly through a human-specific mechanism, indicating its potential as a therapeutic target.

Tumour-reactive CD8⁺ T cells are enriched in functional clusters with tumour cells and/or antigen-presenting cells and can be isolated and expanded from clinical samples.

Targeting FSP1 in lymph nodes has considerable potential for blocking melanoma progression.

The ferroptosis suppressor protein FSP1 has a critical role in ferroptosis protection of tumours across multiple in vivo models and is linked to worse prognosis in human lung adenocarcinoma, suggesting its potential as a therapeutic target in lung cancer.

A new type of mRNA splicing mechanism discovered in Caenorhabditis elegans that detects and removes inverted repeats also occurs in human cells, thereby providing another strategy to protect against the negative effects of transposable elements.

Isotropic tissue magnification is integrated with matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry imaging to enable untargeted spatial proteomics at micrometre resolution and with high protein identification rates in multiple tissue types.