Nature

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01555-z

Many avian species are threatened, but conservation efforts and birds’ high intelligence offer hope.

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01597-3

The outbreak is only the third caused by the rare Bundibugyo virus, for which there are no approved vaccines or therapeutics.

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01556-y

An analysis of what makes young people more likely to commit crimes tears down the influential assumption that character is the main factor.

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-00525-9

If the thought of ‘working’ a room packed with strangers fills you with dread, academic careers coach Caroline Dunne has some advice.

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01563-z

The backlash against artificial intelligence is growing. Nature wants to know what its readers think about the impact on science.

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10619-z

Publisher Correction: GLP-1R–GIPR–PPARα/γ/δ quintuple agonism corrects obesity and diabetes in mice

Nature, Published online: 18 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10649-7

Publisher Correction: Microbiota-induced T cell plasticity enables immune-mediated tumour control

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01601-w

The strength of an upcoming El Niño weather pattern is still up in the air — for now. Plus, almost half of lab-mouse strains aren’t what scientists think they are and the hunt for new antibiotics in a graveyard.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01590-w

The Trump administration has spent months investigating the lab after a Chinese postdoc was charged with smuggling biological material into the country.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01559-9

Could spinach extracts be the next treatment for dry-eye disease?

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01558-w

Eight of the top ten officials at the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases have now been pushed out since President Donald Trump took office.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01503-x

The personalized treatment encourages the immune system to attack the tumours called glioblastomas.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01575-9

Nature staff discuss some of the week's top science news.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01534-4

A survey of more than 300 mouse strains has found widespread discrepancies between how mutant mice are reported and their actual genetic make-up.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01083-w

Forging connections.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01391-1

Brandon Brown sees parallels between life as an academic and tending a citrus grove following his move to the country.

Nature, Published online: 15 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01504-w

Some bacterial species became less abundant in the guts of American football players as the season progressed.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01578-6

Between six and eight hours of sleep each day seems to be a ‘sweet spot’ for preventing disease. Plus, unexpected interbreeding between Denisovans and Homo erectus, and how the look of antibiotics could be driving antimicrobial resistance.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-00895-0

After leaving academia, Bennett Foddy sees connections between games design, creativity and research, as he tells John Tregoning.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01531-7

Old T cells secrete an enzyme that can impair brain function in mice.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01545-1

More than 140,000 fake citations across four research repositories were identified in papers and preprints published in 2025 alone.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01538-0

An El Niño is coming, models say, but Nature spoke to researchers about when and how we’ll know its intensity.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01549-x

Health-evidence reviewers reverse recommendation on a blood test that detects a biomarker of a common cancer after decades of controversy.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01537-1

Some units at the US funding giant are so understaffed, they are focusing on mandated grant renewals rather than new awards.

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10573-w

Author Correction: The AIM2 inflammasome exacerbates atherosclerosis in clonal haematopoiesis

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10620-6

Author Correction: Postprandial lipid metabolism durably enhances T cell immunity

Nature, Published online: 14 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01550-4

Mental illness needs visibility more urgently than almost any other area of medicine and health care. A new award from Wellcome and Nature aims to raise its prominence.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01561-1

Data from the 2.8-kilometre-deep core stretches back 1.2 million years. Plus, the cost of using AI tools in the lab and the greatest physics mysteries that still divide researchers.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01546-0

Drug arrives years after pandemic’s peak, but could still offer critical protection to vulnerable populations.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01322-0

Pregnancy poses many challenges, including protecting against infection and increased nutritional demands. Pregnancy-associated gut changes offer some help.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-00909-x

Trajectories of obesity prevalence over the past 45 years reveal patterns of growth, plateau and decline that differ across high-, middle- and low-income countries.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01081-y

Navigating by the stars.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01376-0

Plans to address drug resistance typically focus on the use of antibiotics, but there are signs that compounds with incidental antibacterial effects might be part of the problem, too.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01380-4

Trials of drugs to fight deadly resistant infections are advancing, but they might fall victim to overuse of agricultural fungicides just like their predecessors.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01378-y

Governments must create meaningful incentives for biopharmaceutical companies to develop antimicrobial products.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01486-9

State control of the media is shown to alter the training data of large language models (LLMs) through its impact on the information environment. This has a substantial effect on the output of LLMs, with states rated more favourably in their own language when they have tighter media control.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01373-3

Antibiotics designed by artificial intelligence, immunotherapy for resistant infections and other highlights from studies and trials.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01321-1

A simple machine-learning algorithm, inspired by honeybees’ visual memory and sense of direction, enables a flying robot to pinpoint its home location.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01328-8

An electron-beam technique that can precisely create thousands of atomic defects in a crystal could be used to build quantum devices.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01151-1

An observation of an ultra-faint galaxy, captured as it was shortly after the Big Bang, indicates the presence of material from the first generation of stars.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01375-1

Medical microbiologist Heiman Wertheim explains why the physical appearance and labelling of antibiotics matter when trying to limit resistance.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01377-z

Antibiotic use in agriculture threatens the health of workers and their communities, but there are potential solutions.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01372-4

Microbiologist Alexander Fleming’s 80-year-old advice is still key to protecting the efficacy of antibiotics.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01532-6

Genetic analysis suggests interbreeding between two groups of human relatives.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01139-x

Yulu Hou and her partner experimented with using ChatGPT to automate marking of undergraduate assignments. Here’s what they learnt.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01318-w

Studies of white matter — the tissue used for communication between brain regions — have revealed substantial changes in people with neurological diseases and disorders. The creation of white-matter brain charts enables individual deviations from the typical structure to be assessed using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) brain scans.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01506-8

Health outcomes were better in people who slept between about six and eight hours a day.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01485-w

Observations from the James Webb Space Telescope reveal that extremely fast, galaxy-scale outflows from luminous objects called quasars were much more frequent, and on average more powerful, about one billion years after the Big Bang than at later cosmic epochs. These outflows could easily escape their host galaxies and regulate the evolution of early massive galaxies.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01379-x

The last antimicrobial peptide was developed decades ago. Now, drug-resistant bacteria are forcing scientists to take a fresh look at this class of antibiotic.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01374-2

Limited access to medical professionals and irresponsible prescribing practices are contributing to antimicrobial resistance in low-resource settings.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10454-2

Integration of data representing 35,120 brain scans from diverse global studies enables construction of reference charts that define normative microstructural and macrostructural properties across the human lifespan for research and clinical diagnosis.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10515-6

PTCHD1-AS, which encodes a long non-coding RNA, is associated with the aetiology of autism spectrum disorder in humans through striatal molecular and circuit-level dysregulation.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10510-x

Combining a computational framework and optogenetic and chemogenetic manipulations within and downstream of the cortico-basal ganglia circuit identifies the specific cortico-basal ganglia synapses that drive the acquisition and expression of rapid vocal changes during juvenile song learning.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10531-6

From pregnancy until lactation, eosinophils accumulate in the small intestine where they regulate goblet cell fate and enhance innate defences against enteric pathogens.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10383-0

Global analysis of obesity trends from 1980 to 2024 in 200 countries and territories using data from 4,050 population-based studies reveals that framing obesity as a single global epidemic masks the highly varied dynamics across countries and age groups.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10491-x

Machine learning analysis of cell-type-specific gene expression in mouse and human neocortex and human cortical organoids reveals human-specific cell-type and temporal variations in expression controlled by JUNB.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10524-5

A cross-organ, multi-omics U-shaped relationship between sleep duration and biological ageing clocks highlights the potential of sleep optimization to promote healthy ageing, lower disease risk and extend longevity.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10489-5

Structured liquid droplets exhibit asymmetric division in the absence of reconstituted protein machinery.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10465-z

An analysis of 5,778 domains 28–64 amino acids in length reveals hidden variation in conformational fluctuations, even between sequences sharing the same fold and global folding stability.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10481-z

Hippocampal–neocortical communication reconfigures predetermined circuit motifs to flexibly encode experiences.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10431-9

Electron-beam control enables deterministic placement of tens of thousands of atomic defects in three-dimensional crystals, creating stable, programmable artificial matter for scalable quantum and nanoscale technologies.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10530-7

High-resolution in situ cryo-electron tomography in Schizosaccharomyces pombe identifies SNOR protein, which binds to ribosomes during dormancy induced by glucose depletion, priming them for rapid reactivation of protein synthesis upon glucose repletion.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10490-y

Systems-level analyses of organ intrinsic nervous systems reveal that these networks are initially configured by lineage-dependent programmes, and their architecture and molecular identity are refined by intra-organ specific local cues.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10523-6

A programmable photonic quantum processor, Jiuzhang 4.0, incorporates 1,024 high-efficiency squeezed states into a hybrid spatial–temporal encoded 8,176-mode circuit.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10469-9

Treatment data for triple-negative breast cancer show the importance of macrophage subtypes and cancer-cell metaprograms for interferon signalling, HLA expression and cell cycle activity that are associated with a good response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10511-w

A twenty-first century fire is shown to be the first to have affected a high-elevation region in the central African mountains in the past 12,000 years, and previous burning at mid-elevations highlights the potential role of humans in transforming Afromontane ecosystems.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10478-8

Palaeoproteomic analysis of ancient enamel proteins extracted from Middle Pleistocene Homo erectus specimens from the Zhoukoudian, Hexian and Sunjiadong sites in China suggests that they are a new genetic monogroup, and super-archaic introgression in Denisovans is likely to have originated from H. erectus.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10544-1

A new metric shows that compound climate extremes rise faster with cumulative CO2 emissions than models project, implying higher risks and smaller remaining carbon budgets for the 1.5 °C and 2 °C targets.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10506-7

Government-controlled media influences the output of large language models via their training data, and models queried in the languages of countries with lower media freedom show a stronger pro-regime valence than models queried in the languages of countries with higher media freedom.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10501-y

Connexin proteins found in white perch fish were used to engineer synthetic electrical synapses, enabling precision circuit editing in mammals.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10494-8

Single-cell transcriptomics combined with morphological and ecological data show that the rapid evolutionary radiation of cichlid fishes in Lake Tanganyika was accompanied by dietary specialization across multiple layers of biological organization.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10480-0

Reparative microglia persist in the brain after stroke but become dysfunctional through ZFP384-mediated mechanisms; however, this process can be mitigated by targeting Zfp384 using therapeutic antisense oligonucleotides.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10461-3

A highly efficient navigation strategy taking inspiration from the visual learning flights of honeybees is described, which enables drones to quickly return from longer flights by means of path integration and uses a neural network as a view memory to reach the home location.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10487-7

Concentration of precipitation in large events decreases land water availability, and this effect will further increase with a future warming climate.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10374-1

LAP1-B—an ultra-faint and tiny galaxy that formed in the reionization era and is strongly magnified by gravitational lensing—is chemically primitive and hosts very few stars in an otherwise dominant dark matter halo.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01505-9

Rare isotopes hint at when the Solar System entered the Local Interstellar Cloud.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01547-z

There are a multitude of red-light emitting consumer goods, but do they really do anything for your health? We look at the science behind the hype — plus, the increasing levels of obesity in lower-income countries.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01424-9

To battle antibiotic resistance, researchers are leaving no stone unturned, looking at folk traditions and harnessing AI to find new antibiotics.

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10626-0

Stereoelectronic manipulation of ligands for perovskite solar cells

Nature, Published online: 13 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01476-x

Scientists are debating whether to limit biological AI software to ward off threats.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01544-2

Thousands of cities worldwide are nailing green growth without fossil fuels. Plus, why the common hormonal condition PCOS is now PMOS and how to vibe code in science.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01502-y

The famously resilient creatures can withstand temperatures of 85 °C if allowed to dry out first.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01475-y

Trust is no longer enough: secure data sharing requires international collaboration across institutions and governments.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01369-z

Recent price hikes, usage limitations and unreliable outputs are causing some scientific researchers to think twice about using artificial intelligence.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01477-w

Using AI coding tools can speed up your work, but there are plenty of pitfalls.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01474-z

The United Nations wants scientists to help design indicators of progress that go beyond GDP. Researchers should seize the chance and be aware of past failures.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01156-w

Genomics and experimental data suggest that an evolutionary arms race between cholera-causing bacteria and their viral predators shapes the disease in humans.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01521-9

Chemistry in the AI era

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01519-3

Animal-testing alternatives will require a cultural change in research institutions

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01523-7

Data from Antarctica could help to solve the mystery of why ice ages were so brutal.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01520-w

UK Biobank breach prompts the field of genomics to rethink open science

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01334-w

An unexpected creature munches on cherry blossom flowers, and the value of drawing art is considered in this week’s pick from the Nature archive.

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01518-4

Cruise-ship hantavirus cluster exposes a wider preparedness gap

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10618-0

Author Correction: A mechanical ratchet drives unilateral cytokinesis

Nature, Published online: 12 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10615-3

Author Correction: Predictive coding of reward in the hippocampus

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01526-4

Why, if sleep has so many benefits, humans as a species sleep so little. Plus, universities attempt to save a world-leading weather and climate research lab in Colorado, and Elsevier has joined a class-action lawsuit against Meta.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01491-y

Greenhouse-gas emissions from burning fossil fuel have been mapped across thousands of cities worldwide.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01512-w

Passengers who were on the cruise ship MV Hondius will quarantine in their home countries.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01479-8

Struggling to remember why you picked a career in science? Here are some heart-warming tales to jog your memory.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01481-0

Science publishing giant Elsevier has joined a class-action lawsuit against Meta that alleges the reproduction of copyrighted works in developing the Llama AI model.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01478-9

A new book brings together ethnography, neurobiology and primatology to argue that how much our species sleeps is an evolutionary trade-off, with lessons for how each of us can sleep better.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01522-8

Floating genetic material could give insights into ecosystem health, the presence of invasive species, and help researchers identify pathogens before they cause harm.

Nature, Published online: 11 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10578-5

Publisher Correction: Presymptomatic training mitigates functional deficits in a mouse model of Rett syndrome

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01473-0

The science communicator has raised awareness of the natural world andits myriad interconnections on which humans depend.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01371-5

As the British naturalist marks a milestone birthday, we take a look at how his work has shaped science.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01079-6

It’s hard to swallow.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01449-0

The Make America Healthy Again movement asserts that over-prescription of drugs for mental-health conditions is rife in the United States.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01493-w

The US Forest Service has proposed closing some three-quarters of its research sites in a move that has provoked widespread fear and uncertainty.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-00748-w

An analysis of 97 million citations has found that rates of fabricated citations have climbed steeply since 2023.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01511-x

Proposed UN progress indicators include greenhouse gas emissions, life expectancy and children’s performance in reading and maths.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01501-z

Universities that run the National Center for Atmospheric Research want to keep it from being dismantled.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01510-y

Nature staff discuss some of the week’s top science news.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01447-2

People with a deadly form of pancreatic cancer survive longer on a drug that blocks the activity of a family of mutant proteins.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01390-2

Chantle Edillor used a fascination with sourdough starters to pivot from studying human diseases to exploring yeast-based cures.

Nature, Published online: 08 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01500-0

Andrew Robinson reviews five of the best science picks.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01350-w

A non-fluent English speaker struggles to navigate language barriers in academic publishing.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01508-6

The month’s most spectacular science images. Plus, the surprising activity in the unconscious brain.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01405-y

OpenAI is under investigation after a person accused of murder in Florida allegedly sought ChatGPT's advice to plan the crime.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01466-z

Analysis of papers from millions of scientists shows that older researchers tend to stick with ideas from their past.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01494-9

Virologist Jay Hooper is developing a vaccine for the rare rodent virus behind an outbreak on a cruise ship.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01446-3

A method reveals that some local wild-meat markets share the same supply chains as global smuggling operations.

Nature, Published online: 07 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10608-2

Author Correction: Proteasome-guided haem signalling axis contributes to T cell exhaustion

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01157-9

Mobile quantum bits, which can be shuttled to where they are needed in a circuit, have been used to perform a quantum process called state teleportation.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01407-w

Digital distractions are vying for people’s focus, but our underlying capacity to pay attention seems to be undiminished.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01454-3

Artificial-intelligence tool spots copied peer reviews, helping to uncover fraud in academic publishing.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01244-x

The month’s sharpest science shots, selected by Nature’s photo team.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01423-w

A new climate coalition to steer the transition away from fossil fuels is good news, but it must avoid undermining existing global scientific structures.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01420-z

Synthetic biologists are engineering bacteria to feast on oil, plastic and toxic chemicals.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01159-7

Depletion of sex hormones that enable male development induces neuroinflammation that disrupts hormonal signalling and immune responses against brain tumours.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01154-y

When two graphene layers are twisted at a ‘magic angle’, their electrons can behave as both heavy and light particles, depending on momentum.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01250-z

Can synthetic biology provide food security in a changing climate?

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01498-5

What the science says about shrinking focus, plus a quantum ‘thermometer’ that can take a reading inside a cell and a celebrity-whale rescue that went very wrong.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01465-0

Neuronal recordings of people under anaesthesia show that their brains are processing words and sounds.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01314-0

An audit of TikTok’s recommendation algorithm using hundreds of automated ‘bot’ accounts during the 2024 US presidential election finds that the ‘For You’ feed of the platform steered users towards Republican-aligned political content, regardless of their initial political leanings.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01311-3

By precisely shaping the leading edge of ultrafast high-power laser pulses, bright ‘harmonic’ radiation has been generated with great efficiency from plasma oscillating at almost the speed of light. This long-sought regime removes a key barrier to the production of extremely intense electromagnetic fields for applications such as compact particle acceleration, attosecond science and strong-field physics.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-00797-1

Burnout is a systemic problem, but individuals can take steps to cope with it and pave a path forward.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01433-8

The entrepreneur was also a pioneer of synthetic biology.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01492-x

Thousands of dark proteins have been reclassified as peptideins and added to databases as a new category.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01155-x

When the concept of ‘click’ chemistry — highly effective and specific reactions — was first reported, some dismissed it as a gimmick. But it has transformed many fields of research.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01419-6

Combining climate models with statistical learning allows an assessment of the relative contributions of different factors to trends in winter precipitation at mid-latitudes. Thermodynamic (non-circulation-related) effects are mostly consistent between models and observations, but whether circulation-related changes are forced or unforced remains unclear.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01310-4

Detailed neural recordings were made from a brain structure called the hippocampus in unconscious anaesthetized people. Neuronal activity responded to ‘oddballs’ in a series of auditory tones, encoded complex meaning-related properties of language and could even predict upcoming words in a heard phrase.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01077-8

Plans for expansion.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10475-x

A new approach to magnetic resonance imaging, ‘multiplexed magnetic resonance imaging’, is reported, which enables high-resolution simultaneous multiparametric mapping of multiple molecules in standard clinical settings.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10447-1

Audit experiments on TikTok show asymmetric partisan exposure that is not explained by observable engagement metrics, with Republican-leaning accounts receiving more aligned content and Democratic-leaning accounts more cross-partisan recommendations.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10404-y

The past two decades of PARP inhibitor synthetic lethality in cancer is explored.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10451-5

Androgens have distinct roles in the brain, acting as immune-based tumour suppressors through neuroinflammation and neuroendocrine mechanisms.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10477-9

James Webb Space Telescope observations show powerful high-redshift quasar outflows, supporting quasar feedback as a key mechanism driving rapid star-formation quenching in early massive galaxies.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10444-4

Humanized glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor (GLP1R) mouse models are used to investigate the neural circuitry through which small-molecule GLP1R agonists modulate feeding, with implications for how these orally delivered weight-loss drugs engage brain reward circuits.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10505-8

A potential premediator, 2-chloropyrimidine, could be a model material for molecular skeleton design enabling lithium–sulfur batteries to achieve a strong average capacity retention and help design functional molecules in broader organic chemical spaces.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10456-0

The Amazon forest faces a near system-wide transition of 62−77% of the area under a combination of 1.5–1.9 °C global warming and 22−28% deforestation.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10378-x

Quantum twisting microscopy is used to directly image the interacting energy bands of magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene, allowing characterization of the dual nature of its electrons at the magic angle.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10441-7

Vortices trapped in superconducting granular aluminium films can behave as a quantum two-level system that can be manipulated and read out, suggesting that they could be used for future quantum technologies.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10458-y

High-throughput barcoded neuroanatomy of two closely related rodent species with divergent vocalizations reveals differences in long-range projection motifs in the brain that may support these differences in vocal complexity.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10453-3

HIV-1 capsid nuclear import at the nuclear pore complex is a bottleneck to resting T cell infection, but HIV-1 overcomes this by triggering receptor-mediated signalling during cell–cell spread to drive nuclear import and licence infection.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10498-4

New predictions for how temporal stability and resilience depend on their resistance and recovery components are explored.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10495-7

The acoustic Purcell effect is observed by constructing a specially engineered, microwave-frequency nanomechanical resonator around a colour centre spin qubit in diamond.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10462-2

The SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant escapes neutralization by antibodies targeting the pan-coronavirus epitope in a spike fusion intermediate via steric hindrance, but reducing the antibody size overcomes this barrier and expands its range of accessible targets.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10443-5

This work provides a mechanistic understanding of how certain prefrontal circuits in the rodent brain permit flexibility to selectively stop learned behaviours through interactions with core subcortical reward systems.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10455-1

Plant community properties affect ecosystem functioning via energy fluxes in food webs, with the leaf and root resource economics of dominant tree species controlling soil food web multifunctionality.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10476-w

Genome-wide selective sweeps commonly occur in the human gut microbiome and can spread across the world within decades to produce epidemic-like population structures.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10448-0

In the hippocampus, complex processing of sensory stimuli occurs even in the unconscious state.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10452-4

Multimodal machine learning reveals that tumour microenvironments can be decomposed into spatially organized multicellular ecosystems, termed spatial ecotypes, that can be accessed non-invasively via liquid biopsy and used to profile individual cancers and target treatments.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10497-5

Analysis of laboratory experiments using a rate-and-state-based Griffith-like rupture framework shows that foreshocks can regulate mainshock nucleation timing, with larger foreshocks generating higher transient sliding velocities and triggering a more rapid transition to dynamic rupture.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10492-w

Multilayer capacitors comprising a solid solution of two electrocaloric materials PbSc0.5Ta0.5O3 and PbMg0.5W0.5O3 are shown to maintain high B-site order and latent heat without needing an energetically expensive anneal, enabling efficient refrigeration across room temperature.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10421-x

Quantification of links among insect pollinators, crop plants, nutrient intake and income of smallholder communities in Nepal show that pollinators substantially contribute to their income and micronutrient intake.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10466-y

Cas12a2 enables RNA-triggered, sequence-specific killing of eukaryotic cells via widespread DNA shredding, allowing selective elimination of cells on the basis of gene expression, including virus-infected or mutation-bearing cells.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10459-x

A large-scale proteomics analysis of the dark proteome by the TransCODE Consortium reveals many translated non-canonical open reading frames to encode microproteins and peptideins.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10423-9

A device architecture comprising silicon-based mobile qubits and the shuttling of two electron spins together demonstrates two-qubit gate fidelity of about 99% as well as quantum state teleportation between qubits separated by 320 nm.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/d41586-026-01480-1

Neuronal recordings taken during surgery reveal that the brain can learn even when unconscious — plus, the electrical test that can determine a cup of coffee’s strength.

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10602-8

Author Correction: Multidimensional profiling of heterogeneity in supratentorial ependymomas

Nature, Published online: 06 May 2026; doi:10.1038/s41586-026-10201-7

Author Correction: Enteric neurons increase maternal food intake during reproduction