Featured
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Correspondence |
Generate verifiable soil carbon credits from croplands
- Peng Fu
- , David Schurman
- & James R. Kellner
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Book Review |
What the Ottomans did for science — and science did for the Ottomans
A hundred years after the birth of modern Turkey, a monumental research project is uncovering the untold story of science and technology during six centuries of the Ottoman Empire.
- Ehsan Masood
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Outlook |
This cyborg cockroach could be the future of earthquake search and rescue
From drivable bionic animals to machines made from muscle, biohybrid robots are on their way to a variety of uses.
- Liam Drew
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Nature Podcast |
The world’s smallest light-trapping silicon cavity
Researchers exploit intermolecular forces to carve a nanoscale hole, and investigating whether poverty can be reduced without increasing emissions.
- Nick Petrić Howe
- & Shamini Bundell
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Comment |
Generative AI could revolutionize health care — but not if control is ceded to big tech
Large language models such as that used by ChatGPT could soon become essential tools for diagnosing and treating patients. To protect people’s privacy and safety, medical professionals, not commercial interests, must drive their development and deployment.
- Augustin Toma
- , Senthujan Senkaiahliyan
- & Bo Wang
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Comment |
ChatGPT one year on: who is using it, how and why?
In just a year, ChatGPT has permeated scientific research. Seven scientists reveal what they have learnt about how the chatbot should — and shouldn’t — be used.
- Marzyeh Ghassemi
- , Abeba Birhane
- & Francisco Tustumi
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News |
How does it feel to have an octopus arm? This robo-tentacle lets people find out
Mimicking the snatch and grab of an octopus snaring its prey required a new way of thinking about robotics.
- Bianca Nogrady
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News Feature |
A new kind of solar cell is coming: is it the future of green energy?
Firms commercializing perovskite–silicon ‘tandem’ photovoltaics say that the panels will be more efficient and could lead to cheaper electricity.
- Mark Peplow
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News |
‘My collaborations would see me jailed’: Australian researchers fear proposed new laws
Under the proposal, technology with potential military use would need authorization to be shared with non-Australian colleagues.
- Bianca Nogrady
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News Explainer |
What the OpenAI drama means for AI progress — and safety
A debacle at the company that built ChatGPT highlights concern that commercial forces are acting against the responsible development of artificial-intelligence systems.
- Nicola Jones
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News & Views |
From the archive: a juice extractor in an insect’s gut, and amateur radio telephony
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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News |
SpaceX Starship launch ends in explosion — what’s next for the mega-rocket?
The craft travelled into space for the first time, before it self-destructed for unknown reasons.
- Alexandra Witze
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News |
‘Electrocaloric’ heat pump could transform air conditioning
Heat pumps are ubiquitous in the form of air conditioners. Scientists just invented one that avoids harmful refrigerant gases.
- Davide Castelvecchi
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Career Q&A |
How my MBA helps me keep my donor-funded research centre afloat
Medicinal chemist Susan Winks shares how she keeps money flowing at the drug-discovery centre she helps to manage.
- Sarah Wild
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Nature Podcast |
Dust: the tiny substance with enormous power
Jay Owens joins us to talk about her book Dust: The Modern World in a Trillion Particles.
- Benjamin Thompson
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Nature Index |
Hypotheses devised by AI could find ‘blind spots’ in research
Artificial intelligence is asking questions that humans hope to answer.
- Matthew Hutson
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Nature Video |
The 3D printer that crafts complex robotic organs in a single run
Combining machine vision with contactless error correction allows for even more advanced multi-material printing.
- Dan Fox
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Nature Podcast |
How to 3D print fully formed robots
Printing multi-material objects in a single run, and the effectiveness of lifestyle interventions for preventing type 2 diabetes.
- Benjamin Thompson
- & Shamini Bundell
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Career Column |
Why postdoctoral training needs a stronger focus on innovation
Innovation straddles policy, change management, budgeting, negotiating and influencing skills. Researchers need all these and more, says David Bogle.
- David Bogle
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Spotlight |
How Paris is becoming a happy home for health-technology start-up companies
A long-term investment plan is helping the French capital to attract talent.
- Nic Fleming
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News Feature |
The rise of brain-reading technology: what you need to know
As implanted devices and commercial headsets advance, what will the real-world impacts be?
- Liam Drew
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Career Feature |
How five researchers fared after their ‘great resignation’ from academia
A career leap into the unknown can be unsettling, but you can take steps to ease the transition.
- Virginia Gewin
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News |
‘ChatGPT detector’ catches AI-generated papers with unprecedented accuracy
Tool based on machine learning uses features of writing style to distinguish between human and AI authors.
- McKenzie Prillaman
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Nature Podcast |
Nature's Take: How will ChatGPT and generative AI transform research?
Nature staff take on the big topics that matter in science.
- Nick Petrić Howe
- , Magdalena Skipper
- & Yann Sweeney
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Career Q&A |
My path to heading a biotech company
Shadi Farhangrazi describes how she accidentally became a chief executive.
- Raveena Bhambra
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Comment |
Garbage in, garbage out: mitigating risks and maximizing benefits of AI in research
Artificial-intelligence tools are transforming data-driven science — better ethical standards and more robust data curation are needed to fuel the boom and prevent a bust.
- Brooks Hanson
- , Shelley Stall
- & Ge Peng
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Research Briefing |
Large-scale nanowire camera with a single-photon sensitivity
Superconducting detectors are a leading technology for the detection of single photons, but have been limited in the number of pixels that they can offer. A 400,000-pixel superconducting nanowire single-photon detector camera provides an improvement by a factor of 400 compared with the current state of the art.
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News |
AI ‘breakthrough’: neural net has human-like ability to generalize language
A neural-network-based artificial intelligence outperforms ChatGPT at quickly folding new words into its lexicon, a key aspect of human intelligence.
- Max Kozlov
- & Celeste Biever
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Comment |
Living guidelines for generative AI — why scientists must oversee its use
Establish an independent scientific body to test and certify generative artificial intelligence, before the technology damages science and public trust.
- Claudi L. Bockting
- , Eva A. M. van Dis
- & Johan Bollen
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Obituary |
C. R. Rao, statistician who transformed data analytics (1920–2023)
Pioneer of powerful tools for sifting data and optimizing device designs.
- Shyamal D. Peddada
- & Ravindra Khattree
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Career Feature |
Postdoc career optimism rebounds after COVID in global Nature survey
Postdoctoral researchers still feel as though they are academia’s drudge labourers, but have more confidence about job prospects in a post-pandemic world.
- Linda Nordling
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News |
Gene therapies for rare diseases are under threat. Scientists hope to save them
As industry steps aside, scientists seek innovative ways to make sure expensive treatments can reach people who need them.
- Heidi Ledford
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Career Column |
How ‘retro’ meetings can enhance collaboration
Allowing team members time to reflect, celebrate successes and learn from mistakes is a tried-and-tested way to foster continuous improvement.
- Akshay Swaminathan
- & Lathan Liou
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News & Views |
How purposeless physics underlies purposeful life
Evolution by natural selection peerlessly describes how life’s complexity develops — but can it be explained in terms of physics? A new approach suggests it can.
- George F. R. Ellis
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Career Guide |
Boomerang academics: why we left academia for industry, but then came back
A move from one sector to another isn’t a one-way street. Researchers who have pivoted between the two explain why.
- Christine Ro
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Research Briefing |
Scandium-45 nuclear-clock candidate driven by X-ray lasers
Precise timekeeping is key to many technologies, motivating the search for more-stable reference oscillators for use as clocks. The resonant X-ray excitation of a long-lived nuclear state in scandium-45 makes it a potential reference oscillator for a nuclear clock that could surpass atomic clocks in stability and resilience against external perturbations.
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News Feature |
AI and science: what 1,600 researchers think
A Nature survey finds that scientists are concerned, as well as excited, by the increasing use of artificial-intelligence tools in research.
- Richard Van Noorden
- & Jeffrey M. Perkel
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Nature Podcast |
This isn’t the Nature Podcast — how deepfakes are distorting reality
The rise of AI-generated fakes, evidence of the earliest-known wooden structure, and how NASA’s OSIRIS-REx brought asteroid samples back to Earth.
- Nick Petrić Howe
- & Benjamin Thompson
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News Feature |
Science and the new age of AI
A Nature special on how AI is transforming the scientific enterprise.
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News Feature |
How to stop AI deepfakes from sinking society — and science
Deceptive videos and images created using generative AI could sway elections, crash stock markets and ruin reputations. Researchers are developing methods to limit their harm.
- Nicola Jones
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Comment |
‘Benevolent’ patent extensions could raise billions for R&D in poorer countries
Research into vaccines, crop seeds and other innovations for low- or middle-income nations could be rewarded by offering longer patent coverage for profitable, non-essential inventions.
- Christopher B. Barrett
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News |
Is depression lifting? AI that interprets brain waves has answers
A pattern of brain activity linked with recovery from severe depression could be used to improve therapies such as deep-brain stimulation
- Max Kozlov
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Editorial |
Why the pandemic treaty risks becoming COVID-19 groundhog day
Talks are stalling, but everyone benefits when the fruits of vaccine and drugs research are shared equitably.
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Career Feature |
Promotion pathways: how scientists can chart their industry career trajectory
Confused about promotion opportunities after moving to industry? Here are some pointers.
- Sandeep Ravindran
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News |
World’s most powerful X-ray laser will ‘film’ chemical reactions in unprecedented detail
Upgraded laser in California will produce one million X-ray pulses per second to study ultrafast processes at the atomic level.
- Katherine Bourzac