Nature
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How our student journal club built on sand developed strong foundations
Sand is the most extracted commodity in the world.Credit: Marco Longari/AFP via Getty We started our faculty positions in Canada after spending two years as postdocs in the United States. At the time, the COVID-19 pandemic was winding down and in-person activities were slowly returning to normal. In this phase of our careers at McGill University in Montreal (where M.B.,…
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Cancer-fighting CAR T cells show promising results for hard-to-treat tumours
T cells (blue) attack a prostate cancer cell (pink) in this scanning electron micrograph image.Credit: Steve Gschmeissner/Science Photo Library A clinical trial using engineered immune cells to hunt cancer cells has reported impressive results for solid tumours, a type of cancer that is difficult to treat. Compared with standard treatments, the immunotherapy lengthened survival of people with cancer1. The phase…
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Scientists with ADHD speak up: when fire meets focus
Lis Gallant’s ADHD helps her to switch her attention rapidly to manage field site safety and data collection under intense volcanic conditions.Credit: Hawaiian Volcano Observatory/USGS For volcanologist Lis Gallant, her first clue that she might have attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) came during a conversation with a professor during her graduate studies. He noticed that her oral presentations were very detailed,…
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Mother–infant bonds in wild chimpanzees resemble those of humans
The bonds of affection between human mothers and their children are crucial for infant well-being. This suggests that such bonds might have a long evolutionary history. Writing in Nature Human Behaviour, Rolland et al. report evidence of human-like mother–infant bonding in wild Western chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus, pictured). The observations improve researchers’ understanding of these ‘attachment’ behaviours in our closest…
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OpenAI’s chief scientist on what to expect
Jakub Pachocki has been OpenAI’s chief scientist since 2024.Credit: OpenAI OpenAI is best known for ChatGPT — the free-to-use, large language model-based chatbot that became a household name after its debut in 2022. The firm, in San Francisco, California, has since released a string of cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) tools, including ‘reasoning’ models that use step-by-step ‘thought’ processes to specialize…
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Teens with anxiety and depression spend more time on social media
The survey asked more than 3,000 UK teens about their experiences using social media.Credit: Ute Grabowsky/Photothek/Getty Teenagers with mental–health conditions spend more time on social media than their peers — on average, 50 more minutes on a typical day. They are also more likely to be dissatisfied with aspects of the experience, such as their number of online friends, a…
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A forensic investigator of glacier change
“In this picture, I’m visiting Steindalsbreen, a glacier in the Lyngen Alps, just east of Tromsø in Norway, where I’m based. The glacier has retreated drastically: it’s slumped in the middle, is thinning around its margins and its tongue has melted into the growing glacial lake behind me. Glaciers are powerful agents of erosion. As they flow, they grind the…
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How India rewrote the rules of space travel when it launched its first satellite
The satellite, Aryabhata, provided a huge boost to India’s space programme.Credit: NASA/Alamy In the early hours of 19 April 1975, the mood at the Soviet military launch site of Kapustin Yar — a space test facility north of the Caspian Sea — was heavy with anticipation. Scientists and engineers moved with brisk deliberation, the pre-launch silence was punctuated only by…
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the fascinating insights meteorites can bring us
The Meteorite Hunters: On the Trail of Extraterrestrial Treasures and the Secrets Inside Them Joshua Howgego Oneworld (2025) The Meteorites: Encounters with Outer Space and Deep Time Helen Gordon Profile (2025) From vacuuming cathedral rooftops to traversing the frozen wastes of Antarctica, people go to great lengths to find the landfall of shooting stars. That is the take-home message of…
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5 charts reveal the power of vaccines
Vaccines have made several deadly diseases a thing of the past.Credit: Christina House/Los Angeles Times/Getty A second unvaccinated child in Texas has died from measles, amplifying fears that the outbreak there could be wider than reported. The death, announced on 6 April, also harkens back to a pre-vaccine past that many Americans have forgotten, when hundreds of children died each…
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