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The genetic basis underlying resistance to Sclerotinia stem rot (SSR) in oilseed rape remains elusive. Here, the authors identify BnaA07.MKK9 as a pivotal regulator of SSR resistance in oilseed rape by GWAS, providing new insights into plant defense mechanisms against necrotrophic pathogens.

Acinetobacter baumannii is an opportunistic pathogen that causes nosocomial and community-acquired infections. Here, the authors determine that human neutrophil α-defensin HNP1 can promote A. baumannii biofilm formation.

Viral coat proteins are perceived by the RING1–IBR–RING2-type ubiquitin ligase, initiating the first step of the natural antiviral response in rice.

Designing catalysts that efficiently and sustainably break down O₃ in humid conditions remains a challenge. Here, the authors present a strategy for incorporating Lewis pairs into the catalyst as electron donor-acceptor sites to achieve robust O₃ decomposition in humid environments.

Genetic studies of Chinese individuals have been performed, but mostly with short read sequencing, limiting the types of variants that can be identified. Here, the authors perform long read sequencing of 945 han Chinese individuals, finding structural variants under natural selection and those associated with human traits and evolutionary history.

High-quality, non-layered 2D β-Bi₂O₃ crystals are grown using a vapour–liquid–solid–solid growth technique. These crystals demonstrate promising properties for p-channel field-effect transistors.

Healthy and sustainable diets that better match the dietary preferences and economic affordability of specific groups are needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. To address this gap, this study proposes a region-specific reference diet for China and compares it to global dietary guidelines.

Swarms of microrobots could eventually be used to deliver drugs to specific targets in the body, but the coordination of these swarms in complex environments is challenging. Yang and colleagues present a real-time autonomous distribution planning method based on deep learning that controls both the shape and position of the swarm, as well as the imaging system used for swarm navigation to cover longer distances.

The DAWN study is a phase 3 clinical trial that demonstrates effective glycemic control of dorzagliatin as an add-on therapy to metfomin in patients with type 2 diabetes.

Metformin decreases the levels of Bacteroides fragilis while increasing the bile acid GUDCA to antagonize intestinal FXR and improves the metabolic health of humans and mice.

By performing a tissue-specific transcriptome analysis, Zhang et al. show how age-related loss of germline stem/progenitor cells in C. elegans is regulated by a signal produced by non-niche cells within the same organ system.

In support of an evolutionary model that links distaste, disgust and socio-moral processes, Gan et al. use functional magnetic resonance imaging to develop a neuromarker for subjective core disgust that generalizes to oral distaste and unfairness.

Hyperferritinemic syndrome is a collective term for a group of severe inflammatory conditions distinguished by high ferritin levels, including adult-onset Still’s disease and COVID-19. Here authors show in an animal model that high ferritin levels are not just a sign of hyperinflammation but also a pathogenic factor that triggers neutrophil leukocyte activation and extracellular trap formation.

The gut microbiome affects systemic metabolism and is a therapeutic target for type 2 diabetes. Here the authors demonstrate in a randomized controlled trial that effects of berberine, a plant alkaloid known to lower blood glucose, may be explained by the inhibition of Ruminococcus bromii mediated biotransformation of the bile acid deoxycholic acid.

Intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy (ICP) is a liver disease that sometimes develops during pregnancy and is characterized by increased serum bile acid levels. Here the authors report that the gut microbiome species B. fragilis is enriched in patients with ICP and promotes ICP development in mice via inhibition of signalling though the bile acid receptor FXR.

H-NS is a global regulatory protein that represses expression of many genes in bacteria. Here, Li et al. show that a second messenger, cyclic di-GMP, binds to H-NS and inhibits its binding to DNA, thus relieving H-NS-mediated transcriptional silencing.

Metabolic oligosaccharide engineering (MOE) is a classical strategy for carbohydrate perception but suffers from glycan quantification. Here the authors develop a selenium-based metabolic oligosaccharide engineering strategy (SeMOE), based on elemental analysis, to quantitatively detect and visualize glycans both in vitro and in vivo.

Aberrant coagulation and thrombosis are associated with severe SARS-CoV-2 infection. Here, the authors show that the E protein are associated with coagulation disorders in COVID-19 patients and could directly enhance platelet activation and thrombosis through a CD36/p38 MAPK/NF-kB signaling axis.

Cyclic-di-GMP transduces extracellular stimuli into intracellular responses to modulate important biological processes. Here, the authors show that AI-2 and bile salts induce cyclic-di-GMP synthesis via YeaJ and YedQ, respectively, to repress the T3SS via a cyclic-di-GMP-responsive T3SS chaperone.

The use of an allosteric drug-design method resulted in the identification of a first-in-class cellularly active SIRT6 activator that induces cell-cycle arrest in the G₀–G₁ phase, thus suppressing proliferation in human hepatocellular carcinoma cells.

Using Zr-doped HfO2 and ultra-thin indium tin oxide, Li et al. develop flexible field-effect transistors with a memory window of 2.78 V and bending reliability to enable high-performance back-end-of-line compatible wearable devices.

Nicotine accumulates in the intestine during tobacco smoking and accelerates the progression of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease to non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), but it can be degraded effectively by the human symbiont Bacteroides xylanisolvens.

The authors examine the effects of antidiabetic medication on the gut microbiome and bile acid composition and show that these data can be used to stratify treatment regimens for type 2 diabetes.

Bi₂O₂Se holds potential for the realization of 2D optical modulators due to its broadband nonlinear response, air stability and carrier mobility. Here, the authors report the realization of defect-engineered Bi₂O₂Se nanoplates as saturable absorbers for femtosecond solid-state lasers, showing improved output power and pulse duration.

Macrophage differentiation and inflammatory function are controlled by cell metabolism. Here, the authors use a viral hepatitis model and a high-fat diet model of insulin resistance to show how VSIG4 inhibits inflammatory macrophage activation by modulating mitochondrial pyruvate metabolism.

In bulk materials crystal lattices typically have a limited resistance to elastic strain, beyond which yielding and plastic deformation occur. Here, usingin situtransmission electron microscopy, a continuous elastic lattice deformation is observed in nickel nanowires, up to a strain of 34.6%.

Air-stability is a critical challenge faced by layered sodium transition metal oxide cathodes. Here, the authors depict a general and in-depth model of the structural/chemical evolution of P2-type layered oxides in air and propose an evaluation rule for the air-stability of layered sodium cathodes.

Most databases of genotype-phenotype associations are manually curated. Here, Kuleshov et al. describe a machine curation system that extracts such relationships from the GWAS literature and synthesizes them into a structured knowledge base called GWASkb that can complement manually curated databases.

Small cell lung cancer (SCLC) may evolve under treatment. But tumor tissues are often not available to study evolution of SCLC. Here, the authors utilize circulating tumor DNA to investigate the genomic evolution and subclonal architecture of SCLC during therapy.

Nuclear dynamics of polyatomic molecules involves multiple degrees of freedom and is challenging to explore. Here the authors study the internuclear distance-dependent depletion and bond-softening induced vibrational wavepacket dynamics of CH₃I molecules using femtosecond XUV transient absorption spectroscopy.

Machine learning approaches in micro- and nanorobotics promise to overcome challenges encountered by applying traditional control methods at the microscopic scale. Lidong Yang et al. review this emerging area in robotics and discuss machine learning developments in design, actuation, locomotion, planning, tracking and navigation of microrobots.

Adenomatous polyposis coli (APC) is shown to promote colorectal cancer cell migration by activating the guanine nucleotide exchange factor Asef. Structure-based design resulted in the development of peptidomimetic inhibitors that disrupted APC–Asef interactions.