Science

A multi-institutional collaboration led by Tongji University has identified the key factors governing oxygen evolution in LiOH-based nonaqueous lithium-oxygen batteries, and shown that a systematic approach to catalyst, electrolyte and current collector design can boost oxygen recovery from near zero to approximately 75%. The study, published in Nature Communications, addresses one of the fundamental challenges […]

Researchers from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Huawei Technologies have designed an FPGA-based sparse Ising machine that solves combinatorial optimization problems up to 68 times faster than previous FPGA implementations, by doing something surprisingly straightforward: treating sparse problems as sparse. The study, published in Nature Communications, targets the Max-Cut problem, an […]

A team led by Christian Drosten’s group at the Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin has published the first systematic experimental and genomic evaluation of a prominent hypothesis linking the SARS-CoV-2 furin cleavage site to a laboratory-adapted MERS coronavirus strain, and the results are unequivocal: the data do not support the proposed connection. The study, published in […]

Editor’s note: This is an opinion article. It reflects a position on current science policy and does not claim neutrality. Science does not interfere with politics. It would be nice if politics returned the favor. On July 10, the National Science Foundation announced a new policy that bans virtually all collaborations between the scientists it […]

Climate change is already costing global agriculture more than $20 billion per year in lost crop production, and the bill is projected to rise eightfold by the end of the century, according to a new statistical analysis presented at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly in May 2026. The study, by Yi-Ling Hwong (IIASA, […]

A team of researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign has shown, through high-resolution molecular dynamics simulations, that a DNA double helix rotating inside a carbon nanotube can transport water and ions against a concentration gradient, a molecular-scale version of the Archimedes screw, one of humanity’s oldest pumping mechanisms. The study, posted as a preprint […]

For more than four centuries, one of the great conspiracy theories of the Renaissance held that Grand Duke Francesco I de’ Medici was poisoned by his own brother, Cardinal Ferdinando. New ancient DNA evidence published in iScience (Cell Press) puts that theory to rest: Francesco died of malaria. A team led by Yale University researchers […]

The U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has proposed a rule that would fundamentally restructure how the federal government funds science, and critics say the historical precedent is a warning from the Soviet Union’s darkest scientific era. Under the proposed rule, political appointees would gain authority to decide how federal research dollars are distributed, […]

A Comment published in The Lancet argues that the United States’ withdrawal from the World Health Organization and sweeping cuts to global health funding are directly compromising the response to the ongoing Bundibugyo ebolavirus (BDBV) outbreak, with implications that extend far beyond the current crisis. The Comment, authored by Krutika Kuppalli (UT Southwestern Medical Center), […]

Researchers at the University of Kansas Medical Center have identified a molecular gatekeeper essential for the earliest stages of pregnancy, an epigenetic enzyme called PRMT1 that governs the self-renewal and differentiation of trophoblast cells, the precursors of the placenta. The study, published in Nature Communications by Purbasa Dasgupta, Soumen Paul, and colleagues, shows that PRMT1 […]