Nature

Close up on the skull and curved back bones of the Chicago Archaeopteryx, shown under UV light with areas of soft tissues shown in light blue

How did birds evolve? The answer is wilder than anyone thought

Discoveries in Jurassic rocks reveal that birds were adept fliers earlier than scientists realized.

How to improve vaccine uptake: a huge study offers clues

An analysis of more than one million people in the UK found that two-thirds of people who were vaccine-hesitant during the COVID-19 pandemic went on to get vaccinated.

Brian Owens
News13 Jan 2026
Same-sex sexual behaviour can help primates to survive — and reproduce

Bonds between same-sex individuals help apes and monkeys to manage conflict and strengthen alliances, especially in dry habitats and predator-rich landscapes.

Ewen Callaway
News12 Jan 2026
A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe

New results indicate that rhabdodontids and the previously described Ajkaceratops are actually distinctive European ceratopsians, a group better known from Asia and North America.

Susannah C. R. Maidment
Richard J. Butler
Attila Ősi
Article07 Jan 2026
Daily briefing: The neural circuit that can make it hard to start a difficult task

A ‘motivation brake’ in our brains makes taking that first step towards a task less appealing. Plus, US scientists have signed an open letter in solidarity with Greenland and what Wikipedia can teach us about trust.

Flora Graham
Nature Briefing12 Jan 2026
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Current Issue08 Jan 2026

News & Comment

AI can spark creativity — if we ask it how, not what, to think

Studies aiming to maximize human creativity demonstrate that people work best when buoyed up by others who show them new ways to innovate.

Brian Uzzi

World View13 Jan 2026
The academic community failed Wikipedia for 25 years — now it might fail us
Dariusz Jemielniak

World View13 Jan 2026
Do their ears hang low? The genetics of dogs’ adorable floppy ears
Heidi Ledford

News13 Jan 2026
How did birds evolve? The answer is wilder than anyone thought
Michael Marshall

News Feature13 Jan 2026
How to improve vaccine uptake: a huge study offers clues
Brian Owens

News13 Jan 2026
Fresh starts: how to thrive when you leave academia
Josie Glausiusz

Career Feature12 Jan 2026
Same-sex sexual behaviour can help primates to survive — and reproduce
Ewen Callaway

News12 Jan 2026

Latest Reviews & Analysis

- Should the Loch Ness Monster have a scientific name?
  
  A debate over a potential newly discovered species, and a tip for buying good sherry in this week’s pick from the Nature archive.
  
  News & Views13 Jan 2026
- The complex role of nutrients in cancer spread
  
  An in-depth analysis of nutrient availability across mouse tissues reveals their influence on the spread of cancer to other organs.
  
  Sandhya Yadav
  Tara TeSlaa
  
  News & Views07 Jan 2026
- Ultra-low-density exoplanets observed around a young star
  
  Measurements of the masses of exoplanets orbiting a young star have identified a system of low-density ‘super-puff’ planets.
  
  Valerio Nascimbeni
  
  News & Views07 Jan 2026
- Of all the quarries: Casablanca fossils reveal African ancestors of Homo sapiens
  
  Surprising fossil finds in a Moroccan quarry reveal 773,000-year-old hominin specimens that are close to the ancestor of modern humans.
  
  Antonio Rosas
  
  News & Views07 Jan 2026
- How viral RNAs escape a host mechanism that controls translation
  
  A long-standing question has been how viral RNAs that use genetic codes different from those used in human cells can still drive efficient viral protein production during infection. It emerges that the sequences of 5′ untranslated regions in viral RNAs drive codon-usage-independent translation by blocking mRNA circularization, enabling viruses to evade the host’s codon-usage control of translation.
  
  Research Briefing07 Jan 2026
- Chronic pain could be eased by uncoupling the sensory and emotional experiences
  
  Nicolas Massaly
  Monique L. Smith
  
  News & Views07 Jan 2026
- Exotic quasiparticles glimpsed in graphene
  
  Research Briefing07 Jan 2026
- A way to identify the biological basis of gene–trait associations
  
  Research Briefing07 Jan 2026
- Blood protein thwarts deadly fungal disease
  
  Katrina B. Mar
  Tobias M. Hohl
  
  News & Views07 Jan 2026

Latest Research articles

Electrochemical defluorinative Matteson-type homologation

Tsoh Lam Cheung
Yujun Li
Hairong Lyu
Article07 Jan 2026
Systematic analyses of lipid mobilization by human lipid transfer proteins

Kevin Titeca
Antonella Chiapparino
Anne-Claude Gavin
Article07 Jan 2026
A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe

New results indicate that rhabdodontids and the previously described Ajkaceratops are actually distinctive European ceratopsians, a group better known from Asia and North America.

Susannah C. R. Maidment
Richard J. Butler
Attila Ősi
Article07 Jan 2026
A young progenitor for the most common planetary systems in the Galaxy

A nine-year transit-timing campaign has measured the extremely low masses and densities of four large planets orbiting the young star V1298 Tau, which are now predicted to contract and form a typical compact super-Earth and sub-Neptune system.

John H. Livingston
Erik A. Petigura
Lorenzo Pino
ArticleOpen Access07 Jan 2026
Surface optimization governs the local design of physical networks

Analysis of the local branching geometries of several physical networks shows violations of predictions of length and volume minimization, leading to the hypothesis that estimating the material cost requires accounting for the full three-dimensional geometry.

Xiangyi Meng
Benjamin Piazza
Albert-László Barabási
ArticleOpen Access07 Jan 2026

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How did birds evolve? The answer is wilder than anyone thought

How to improve vaccine uptake: a huge study offers clues

Same-sex sexual behaviour can help primates to survive — and reproduce

A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe

Daily briefing: The neural circuit that can make it hard to start a difficult task

News & Comment

AI can spark creativity — if we ask it how, not what, to think

The academic community failed Wikipedia for 25 years — now it might fail us

Do their ears hang low? The genetics of dogs’ adorable floppy ears

How did birds evolve? The answer is wilder than anyone thought

How to improve vaccine uptake: a huge study offers clues

Fresh starts: how to thrive when you leave academia

Same-sex sexual behaviour can help primates to survive — and reproduce

Latest Reviews & Analysis

Should the Loch Ness Monster have a scientific name?

The complex role of nutrients in cancer spread

Ultra-low-density exoplanets observed around a young star

Of all the quarries: Casablanca fossils reveal African ancestors of Homo sapiens

How viral RNAs escape a host mechanism that controls translation

Chronic pain could be eased by uncoupling the sensory and emotional experiences

Exotic quasiparticles glimpsed in graphene

A way to identify the biological basis of gene–trait associations

Blood protein thwarts deadly fungal disease

Latest Research articles

Electrochemical defluorinative Matteson-type homologation

Systematic analyses of lipid mobilization by human lipid transfer proteins

A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe

A young progenitor for the most common planetary systems in the Galaxy

Surface optimization governs the local design of physical networks

Collections

Influenza

Trending - Altmetric

Science jobs

Talent Recruitment Announcement of the College of Informatics, Huazhong Agricultural University

Faculty Positions in School of Al for Science / School of Electronic and Computer Engineering, PKUSZ

Postdoctoral Researcher in human intestinal tumor- and inflammation research

Institute of Nanotechnology And Intelligence Global Recruitment for Outstanding Young Scientists

High-Level Talent at the Major Agricultural Microbiology Research Facility of HZAU

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Early hominins from Morocco basal to the Homo sapiens lineage

Mitochondrial transfer from glia to neurons protects against peripheral neuropathy

A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe

A young progenitor for the most common planetary systems in the Galaxy

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