Intergroup conflict is a potent evolutionary force across taxa, but little research has investigated how social animals pre-emptively change their behaviour in scenarios where contests with rivals are more likely. Moreover, the few studies examining this aspect of intergroup conflict fail to consider rival characteristics despite them determining contest outcomes and interaction costs, which define the threat level different groups pose. Here we show how non-human animals can tailor their anticipatory behaviour to the specific threat posed by rivals, using 10 years of detailed behavioural observations and GPS data. We demonstrate that dwarf mongooses (Helogale parvula) adjust their space use, information provisioning and resource defence dependent on the relative group size of neighbours to help them mitigate the threat from both well-matched competitors and more dangerous larger rivals. By contrast, behavioural differences between the core and edge of home ranges were more equivocal, highlighting the importance of considering rival characteristics rather than just spatial location as an indicator of threat level. Our results showcase how animals have evolved to be best prepared for a key part of their ecology, potential future contests, indicating abilities that allow them to survive and thrive in a landscape of intergroup conflict.
Previous studies have found that androstadienone (AND) influences women's mate preferences and their attractiveness ratings of men. This study examined whether AND affects women's engagement in intrasexual competition (i.e., the likelihood of gossip) and intrasexual competition-related perceptions (i.e., perceptions of flirtatiousness from romantic rivals). Overall, 52 women participated in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, and within-subject experiment, where they were randomly assigned to receive the AND or placebo on two consecutive experimental days. After the AND or placebo was administered, participants completed an information-sharing task and a first-impression task in the context of intrasexual competition to assess women's self-reported likelihood of gossip and perceptions of flirtatiousness of romantic rivals, respectively. The results indicated that AND increased the self-reported likelihood of negative gossip in women. However, the influence of AND on the self-reported likelihood of neutral and positive gossip in women was not significant. In addition, AND increased women's perceptions of flirtatiousness from romantic rivals. These findings indicate that AND may intensify women's intrasexual competition and perceived romantic threat in the context of intrasexual competition.
Achieving renewable, high-performance elastomers remains a key goal of green materials science. Here, we report a high-performance and recyclable elastomer produced directly from industrial Kraft lignin through a one-pot in situ graft copolymerization strategy. A deep eutectic solvent composed of oxalic acid and 1,6-hexanediol simultaneously dissolves lignin, provides flexible chains, and drives catalyst-free esterification at 110°C, constructing an interpenetrating rigid-flexible network that incorporates 50-75 wt.% lignin. The optimal elastomer delivers a tensile strength of 12.0 MPa, 878% elongation, and 85.1 MJ m- 3 fracture energy, rivaling or exceeding petroleum-derived nitrile butadiene rubber (3.1 MPa, 750% elongation and 11.0 MJ m- 3). It also offers a low dielectric constant, high electrical insulation, superior oil and abrasion resistance, efficient photothermal conversion, and infrared-induced self-healing. The material can be repeatedly reprocessed, enabling closed-loop recycling. Converting an abundant lignin by-product into a value-added elastomer thus provides a scalable route to eco-materials with broad application potential.
The human extrastriate visual cortex contains fine-scale columns selectively responsive to motion, disparity, and color. However, the developmental interplay between these functional modules remains poorly understood. Using high-resolution functional MRI, we compared the mesoscale organization of the extrastriate cortex in 16 individuals with normal vision and 15 participants with amblyopia (PwA) caused by strabismus (n = 8) or anisometropia (n = 7). In controls, the cortical territory occupied by disparity-selective columns exhibited a competitive relationship with that of motion- and color-selective columns. In PwA, we witnessed a reduction in the size of disparity-selective columns accompanied by expansion of the cortical territory allocated to motion- and color-selective columns, while the interdigitated organization of these sites remained unchanged. At the macroscale, this phenomenon simply manifested as weaker disparity- plus stronger motion- and color-selective responses in PwA than controls. Our results show that the mesoscale modules are rivals in development allowing intact functions to usurp those that are compromised.
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Clinical audit and quality improvement are both central to improving healthcare quality; however, there is often a lack of conceptual clarity about their similarities and differences. They are frequently misunderstood, conflated, or applied in ways that do not match their primary purpose. In the United Kingdom, this lack of conceptual clarity is evident across clinical practice, healthcare improvement literature, and professional curricula. The misapplication of methods may contribute to inefficient use of resources and missed opportunities to improve experiences and outcomes for patients, families, and staff. This practice-informed perspective article clarifies the distinct purposes and roles of clinical audit and quality improvement before demonstrating how they can be used in practice. Drawing on published literature, professional guidance, and the authors' practical experience, we examine the key similarities, differences, and common points of confusion between clinical audit and quality improvement. We highlight recurring challenges faced by UK healthcare professionals when selecting and applying these approaches in real-world settings, as a call for international reflection. We present a decision aid to support intentional and effective method selection and purposeful transition between approaches. By providing clarity on how clinical audit and quality improvement are distinct yet complementary, this article aims to support more rigorous, contextually appropriate, and impactful improvement efforts across all healthcare systems.
Compelling epidemiological evidence suggests that exercise and smoking are modifiable risk factors that are linked to a reduced risk of Parkinson's disease. These two risk factors represent opposite ends of a spectrum: exercise is universally embraced, while smoking is rightly eschewed for its established adverse health effects. Yet, intriguingly, preclinical evidence suggests that at their biological cores, exercise and some of the many components of tobacco may share strikingly similar working mechanisms that may favorably modify PD risk or disease course, for which definitive evidence is still lacking. Here, we deconstruct these overlapping and putative neuroprotective mechanisms. Our aim is to transform this unexpected overlap into an actionable perspective toward identifying novel targets for disease-modifying therapies that can slow the progression of Parkinson's disease, and to inspire novel translational efforts in disease modification in PD. We stress that while both factors may theoretically inform disease-modifying strategies for PD, in practice, only exercise should be promoted for its health benefits, whereas smoking remains firmly contraindicated due to its known detrimental health effects.
In the vanishing ball illusion (VBI), a magician feigns throwing a ball, and spectators report seeing it rise into the air, even though it never leaves the performer's hand. Although many studies have investigated factors that can modulate this illusion, none have examined the extent to which participants can detect this anticipatory error, or whether susceptibility to the illusion and this potential detection depend on available executive resources. In the present study, error detection was assessed by comparing the confidence in the perceptual experience of participants susceptible to the VBI (N = 64) with that of participants exposed to a real throw (N = 64). Moreover, working memory resources were manipulated by asking participants to memorize either two (low load) or four (high load) cross positions presented in a 3 × 3 grid. Contrary to our hypothesis, working memory resource availability did not significantly affect susceptibility to the VBI. Moreover, participants' confidence in detecting an error did not differ between those experiencing the VBI and those observing a real throw, and this lack of error detection was independent of available working memory resources. Our findings suggest that the illusory ball is interpreted and trusted as if it were genuine bottom-up information (i.e., a real throw). We discuss the mechanisms underlying this illusion that may account for the absence of error detection, focusing in particular on the roles of source monitoring and the automatization of perceptual simplification processes.
Solar-driven CO2 reduction offers a sustainable route to carbon neutrality by converting greenhouse gases into value-added fuels. Here, we report a secondary coordination sphere design strategy that directs CO2 photoreduction selectivity toward methane (CH4). A redox-active Ni complex (C1), incorporating two (6-amino-2-(phenylazo)pyridine) ligands with a pendant amine, exhibits markedly enhanced CH4 selectivity compared to control complexes lacking the pendant -NH2 group. Systematic evaluation of sacrificial donors, proton sources, and photosensitizers identified a dimeric Cu(i)-based photosensitizer (Cu-PS-1) as a cost-effective alternative to Ir-based systems, achieving TONCO2→CO = 4789, TONCO2→CH4 = 1130, and TONCO→CH4 = 3102, rivalling Ir-PS-1. Operando UV-vis, FTIR, and EPR spectroscopy, together with DFT calculations, revealed a stepwise 8e-/8H+ reduction pathway in which the pendant -NH2 group stabilizes key COOH and CH x intermediates through hydrogen bonding, lowering activation barriers and steering selectivity toward CH4. These results establish OCS engineering as a powerful design principle for earth-abundant molecular catalysts and highlight new opportunities for selective CO2-to-CH4 conversion in artificial photosynthesis and carbon valorization.
Inverted (p-i-n structure) perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have garnered substantial commercial interest owing to their superior operational stability, solution-processability, and inherent compatibility with tandem architectures. Recent achievements in performance rivaling that of regular (n-i-p structure) devices, coupled with significant progress in large-scale fabrication, have intensified research momentum in this field. Nevertheless, the still-constrained efficiency of inverted PSCs remains a critical challenge that requires fundamental understanding and resolution. Herein, we summarize recent advancements in inverted PSCs, delving into the origins of energy losses and their impact on device performance. We highlight effective strategies to enhance the high-performance capabilities of inverted PSCs, focusing on advances in charge transport layers, interface engineering and perovskite film modification. Furthermore, we critically evaluate the latest progress in scalable fabrication and long-term stability. Finally, we delineate key future research directions essential for achieving high efficiency, durability and manufacturability to ensure the commercial viability of this promising technology.
The possibility of the emergence of proto-antibiotic and proto-resistance molecules in the prebiotic world, as primary elements involved in "molecular wars," is examined in this conceptual review. Throughout the Earth's early history, prebiotic chemical processes produced molecules that associated both randomly and persistently. Over time, those configurations that achieved greater stability were favored, their longevity effectively serving as a mechanism for prebiotic selection. Available chemical molecules or physical surfaces could stabilize and prolong the duration of certain aggregates, creating competition among them. Hypothetically, some aggregates could yield conformations capable of disrupting the assembly or stability of rival structures, thereby acting as proto-antimolecules and later evolving into proto-antibiotics in a primitive cellular scenario. Concurrently, some other molecular aggregates may deactivate such proto-antimolecules and antibiotics, acting as primitive mechanisms of resistance. Probably, both production and protection mechanisms tended to coalesce in multimolecular assemblies, ensuring the non-self-destruction of producers. Over a prolonged period, the chemical Thioester World, RNA World, and the biological Proto-Cellular World coexisted, and proto-organelles began to be influenced and protected by proto-antibiotics and proto-resistances. Antibiotic production and resistance remained associated, even at the stage of antibiotic polyketides, which progressively emerged in a more oxygenated landscape, with early biosynthetic pathways giving rise to contemporary ones, mainly in Actinomycota. This simultaneous action-and-reaction scenario provided an ecological equilibrium in which antibiotic molecules were not necessarily killer agents but rather regulatory signals within the microbiosphere, ensuring healthy bacterial interactions. The massive anthropogenic antibiotic production altered such an equilibrium, favoring an unbalanced resistance reaction through the massive diffusion of antibiotic resistance genes, now decoupled from antibiotic production and spreading across the microbial world, mostly carried in mobile genetic elements.
Some species of fly larvae and nematodes achieve rapid locomotion by forming loops with their bodies, latching their heads and tails, and storing elastic energy by pressurizing their soft bodies, until rapidly releasing the energy to power a jump, even without legs. Here, we model the mechanics of curved expanding bodies to understand the forces generated against a latch and the energetics that govern jumping. We then present a gall midge inspired soft-bodied jumper inspired by the incredible feats of these larvae and nematodes that emulates this jumping strategy through thermally induced volumetric expansion and mechanical latching. The robot is constructed from a silicone-alcohol composite that expands under Joule heating from an embedded nichrome wire, and is secured by a polyimide latch that enables elastic energy storage and sudden release. With a mass of 150 mg and length of 13 mm, the soft-bodied jumper reaches take-off velocities up to 1.82 m/s and a jumping power density up to 1274 W/kg, rivaling the performance of its biological counterparts, and demonstrating one of the highest-performing soft-bodied LaMSA systems. Together, the model and physical system illustrate a simplified soft-bodied latch-mediated spring actuation (LaMSA) mechanism, showing how the interplay of elastic energy storage and rapid release enables high-speed, impulsive motion in small-scale synthetic systems.
While hybrid transparent conductive electrodes (TCEs) that combine silver nanowires (Ag NWs) with metal mesh frameworks have emerged as promising alternatives to other transparent electrode materials such as carbon-based materials, conductive polymers, and indium tin oxide (ITO), their performance remains constrained by high contact resistance at junctions between NWs and metal mesh interfaces. This study demonstrates that thermal welding at 200 °C for 10 min both reduces the contact resistance and fundamentally alters the conduction behavior of Ag mesh/Ag NW hybrid electrodes from a percolative regime to a bulk-like regime. This transition shifts the dominant factor governing the figure of merit (FoM) from sheet resistance to optical transmittance. As a result, even with a minimal Ag NW concentration, the welded hybrid electrodes achieve a sheet resistance of 7 Ω sq-1, a transmittance of 86.1% at 550 nm, and an FoM of 373, thereby rivaling commercial ITO. Furthermore, a systematic analysis of the mesh density and Ag NW coverage reveals distinct conduction sensitivities depending on pitch. These findings highlight the potential of contact-engineered conduction mode switching as a design principle for high-efficiency, low-cost TCEs, offering a scalable pathway toward next-generation optoelectronic and flexible devices.
The development of advanced materials that integrate electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding, infrared stealth, and self-cleaning functionalities into a single flexible architecture remains a formidable challenge in materials science. To address this, we propose an interfacial engineering strategy that constructs a dual mechanical interlock between a nanoporous copper foil (NPCF) core and polydopamine-modified electroless copper-plated ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE@Cu) outer layers via hot-pressing, achieving robust metal-polymer interfacial adhesion. The resulting sandwich-structured composite exhibits an average EMI shielding effectiveness (SE) of 111.86 dB in the X-band, rivaling that of pure copper foil, alongside a tensile strength of 41.3 MPa. It maintains excellent structural integrity and EMI shielding performance under extreme conditions, including cryogenic exposure, immersion in strong acid/alkali solutions, 1000 bending cycles, and ultrasonic treatment. Furthermore, the composite demonstrates an average emissivity as low as 0.16 within the 7-14 μm infrared atmospheric window and a water contact angle of 114°, thereby integrating prominent infrared stealth and self-cleaning functionalities. This work not only provides an innovative material solution for flexible electronics, wearable devices, and military equipment in harsh environments but also establishes a new interfacial design paradigm for developing next-generation multifunctional composites adaptable to extreme service conditions.
Synthetic dyes with photoactivatable fluorescence allow the monitoring of dynamic events with time-lapse measurements and the reconstruction of images with subdiffraction spatial resolution. Their application to the investigation of cellular processes, however, requires first the identification of appropriate protocols to label selectively subcellular structures without compromising their photochemical and photophysical properties. To this end, the ability of self-labeling protein tags to connect synthetic dyes selectively to intracellular targets with structural control rivaling that possible with fluorescent proteins is extremely attractive. Indeed, we designed multistep synthetic strategies to install ligands for the selective labeling of HaloTag or SNAP-tag on the meso-position of borondipyrromethene (BODIPY) chromophores with photoactivatable fluorescence. We demonstrated that the targeting ability of the ligand and the photochemical and photophysical properties of the chromophoric assembly are preserved in the resulting molecular constructs. We also assessed the influence of the protein on the connected fluorescent chromophore with ensemble and single-molecule spectroscopic measurements as well as with molecular dynamics simulations. We additionally showed that our photoresponsive dyes label fusion proteins in the interior of model cells to enable intracellular fluorescence photoactivation with optimal contrast. Thus, our synthetic dyes may evolve into invaluable molecular probes for the investigation of the structures and dynamics of intracellular proteins with the level of spatiotemporal control that is only possible with fluorescence photoactivation.
Takotsubo syndrome (TTS) is an acute heart failure syndrome characterized by transient left ventricular dysfunction and characteristic regional wall motion abnormalities extending beyond a single coronary territory in the absence of culprit coronary lesions. Predominantly affecting postmenopausal women, TTS often mimics acute myocardial infarction, with chest pain, dyspnea, electrocardiographic changes, and elevated cardiac biomarkers. Emotional or physical stressors trigger most cases, though one-third occur without identifiable precipitants. Pathophysiology is multifactorial, involving transient catecholamine-mediated cardiotoxicity, coronary microvascular dysfunction, sympathetic hyperactivity, brain-heart axis alterations, and estrogen deficiency, with emerging evidence implicating inflammation and genetic susceptibility. Diagnosis relies on multimodality imaging, including echocardiography, coronary angiography, and cardiac magnetic resonance imaging. Management remains empiric and largely supportive, guided by hemodynamic status and complications, with judicious avoidance of catecholamines. Long-term therapy with beta-blockers ACE inhibitors, ARBs and SGLT2 inhibitors has been proposed to improve prognosis but evidence is observational and limited. TTS is not benign; in-hospital and long-term morbidity and mortality rival those of acute coronary syndromes. Ongoing research is essential to refine risk stratification, elucidate pathophysiology, and develop targeted, evidence-based therapies.
Proteins function through a complex interplay of structural and biochemical properties, and mutations can reshape these properties to generate fitness landscapes spanning multiple functional objectives. A central challenge in protein engineering is the need to simultaneously optimize multiple properties. In biocatalysis, for example, practical enzyme development routinely requires the concurrent optimization of catalytic activity, selectivity, stability, and substrate generality. However, despite recent advances in computational protein design and fitness prediction, most existing approaches treat these properties independently and do not explicitly capture the dependencies and trade-offs that govern real-world protein performance. We present SynFit, a multi-objective learning framework that integrates pretrained protein language models with experimental fitness measurements for protein fitness prediction and engineering. SynFit learns both shared and property-specific protein sequence representations through a synergistic contrastive learning strategy, enabling the identification of variants that simultaneously optimize multiple functional properties. Across a large-scale multi-fitness deep mutational scanning benchmark, SynFit consistently outperforms state-of-the-art supervised models trained on individual objectives and more accurately identifies variants that balance competing functional constraints. We further applied SynFit to multi-objective enzyme design for a new-to-nature biocatalytic enantioselective borylation reaction, providing a diverse array of novel cytochrome c sextuple variants in a single round of design with simultaneously improved catalytic activity and enantioselectivity that rival the best variants obtained through directed evolution. Together, these results establish SynFit as a general framework for multidimensional protein fitness prediction and highlight its potential to enable efficient multi-objective optimization in protein engineering, particularly in biocatalysis.
The scalable synthesis of high-crystalline covalent organic frameworks with irreversible bond linkages remains a significant challenge, especially those constructed via dehydrohalogenative condensation. Here, we report a green and scalable solvent-free synthesis method for the COFs from dehydrohalogenative polycondensation via "metal salt eutectic melt." In this approach, hydroxyl monomers form a self-generating eutectic melt with benzoic acid upon alkali metal treatment, enabling direct melt polymerization of high-melting-point monomers at significantly reduced temperatures. This solvent-free synthesis strategy exhibits broad generality and operational simplicity, affording not only polyether (dioxin- and cyanurate-linked) COFs but also polyester COFs with enhanced crystallinity and porosity, and enabling ease of scale-up synthesis (e.g., hundred-gram-scale), surpassing conventional solvothermal and solvent-free methods. Furthermore, the resulting COFs can directly form monoliths with exceptional mechanical properties that rival those of commercial polymers prepared from nucleophilic substitution. When used as an anode for lithium batteries, the COFs exhibit an outstanding stability over 10,000 cycles at 20 A g-1, surpassing state-of-the-art COFs and organic materials. This work thus bridges molecular design and synthesis, green chemistry, and energy technology, pointing toward a future where advanced materials are both performance-optimized and sustainably manufactured.
Male dragonflies engage in aggressive aerial contests to establish breeding territories. Using field stereographic recordings of Trithemis aurora, we examined dragonfly behavioural objectives during these encounters. Unlike predatory pursuits, in which intercept trajectories minimize time-to-contact, male T. aurora steer to keep their opponent in a slightly elevated position within their frontal visual field, modulating speed to avoid direct collision. These contests feature frequent role reversals, with evenly matched rivals alternating between chaser and evader. The manoeuvres observed during these exchanges, including looping and spiralling flight, emerge from the underlying pursuit objectives. During territorial conflicts, males exhibit exceptional agility with centripetal accelerations up to 6g. Despite this high performance, individuals spent approximately one-third of flight time gliding in short bursts, even during close combat. These findings show that complex aerial contests can arise from simple control objectives constrained by sensorimotor limits.