Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-30DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03050-0
Yaroslav I. Sobolev
{"title":"From bending to lightning","authors":"Yaroslav I. Sobolev","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03050-0","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41567-025-03050-0","url":null,"abstract":"Laboratory measurements reveal that ice exhibits flexoelectricity — the generation of an electrical field upon bending. This flexoelectricity may be the microscopic mechanism for the mysterious charge separation that creates lightning in thunderstorms.","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"21 10","pages":"1518-1519"},"PeriodicalIF":18.4,"publicationDate":"2025-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145284997","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-26DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03015-3
Isabela Corina Fortunato, David B. Brückner, Steffen Grosser, Rohit Nautiyal, Leone Rossetti, Miquel Bosch-Padrós, Jonel Trebicka, Pere Roca-Cusachs, Raimon Sunyer, Edouard Hannezo, Xavier Trepat
{"title":"Single-cell migration along and against confined haptotactic gradients","authors":"Isabela Corina Fortunato, David B. Brückner, Steffen Grosser, Rohit Nautiyal, Leone Rossetti, Miquel Bosch-Padrós, Jonel Trebicka, Pere Roca-Cusachs, Raimon Sunyer, Edouard Hannezo, Xavier Trepat","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03015-3","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41567-025-03015-3","url":null,"abstract":"Haptotaxis is the process of directed cell migration along gradients of extracellular matrix density and is central to morphogenesis, immune responses and cancer invasion. It is commonly assumed that cells respond to these gradients by migrating directionally towards the regions of highest ligand density. In contrast with this view, here we show that cells exposed to micropatterned fibronectin gradients exhibit a wide range of complex trajectories, including directed haptotactic migration up the gradient but also linear oscillations and circles with extended periods of migration down the gradient. To explain this behaviour, we developed a biophysical model of haptotactic cell migration based on a coarse-grained molecular clutch model coupled to persistent stochastic polarity dynamics. Although initial haptotactic migration is explained by the differential friction at the front and back of the cell, the observed complex trajectories over longer timescales arise from the interplay between differential friction, persistence and physical confinement. Overall, our study reveals that confinement and persistence modulate the ability of cells to sense and respond to haptotactic cues and provides a framework for understanding how cells navigate complex environments. Haptotaxis was traditionally seen as migration up protein gradients. It is now shown that cells can also oscillate or migrate down the gradient.","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"21 10","pages":"1638-1647"},"PeriodicalIF":18.4,"publicationDate":"2025-09-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145284995","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-26DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03010-8
Alex Mogilner, Mariya Savinov
{"title":"Simple cell motility on adhesive gradients","authors":"Alex Mogilner, Mariya Savinov","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03010-8","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41567-025-03010-8","url":null,"abstract":"Haptotaxis — a mechanism of sensing adhesive gradients by motile cells — was thought to rely on complex mechanochemistry. It turns out that this mechanism is simply based on the difference of adhesive friction at cell front and rear.","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"21 10","pages":"1524-1525"},"PeriodicalIF":18.4,"publicationDate":"2025-09-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145284984","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-22DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03001-9
Dominik M. Juraschek, R. Matthias Geilhufe, Hanyu Zhu, Martina Basini, Peter Baum, Andrey Baydin, Swati Chaudhary, Michael Fechner, Benedetta Flebus, Gael Grissonnanche, Andrei I. Kirilyuk, Mikhail Lemeshko, Sebastian F. Maehrlein, Maxime Mignolet, Shuichi Murakami, Qian Niu, Ulrich Nowak, Carl P. Romao, Habib Rostami, Takuya Satoh, Nicola A. Spaldin, Hiroki Ueda, Lifa Zhang
{"title":"Chiral phonons","authors":"Dominik M. Juraschek, R. Matthias Geilhufe, Hanyu Zhu, Martina Basini, Peter Baum, Andrey Baydin, Swati Chaudhary, Michael Fechner, Benedetta Flebus, Gael Grissonnanche, Andrei I. Kirilyuk, Mikhail Lemeshko, Sebastian F. Maehrlein, Maxime Mignolet, Shuichi Murakami, Qian Niu, Ulrich Nowak, Carl P. Romao, Habib Rostami, Takuya Satoh, Nicola A. Spaldin, Hiroki Ueda, Lifa Zhang","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03001-9","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41567-025-03001-9","url":null,"abstract":"A rapidly increasing body of work reporting phenomena associated with lattice vibrations carrying angular momentum has led to the emergence of the field of chiral phonons. Some of these properties, such as the phonon magnetic moment, also occur in achiral phonons that are circularly or elliptically polarized, while the presence of chirality has additional implications for the types of interaction allowed between the phonons and light, electrons and other quasiparticles. In this Perspective we introduce a framework for classifying phonons with angular momentum, and provide illustrations of the different types using examples from the recent literature. Specifically, we suggest the term ‘axial phonon’ to encompass all phonons that carry angular momentum, real or pseudo, and reserve the term ‘chiral phonon’ for those phonons that break improper rotational symmetry. We hope that this scheme provides clarification on the matter of phonon chirality and will serve as a guide for future research. Phonons are quanta of the vibrations of the lattice in solids. They can carry angular momentum and allow an emergent chirality. This Perspective defines various types of chiral phonon and classifies the previously observed manifestations of them.","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"21 10","pages":"1532-1540"},"PeriodicalIF":18.4,"publicationDate":"2025-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145284989","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-18DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03000-w
Shuqiu Wang, Kuanysh Zhussupbekov, Joseph P. Carroll, Bin Hu, Xiaolong Liu, Emile Pangburn, Adeline Crepieux, Catherine Pepin, Christopher Broyles, Sheng Ran, Nicholas P. Butch, Shanta Saha, Johnpierre Paglione, Cristina Bena, J. C. Séamus Davis, Qiangqiang Gu
{"title":"Odd-parity quasiparticle interference in the superconductive surface state of UTe2","authors":"Shuqiu Wang, Kuanysh Zhussupbekov, Joseph P. Carroll, Bin Hu, Xiaolong Liu, Emile Pangburn, Adeline Crepieux, Catherine Pepin, Christopher Broyles, Sheng Ran, Nicholas P. Butch, Shanta Saha, Johnpierre Paglione, Cristina Bena, J. C. Séamus Davis, Qiangqiang Gu","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03000-w","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41567-025-03000-w","url":null,"abstract":"Although no known material exhibits intrinsic topological superconductivity, where a spin-triplet electron pairing potential has odd parity, UTe2 is now the leading candidate. Generally, the parity of a superconducting order parameter can be established using Bogoliubov quasiparticle interference imaging. However, odd-parity superconductors should support a topological quasiparticle surface band at energies within the maximum superconducting energy gap. Quasiparticle interference should then be dominated by the electronic structure of the quasiparticle surface band and only reveal the characteristics of the bulk order parameter indirectly. Here we demonstrate that at the (0–11) cleave surface of UTe2, a band of Bogoliubov quasiparticles appears only in the superconducting state. Performing high-resolution quasiparticle interference measurements then allows us to explore the dispersion of states in this superconductive surface band, showing that they exist only within the range of Fermi momenta projected onto the (0–11) surface. Finally, we develop a theoretical framework to predict the quasiparticle interference signatures of this surface band at the (0–11) surface. Its predictions are consistent with the experimental results if the bulk superconducting order parameter exhibits time-reversal conserving, odd-parity, a-axis nodal, B3u symmetry. UTe2 is a proposed intrinsic topological superconductor, but its quasiparticle surface band has not yet been visualized. Now this is achieved using quasiparticle interference imaging, revealing the symmetry of the superconducting order parameter.","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"21 10","pages":"1555-1562"},"PeriodicalIF":18.4,"publicationDate":"2025-09-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.comhttps://www.nature.com/articles/s41567-025-03000-w.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145284998","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-18DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03024-2
Yukio Tanaka
{"title":"Topological superconductivity finds its missing piece","authors":"Yukio Tanaka","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03024-2","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41567-025-03024-2","url":null,"abstract":"Topologically protected surface states are expected to exist in topological superconductors. These states have now been detected using momentum-resolved tunnelling spectroscopy in a spin-triplet superconductor.","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"21 10","pages":"1512-1513"},"PeriodicalIF":18.4,"publicationDate":"2025-09-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145285003","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-16DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03026-0
Adam Wills, Min-Hsiu Hsieh, Hayata Yamasaki
{"title":"Constant-overhead magic state distillation","authors":"Adam Wills, Min-Hsiu Hsieh, Hayata Yamasaki","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03026-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-025-03026-0","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Most schemes for realistic quantum computing require access to so-called magic states to allow universal quantum computing. Because the preparation process may be noisy, magic state distillation methods are needed to improve their accuracy and suppress any potential errors. Unfortunately, magic state distillation is resource-intensive and often considered a bottleneck to scalable quantum computation. Here, the cost is defined by the overhead: the ratio of noisy input magic states to cleaner outputs. This is known to scale as <span>({mathcal{O}}({log }^{gamma }(1/epsilon )))</span> as <i>ϵ</i> → 0, where <i>ϵ</i> is the output error rate and <i>γ</i> is some constant. Reducing this overhead, corresponding to smaller <i>γ</i>, is highly desirable to remove the bottleneck. However, identifying the smallest achievable exponent <i>γ</i> for distilling magic states of qubits has proved challenging. Here, we resolve this problem by demonstrating protocols with the optimal exponent <i>γ</i> = 0, thus corresponding to magic state distillation with a constant overhead, and we show that this is achievable for the most important magic states such as <span>(leftvert {mathsf{T}}rightrangle)</span> and <span>(leftvert {mathsf{CCZ}}rightrangle)</span>. This is achieved by using algebraic geometry constructions to build the first asymptotically good quantum codes with transversal non-Clifford gates, for which we also construct an efficient decoder with linear decoding radius.</p>","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"67 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":19.6,"publicationDate":"2025-09-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145067839","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-16DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03032-2
Mun K. Chan, Katherine A. Schreiber, Oscar E. Ayala-Valenzuela, Eric D. Bauer, Arkady Shekhter, Neil Harrison
{"title":"Observation of the Yamaji effect in a cuprate superconductor","authors":"Mun K. Chan, Katherine A. Schreiber, Oscar E. Ayala-Valenzuela, Eric D. Bauer, Arkady Shekhter, Neil Harrison","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03032-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-025-03032-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p>The pseudogap state of high-temperature superconducting cuprates, known for its partial gapping of the Fermi surface above the superconducting transition temperature, is believed to hold the key to understanding the origin of Planckian relaxation and quantum criticality. However, the nature of the Fermi surface in the pseudogap state has remained a fundamental open question. Here we report the observation of the Yamaji effect, which appears as a peak in the <i>c</i>-axis resistivity at a specific angle of the applied magnetic field, in angle-dependent magnetoresistivity measurements above the critical temperature in the cuprate HgBa<sub>2</sub>CuO<sub>4+<i>δ</i></sub>. The observation of the Yamaji peak is evidence for small Fermi-surface pockets in the normal state of the pseudogap phase. The small size of the pockets, each estimated to occupy only 1.3% of the Brillouin zone area, is not expected given the absence of long-range broken translational symmetry.</p>","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"12 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":19.6,"publicationDate":"2025-09-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145067840","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Nature PhysicsPub Date : 2025-09-15DOI: 10.1038/s41567-025-03030-4
Rongrong Zhang, Shengjie Wan, Jiarui Xiong, Lei Ni, Ye Li, Yajia Huang, Bing Li, Mei Li, Shuai Yang, Fan Jin
{"title":"Decoding frequency-modulated signals increases information entropy in bacterial second messenger networks","authors":"Rongrong Zhang, Shengjie Wan, Jiarui Xiong, Lei Ni, Ye Li, Yajia Huang, Bing Li, Mei Li, Shuai Yang, Fan Jin","doi":"10.1038/s41567-025-03030-4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-025-03030-4","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Bacterial second messenger networks transmit environmental information through both amplitude and frequency modulation strategies. However, the mechanisms by which cells decode frequency-encoded signals remain poorly understood. By reconstructing the cyclic adenosine monophosphate second messenger system in <i>Pseudomonas aeruginosa</i>, we demonstrate that frequency-to-amplitude signal conversion emerges through three distinct filtering modules that decode frequency-encoded signals into gene expression patterns. Our mathematical framework predicts a range of frequency filtering regimes controlled by a dimensionless threshold parameter. We validated these using synthetic circuits and an automated experimental platform. Quantitative analysis reveals that under the given parameter conditions, frequency modulation expands the accessible state space more substantially than amplitude modulation alone. The total number of accessible states scales as the square of the number of regulated genes for frequency-enhanced control, compared with the power of 0.8 for amplitude-only control. This results in approximately two additional bits of information entropy in three-gene systems when using frequency-based control. Our findings establish the fundamental principles of frequency-based signal processing in bacterial second messenger networks, revealing how cells exploit temporal dynamics to regulate multiple genes and expand accessible state spaces. This provides insights into both cellular information physics and design principles for synthetic biology.</p>","PeriodicalId":19100,"journal":{"name":"Nature Physics","volume":"45 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":19.6,"publicationDate":"2025-09-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145059440","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"物理与天体物理","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}