These are extraordinarily challenging times for university researchers across the United States. After decades of government largess based on the idea that a large and well-financed research ecosystem will produce social and economic progress, there have been huge cuts in federal funding. Those applying for remaining scraps face new restrictions designed to ensure their political alignment with the current presidential administration. These policies are destroying scores of careers, as government funding is an important marker of an investigator’s potential and pivotal for securing job offers, promotion, and tenure. It is also necessary to train the next generations of scientists and engineers. As a result, science and innovation may be suffering.

Interview with Patrícia Izar, who studies the behavioral ecology, plasticity, and cognition of Platyrrhine primates at the University of São Paulo.

Tropical pollinators forage in environments where floral resources vary in space and time, requiring flexible strategies to optimise foraging efficiency. One such strategy, floral constancy - the temporary restriction to a single flower type - strongly influences foraging success and plant-pollinator interactions. We aimed to: (1) quantify spontaneous colour preferences and constancy in the Asian giant honeybee Apis dorsata, (2) test whether reward concentration modulates these preferences, (3) evaluate how quickly learned associations override spontaneous biases, (4) determine whether bees can use multiple colour associations simultaneously, and (5) assess whether local floral spectral patterns correlate with bee preferences. Bees trained to a neutral UV-grey stimulus showed a strong spontaneous preference and high constancy to blue, revealing a robust short-wavelength bias. Crucially, the strength of this spontaneous bias depended on reward concentration; Low-reward conditions elicited strong blue constancy, whereas high-reward conditions weakened it, demonstrating that reward expectation shapes spontaneous colour choices. This bias was flexible. When bees learned that yellow was rewarding, they switched their preferences. Bees sequentially trained to both colours visited blue and yellow, showing no overall bias, or effect of the last-trained colour, indicating that recent experiences disrupt colour-specific constancy and generate largely random foraging choices. Bees were capable of learning and retaining two colours simultaneously, effectively suppressing the influence of spontaneous preferences. Finally, analysis of the community floral spectral distribution revealed a strong dominance of short-wavelength flowers, suggesting that long-term selection by the local floral environment may underlie the spontaneous blue preference observed in A. dorsata.

The relationship between morphology and ecology is mediated by behavior. We explore this relationship by assessing the link between trophic ecology and the use of prey-specific feeding behaviors in a cichlid fish system. Cichlid diversification features repeated transitions between free-moving prey and attached benthic prey, requiring predators to evolve prey-specific approaches to feeding. Using 2000 Hz video, we characterized feeding behavior on an experimental attached benthic prey in seven species of Mesoamerican heroine cichlid spanning three independent transitions to specialized piscivory and two to specialized benthic-feeding ecology. We investigated the effect of feeding ecology on the behavior and kinematics of benthic grazing, a derived, specialized mode of cichlid feeding. Surprisingly, all species readily fed on benthic prey, regardless of their feeding ecology. Nearly all non-benthic species used the same benthic-feeding behaviors as ecological benthic-feeders. Our findings demonstrate an unexpected level of behavioral versatility among cichlid species in exploiting functionally demanding prey outside their typical diets. We propose that this repertoire of latent feeding behaviors supports trophic versatility and facilitates niche diversification. We also show that two benthic-feeding lineages of Neotropical cichlids evolved distinct approaches to benthic feeding, exhibiting the highest and lowest total feeding-strike kinesis, respectively. Together, our findings highlight the importance of behavior in linking morphology and ecology and motivate further study into the diversity and evolutionary context of benthic feeding across the Cichlidae.

Nature Communications, Published online: 22 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-68742-4Generating high-quality training data for machine learning is costly. Here, authors include sequence-to-function modeling in benchmarking of custom and commercial droplet-based scATAC platforms, and release a new Drosophila embryo atlas along with a new mouse cortex atlas, assessed for model interpretability.

Industry-linked studies were also more likely to focus on particular topics, suggesting these ties may be skewing the field

The current study explores the social experiences of adolescent and transition-age youths with intellectual disabilities (IDs) and the support mechanisms available to these groups in Saudi Arabia. This study adopts a qualitative methodology with a semi-structured interview constituting the data collection method involving 13 parents with children aged between 11 and 19 years, a critical adolescent period and transition to early adulthood. The results suggest that family, caregivers, community, friendships, and healthcare providers play important roles that impact the quality of life for these groups. The main challenges identified include health-related issues, employment challenges, educational barriers, insufficient services, inadequate community participation, and limited social relationships, with special emphasis on obstacles linked to transition during the 18 to 19-year period when youths must navigate transfers from pediatric to adult services and changes associated with legal rights. This study highlights several reasons it is important to increase awareness and education, while also continuing to improve support systems aimed at dealing with both transition challenges and adolescent needs. The results further illustrate that although support from family provides the foundation for care, systemic changes are needed to promote social inclusion and reduce stigma during critical development periods. The current study contributes to the limited research related to IDs in the context of the Middle East, with special reference to Saudi Arabia. Finally, the discussion highlights several insights that are culturally specific for the development of policy and provision of services associated with the transition from adolescence to early adulthood.

by Fabian Schneider, Helen Blank The human brain makes abundant predictions in speech comprehension that, in real-world conversations, depend on conversational partners. Yet, tested models of predictive processing diverge on how such predictions are integrated with incoming speech: The brain may emphasise either expected information through sharpening or unexpected information through prediction error. We reconcile these views through direct neural evidence from electroencephalography showing that both mechanisms operate at different hierarchical levels during speech perception. Across multiple experiments, participants heard identical ambiguous speech in different speaker contexts. Using speech decoding, we show that listeners learn speaker-specific semantic priors, which sharpen sensory representations by pulling them toward expected acoustic signals. In contrast, encoding models leveraging pretrained transformers reveal that prediction errors emerge at higher linguistic levels. These findings support a unified model of predictive processing, wherein sharpening and prediction errors coexist at distinct hierarchical levels to facilitate both robust perception and adaptive world models.

Scientific Reports, Published online: 24 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s41598-026-35577-4Application of the expanded theory of planned behavior in predicting Iranian students’ intention to use probiotic products

Nature Communications, Published online: 23 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-68796-4Spin-crossover complexes are promising candidates for molecular bits owing to their magnetic bistability but engineering high-density bits is challenging due to cooperative switching dynamics. Here the authors modulate the cooperative dynamics of surface-confined spin-crossover complex chains.

The Salicaceae Itoa orientalis differs from Salix/Populus in initially bisexual flowers. Zhao et al. show that its XY sex-determination system is fundamentally different from that of Salix/Populus, involving two genes, including one that regulates male function in Asparagus officinalis, suggesting genetic canalization in the evolution of dioecy.

Publication date: Available online 22 January 2026 Source: Applied Animal Behaviour Science Author(s): Kiana McDole, Katrina Merkies

Prezygotic interspecific incompatibility prevents hybridization between species, which limits interbreeding strategies for crop improvement using wild relatives. The Brassica rapa female self-incompatibility determinant, S-locus receptor kinase (SRK), ...

Opportunity for multiple mating should affect the fitness cost of sexual cannibalism for males. We used newly developed microsatellite loci to study multip

Haifeng Jiao and Li Yu introduce migrasomes, large dynamic vesicular structures that form at the tips or intersections of retraction fibers and function in intercellular communication and cellular homeostasis.

Ecology and Evolution, Volume 16, Issue 1, January 2026.

Understanding how living organisms process sensory information from their surroundings and translate it into decisions is a fundamental problem across biological scales -- from biochemical signalling in single-cells to neural computations in animal brains. In this work, we address this challenge by introducing a method to reconstruct general decision processes directly from behavioral observations alone. Our approach is applicable to any biological agent and does not require prior knowledge of its internal mechanisms or its environment.Our agent model is defined by a recurrent dynamics over a discrete set of internal states which encode and process sensory information, and dictate which actions to execute. We validate our method on synthetic agents and demonstrate that we can exactly recover the agent's behavior for non-trivial tasks. Then, we infer agent models from experimental data of rats performing evidence accumulation and of mice making decisions under uncertainty and in changing environments. In both cases, very few internal states suffice to reproduce the observed behavior with high accuracy. Crucially, the immediate interpretability of the inferred dynamics allows to understand the computational process underlying decision making. Our results show that our approach provides a broadly applicable framework for understanding how general agents make decisions in complex environments.

Brain and Behavior, Volume 16, Issue 1, January 2026.

Oviposition site selection is critical for mosquito population dynamics and disease transmission. Gravid mosquitoes rely on chemical cues to identify suitable breeding habitats. However, the sensory mechanisms governing this behavior in Anopheles stephensi remain poorly understood. Here, we examined the role of indole, a microbial volatile associated with aquatic environments, in oviposition site choice and assessed the involvement of sensory organs in its detection. In two-choice oviposition assays, water conditioned with first-instar larvae attracted gravid females (OAI = 0.56), whereas water from fourth-instar larvae was repellent (OAI = -0.20), consistent with avoidance of suboptimal, resource-depleted habitats. Indole elicited strong oviposition attraction across a broad concentration range (0.1-50 M), with no clear dose-response relationship. Surgical ablation of antennae and maxillary palps, the principal olfactory organs in the head, did not abolish indole-mediated preference but significantly reduced behavioral variability, suggesting that these structures modulate, rather than solely mediate, indole detection. Reanalysis of chemosensory organ transcriptomes (antennae, maxillary palps, and legs) in An. gambiae and An. colluzzii, along with quantitative RT-PCR in An. stephensi, revealed the expression of chemosensory genes (including Obp1, Obp13, Obp25, Obp71, Or2, and Or10) in the legs, indicating a potential role for leg chemosensation in oviposition decisions. These findings underscore the complexity of chemoreception and chemoperception in mosquito habitat assessment.

Categorization studies, in which stimuli vary along a category continuum, are becoming increasingly popular in psychological science. These studies demonstrate the effect of category ambiguity on various behavioral and neural measures. In such studies, researchers manipulate objective category levels by varying the physical properties of the stimuli, and then use these levels as predictors of behavior—assuming they map directly onto participants’ perceived locations along the category continuum. This approach might not be optimal, considering the variability in participants’ category boundary locations (their point of subjective equality, or PSE). In this tutorial, we propose addressing this issue by estimating participants’ individual points of subjective equality, adjusting category levels relative to these points, and conducting statistical analyses on the subjective category levels. Implementing this method significantly improves the statistical power of the analysis in both experimental and simulated data. Adjusting stimulus levels by the points of subjective equality is highly suited for social categorization studies, in which points of subjective equality vary significantly. On a broader scale, it can be applied to a variety of categorization, discrimination, and decision-making studies.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume 123, Issue 2, January 2026. SignificanceEpigenetic mechanisms, including histone acetylation, are crucial for learning and memory, particularly in Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia (ADRD). Acetyl-CoA synthetase 2 (ACSS2), an enzyme generating acetyl-CoA, regulates histone ...

Nature Communications, Published online: 22 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-68652-5The cellular mechanisms to initiate allergic responses involve various immune cells in the lungs. Here the authors identify a Ly6G+Nur77+ macrophage population involved in initiation of HDM-driven Th2 responses that detect Derp1 allergen through PAR2 and modulate migration of conventional DC to draining lymph nodes via cysteinyl leukotriene production.

Publication date: February 2026 Source: Hormones and Behavior, Volume 178 Author(s): Marcia L. Collaer, Debra Spencer, Karson T.F. Kung, Ajay Thankamony, Ieuan A. Hughes, Carlo Acerini, Umasuthan Srirangalingam, Helena Gleeson, Eileen Luders, Melissa Hines

Nature Communications, Published online: 23 January 2026; doi:10.1038/s41467-026-68770-0The cancer cell membrane replicates the characteristic molecular profile of its parental cells. Here, authors construct a homotypic membrane-powered biomimetic interface for subtype-specific analysis of breast cancer extracellular vesicles.

Avian brood parasitism is a widespread reproductive strategy in which parasitic birds exploit host nests to raise their offspring, often at a significant cost to the host species. Hosts counter parasitism through various defensive mechanisms, including egg rejection, which the either the visual presence or the vocalisations of the parasite near the nest can trigger. This study aimed to assess the response of Red-backed Shrikes (Lanius collurio), a species formerly commonly parasitised by the Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) to simulated brood parasitism based solely on auditory cues, using playbacks of cuckoo vocalisations. Over two breeding seasons in eastern Poland, artificial Cuckoo eggs were placed in 63 Shrike nests, followed by playback experiments. The results revealed no significant effect of simulated parasite presence on egg rejection rates, and the playback of the Sparrowhawk call also did not affect the host’s responses. However, the observed pattern suggests a possible influence of incubation advancement on host responses. Defensive behaviour peaked during the egg-laying and early incubation phases, with over 90% of eggs rejected, and fell slightly during advanced egg incubation. These findings suggest that Shrikes do not rely on auditory cues to detect parasitic threats. This study highlights the critical role of the breeding stage in shaping anti-parasitic strategies, and suggests that a strong ability to recognise parasitic eggs may reduce dependence on additional sensory cues. Further research is needed to examine the interplay between auditory and visual stimuli across different host species and geographic regions.