Astrobiology

Venus’ Atmospheric Chemistry and Cloud Characteristics Are Compatible with Venusian Life
Bains et al. – Astrobiology

Operation of a programmable microfluidic organic analyzer under microgravity conditions simulating space flight environments
Estlack et al. – npj Microgravity

Detection of phosphates originating from Enceladus’s ocean
Postberg et al. – Nature

Stability of nucleic acid bases in concentrated sulfuric acid: Implications for the habitability of Venus’ clouds
Seager et al. – Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Exploring the Development of Astrobiology Scientific Research through Bibliometric Network Analysis: A Focus on Biomining and Bioleaching
Tonietti et al. – Minerals

Astrophysics

Hydrothermal fluid activity on asteroid Itokawa
Che et al. – Nature Astronomy

Identification of a 4.3 billion year old asteroid family and planetesimal population in the Inner Main Belt
Ferrone et al. – preprint

Biochemistry

Bacteria evolve macroscopic multicellularity by the genetic assimilation of phenotypically plastic cell clustering
Chavhan et al. – Nature Communications

Ribozyme activity modulates the physical properties of RNA–peptide coacervates
Le Vay et al. – eLife

Proteostatic tuning underpins the evolution of novel multicellular traits
Montrose et al. – preprint

Origin of biological homochirality by crystallization of an RNA precursor on a magnetic surface
Ozturk et al. – Science Advances

‘Breakthrough’ could explain why life molecules are left- or right-handed
Service – Science News

Aquatic Ferrous Solutions of Prebiotic Mineral Salts as Strong UV Protectants and Possible Loci of Life Origin
Subbotin et al. – Astrobiology

Biophysics

Critical behavior in a chiral molecular model
Piaggi et al. – preprint

Chemistry

Prevalence of multistability and nonstationarity in driven chemical networks
Nicolaou et al. – The Journal of Chemical Physics

Molecular biology

Inference and reconstruction of the heimdallarchaeial ancestry of eukaryotes
Eme et al. – Nature

Planetary sciences

Silicon isotope constraints on terrestrial planet accretion
Onyett et al. – Nature

Hadaean to Palaeoarchaean stagnant-lid tectonics revealed by zircon magnetism
Tarduno et al. – Nature

Synthetic biology

Creating complex protocells and prototissues using simple DNA building blocks
Arulkumaran et al. – Nature Communications