A research team from the Institute of Geochemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IGCAS), together with collaborators, used complementary molecular dynamics simulations, combining ab initio and deep-learning potential methods. Their findings, published in Science Advances on January 28, reveal that under deep lower mantle and core–mantle boundary (CMB) conditions, water and the key hydrous mineral δ-AlOOH enter a superionic state—which combines features of a solid crystal lattice with liquid-like mobile ions—thereby fundamentally altering their stability and dehydration behavior.

While paleontologists have uncovered dozens of such Cambrian soft-bodied fossil sites—including China's early Cambrian Chengjiang biota in Yunnan and Canada's middle Cambrian Burgess Shale biota, the most famous examples of their kind—no equivalent top-tier soft-bodied fossil deposit had ever been found from the critical post-Sinsk Event time interval.

That changed over the past five years, however, with the discovery of the Huayuan biota—a world-class soft-bodied fossil deposit dating to shortly after the Sinsk Event. The deposit, located in Huayuan County, Hunan Province, was identified by a research team from the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), whose findings were published in Nature on January 28.

Led by the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the team—which included researchers from China, Australia, Spain, and the United States—conducted multidisciplinary archaeological investigations at the Xigou site in the Danjiangkou Reservoir region of central China. Their work yielded evidence of sophisticated stone tool technologies dating from 160,000 to 72,000 years ago, revealing that hominins in the region were far more innovative and adaptable than previously thought.

Using in situ liquid-phase transmission electron microscopy under conditions that excluded the influence of dissolved oxygen and electron beams, scientists have achieved the first nanoscale, real-time observation of the reaction between pyrite and gold-bearing solutions, providing critical insights into gold enrichment by pyrite.

Research teams led by Profs. WANG Qianfei and LIU Zhaoqi from the China National Center for Bioinformation, a research center affiliated to the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in collaboration with researchers from the Children's Hospital of Soochow University, analyzed transcriptome sequencing data from 702 pediatric AML patients. The team identified sequence-dependent ribonucleic acid (RNA) splicing abnormalities in roughly 36% of the cases.