Reduced human mobility during the COVID-19 pandemic was associated with a 12.3% decline in global fire incidence, but fires increased in some countries. A study led by WANG Jianghao and GE Yong at the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences helps explain this contrast: people can both ignite fires and keep them under control. The study appears in Cell Reports Sustainability on October 9, 2026.

Researchers led by Prof. DAI Lianpan and Prof. George F. Gao from the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Dr. LU Shuaiyao from the Institute of Medical Biology of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences reported that a fusion-loop-engineered vaccine against the Zika virus (ZIKV) has shown promise in a nonhuman primate model. 

Chinese researchers have developed a Prussian blue (PB)-based strategy to regulate both crystallization and ion migration processes in perovskite solar cells, achieving high power conversion efficiencies from small-area cells to 30 cm × 30 cm submodules.

The Moon no longer has a global magnetic field, but lunar rocks and soils still contain records of ancient magnetism. Therefore, studying the magnetic minerals in these samples can help scientists understand how the Moon’s magnetic field evolved over time. Recently, researchers examining impact-glass particles containing metallic iron from Chang’e-6 lunar soil samples discovered face-centered cubic γ-Fe—the first time this iron phase has been identified in natural lunar samples.

Researchers from the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and their collaborators revealed that plant community turnover and nematode body width play fundamental roles in shaping soil nematode diversity across different spatial scales. Their findings highlight that protecting the variety of plant species is essential for preserving nematode diversity and that a nematode's body width largely determines how it spreads across the environment.