Lack of standardization, transparency and interaction creates information gaps in scientific publications. Through strategies such as voluntary information management, standardization of reaction set-ups, and smart screening approaches, this Perspective gives guidelines on how to improve data management in publications reporting chemical reactions, focusing on reproducibility, standardization and evaluation of synthetic transformations.

Serotonin is known by many names — in science as 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) or enteramine, and in popular culture as the ‘feel good’ chemical or the ‘happy hormone’. Cameron Movassaghi and Anne Andrews discuss the knowns and unknowns of this well-studied yet elusive neurotransmitter.

Becoming an assistant professor brings with it several challenges, one of which is developing new relationships that can be professionally and personally beneficial. Shira Joudan reflects on getting to know people at a new institution, having different types of relationships, and how they help with happiness and success.

Nanopore label-free sequencing of DNA and RNA at the single-molecule level offers rapid readout, high accuracy, low cost and portability. This Review surveys technologies underpinning commercial and academic nanopore sequencing, and examines how underlying biochemical advances can fuel future developments in nanopore-based protein sequencing.

Overcrowded alkene-derived molecular motors convert light and heat into chirality-directed unidirectional rotary motion, but the efficiency of their photochemical isomerization remains limited. Now formylation of the motor core has been shown to boost all aspects of motor photochemistry by improving photochemical efficiency, diminishing competing processes and redshifting absorption.

The construction of analogues of natural gap junctions would provide a bottom–up strategy for building intercellular communication pathways for synthetic cells. Now artificial intercellular gap junctions have been prepared from unimolecular tubular channels by mimicking the hydrophobic–hydrophilic–hydrophobic triblock structure of natural junction channels.

Advances in the development of cytoskeletal-like materials with modular structures and mechanics are pivotal for the engineering of synthetic cells. Now actin-mimetic supramolecular peptide networks have been designed using programmable peptide–DNA crosslinkers, giving rise to tunable tactoid-shaped bundles and mechanical properties that control spatial localization, the diffusion of payloads and shape changes within artificial cells.

Knots reduce the tensile strength of macroscopic threads and fibres. Now it has been shown that the presence of a well-defined overhand knot in a polymer chain can substantially increase the rate of scission of the polymer under tension, as deformation of the polymer backbone induced by the tightening knot activates otherwise unreactive covalent bonds.

The selective synthesis of ultrahigh-molar-mass (UHMM) cyclic polymers from direct polymerization is elusive. Using a chemically recyclable polythioester as a model, it has now been shown that a common superbase mediates living linear-chain growth, followed by proton-triggered linear-to-cyclic topological transformation, producing UHMM cyclic polymers with a narrow dispersity.

Although metal-free catalysts, featuring defined active sites, represent alternatives to scarce or problematic metals, metal-free compounds rarely show activities as promising as metal-based materials. Now deprotonated 2-thiolimidazole is shown to serve as a metal-free electrocatalyst for selective acetylene hydrogenation and achieves competitive performances with metal-based catalysts.

Excited by the prospect of future missions to the Jupiter system, Bruce Gibb explores the chemistry of Jupiter’s moons and wonders whether there could be life on Europa.

Serotonin is known by many names — in science as 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) or enteramine, and in popular culture as the ‘feel good’ chemical or the ‘happy hormone’. Cameron Movassaghi and Anne Andrews discuss the knowns and unknowns of this well-studied yet elusive neurotransmitter.

Becoming an assistant professor brings with it several challenges, one of which is developing new relationships that can be professionally and personally beneficial. Shira Joudan reflects on getting to know people at a new institution, having different types of relationships, and how they help with happiness and success.

Ciro Romano, Jack I. Mansell, and David J. Procter have explored the versatility and selectivity of samarium diiodide, and its use as a radical relay catalyst.

Thomas Kruse and Søren Østergaard reflect on the development of the GLP-1 analogue, semaglutide, which is reshaping peptide therapeutics in type 2 diabetes, weight management, and beyond.