Nature Reviews Cardiology, Published online: 10 April 2025; doi:10.1038/s41569-025-01157-8Researchers have engineered a millimetre-scale, bioresorbable, optoelectronic system that can be minimally invasively implanted into the heart and wirelessly controlled by a light source on the surface of the skin to provide temporary cardiac pacing.

Nature Reviews Cardiology, Published online: 08 April 2025; doi:10.1038/s41569-025-01153-yHooi Min Lim describes how the Bogalusa Heart Study emphasized the importance of primordial prevention of cardiovascular disease and profoundly influenced subsequent cardiovascular research on children and adolescents.

Nature Reviews Cardiology, Published online: 07 April 2025; doi:10.1038/s41569-025-01145-yTo regenerate the injured heart, cardiomyocytes must proliferate to replace lost myocardial tissue, but this capacity is largely absent in adult mammals. In this Review, Koopmans and van Rooij explore the key pathways that drive cardiomyocyte maturation after birth and how targeted manipulation might reactivate the cell cycle in adult cardiomyocytes.

Nature Reviews Cardiology, Published online: 02 April 2025; doi:10.1038/s41569-025-01151-0A new study reports the presence of tunnelling nanotube-like structures in mouse embryonic hearts that have a crucial role in facilitating long-distance cell–cell communication during early heart morphogenesis.

Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, Published online: 07 April 2025; doi:10.1038/s41571-025-01016-yThe development of companion diagnostic assays enabling the detection and quantification of HER2 expression and ERBB2 amplifications has provided an important early example that has informed the development of many companion diagnostics for the identification of other drug targets. However, the introduction of trastuzumab deruxtecan and, potentially, other novel antibody–drug conjugates has created the need for assays that are much more sensitive. In this Review, the authors describe the historical development of HER2 companion diagnostic assays in breast and other HER2-positive cancers and highlight the possible, future, more sensitive methods of HER2 detection and quantification that might provide the next generation of companion diagnostics.

Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, Published online: 03 April 2025; doi:10.1038/s41571-025-01015-zTumours with deficient DNA mismatch repair (dMMR) leading to a microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H) phenotype are characterized by a high burden of immunogenic mutations and, thus, an immunological ‘hot’ microenvironment that is associated with high sensitivity to immune-checkpoint inhibitors. In this Review, the authors discuss the epidemiology, biology, pathogenesis, clinical diagnosis and treatment of MSI-H/dMMR tumours, highlighting idiosyncrasies associated with specific pathogenetic alterations and tumour histologies.

Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, Published online: 19 March 2025; doi:10.1038/s41571-025-01013-1Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) has been established as a key therapeutic modality for the management of brain metastases. In this Review, an international group of experts discuss the expanding opportunities for SRS, including application for larger brain metastases and cumulative intracranial tumour volumes, fractionated delivery, neoadjuvant use and combinatorial approaches with modern systemic therapy, as well as associated challenges and remaining questions.

Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology, Published online: 14 March 2025; doi:10.1038/s41571-025-01011-3Acquired resistance is a common occurrence among patients with oncogene-driven non-small-cell lung cancer receiving targeted therapies. Monitoring of circulating tumour DNA in liquid biopsy samples provides an appealing, minimally invasive method of monitoring for acquired resistance in this setting. However, research into detecting mechanisms of acquired resistance in liquid biopsy samples has thus far been limited by various challenges. In this Perspective, the authors describe the available data on detecting mechanisms of acquired resistance to targeted therapies in patients with non-small-cell lung cancer, as well as the various challenges to progress, such as a lack of a consensus definition of acquired resistance, and other inconsistencies in the approach to detecting and investigating these alterations.