News & Comment

Cities are under growing pressure from climate change, biodiversity loss and social inequities. Yet new research highlights how biological, digital and social innovations can help urban systems to adapt and thrive. This issue of Nature Cities showcases advances from artificial intelligence applications to inclusive policy models to self-healing infrastructure, which offer pathways towards more-resilient urban futures.

The authors discuss the challenges of curbing land take and the complexity of achieving the net-zero limit. They call for a shift in perspective beyond the restrictive logic of traditional land-use planning and suggest that the regenerative potential of cities be unleashed.

Urban resilience is rooted in our ability to harmonize with nature and cultivate deeper relationships with local climates. Mojtaba Parsaee reflects on how the historic neighborhoods of four cities have nurtured his poetic bond with harsh climates, which inspires his vision of resilience.

Cities frequently find themselves on the frontlines of the climate crisis, facing acute environmental risks while also holding the potential to lead transformative changes. In this joint Focus issue between Nature Climate Change and Nature Cities, we explore how cities are evolving into strategic actors by harnessing public education, engineering innovation and governance frameworks to drive climate solutions.

Cities — as with complex living systems — could benefit from check-ups, as is happening in a new program in China. However, improvements are needed through adjusting health assessment indicators, enhancing public participation, and integrating the insights of both Eastern and Western medicine.

Urban health stands as one of the defining challenges and opportunities of our century. As cities continue to expand and densify, the well-being of their inhabitants is shaped not only by the bricks and mortar of urban form but also by the green and blue spaces that thread through our daily lives, the shifting patterns of infectious disease, and the social and economic structures that govern access and equity. This issue of Nature Cities brings together a set of manuscripts that collectively shed light on these interwoven pathways through which urban environments influence human health.

Urban residents navigate the delicate balance between order and chaos in urban life. Cities reflect this interplay, which shapes their identity and livability through the rules that cities establish and the freedoms they allow. From Tokyo’s precise order to Cairo’s spontaneous vibrancy, these contrasts illuminate fundamental questions about what makes a city thrive.

Blending hydrogen into existing urban gas networks presents promising pathways for urban decarbonization, yet numerous challenges persist. On this path, Hongfang Lu calls for collaborative action from industry, policymakers, community representatives and researchers to address technical barriers, management complexities and gaps in public awareness.

Groundwater-associated hazards in coastal cities can be as acute as surface flood hazards, but are often overlooked, more persistent and harder to identify. Here we discuss how climate change is causing flooding and corrosion of coastal infrastructure by driving groundwater rise and salinization.

The 2025 Los Angeles fires exposed the escalating threat of urban fires and their potential to trigger major human disasters. This Comment outlines key policy strategies to strengthen fire resilience and reframe urban fires as both a climate risk and a national security concern.

In this interview, journalist and urban farmer Claudia Visoni explores how the community gardens of São Paulo city are transforming urban landscapes through grassroots activism, and revealing strategies for building sustainable green spaces that combat climate change, strengthen communities and challenge Brazil’s cultural relationship with manual labor and collective action.

In the digital era, cities are not just adapting to emerging technologies. They are being fundamentally reshaped and reimagined by them. In this July issue, we explore how innovations — such as digital platforms, surveillance technologies and artificial intelligence — are transforming urban planning, everyday life and governance.

Biocement, a product of microbial mineralization, offers a sustainable approach to enhancing the resilience and longevity of urban infrastructure. By enabling self-healing and reducing maintenance needs, it supports the development of eco-efficient cities that face climate and durability challenges.

In the heart of Guangzhou, I find Shipai Village — where algorithmic precision meets grassroots adaptability to form a hidden, essential system that sustains the city’s pulse — thriving in chaotic resilience.