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Abstract Cost-effective coastal flood adaptation requires a realistic valuation of losses, costs and benefits considering the uncertainty of future flood projections and limited resources for adaptation. Here we present an approach to quantify the flood protection benefits of beaches accounting for the dynamic interaction of storm erosion, long-term shoreline evolution and flooding. We apply the method in Narrabeen-Collaroy (Australia) considering uncertainty in different shared socioeconomic pathways, sea-level rise projections, and beach conditions. By 2100, results show that failing to consider erosion can underestimate flood damage by a factor of 2 and maintaining present-day beach width can avoid 785 million AUD worth assets from flood damage. By 2050, the flood protection and recreational benefits of holding the current mean shoreline could be more than 150 times the cost of nourishment. Our results give insight on the benefits of beaches for adaptation and can help accelerate financial instruments for restoration.

Weak interactions between functional groups are often difficult to characterize in host–guest complexes. Here, the authors report the metal-free active template synthesis of a series of rotaxanes that permit a range of kinetically stabilized, weak crown ether-axle interactions to be characterized in solution and the solid state.

Mechanically interlocked molecules and molecular cages are two important themes in supramolecular chemistry. Here, the authors combine these concepts to construct a giant [13]rotaxane built around a palladium capsule, one of the most complex metallosupramolecular assemblies yet.

Coral reefs provide significant coastal protection from storms but they have experienced significant losses. Here the authors show that the annual damages from flooding would double globally without reefs and they quantify where reefs provide the most protection to people and property.

The physical implementation of quantum information processing requires individual qubits and entangling gates. Here, the authors demonstrate a modular implementation through chemistry, assembling molecular {Cr7Ni} rings acting as qubits, with supramolecular structures realizing gates by choice of the linker.

Paramagnetic heterometallic rings have long been considered as possible qubits within a quantum information processing system. Here, the authors employ supramolecular chemistry to fabricate multiple rings around multi-armed threads, as an important step towards generating useful qubit arrays.