The cover shows the aftermath of the collapse of a nine-storey building in Guiyang, China, in 2015. Catastrophic building collapses have a huge cost and result in the loss of life. To try to mitigate problems, conventional building design aims to redistribute the load from any failed parts of a building to the rest of the structure, but this can cause sections of the building to collapse that would otherwise have been unaffected. In this week’s issue, Jose Adam and colleagues present an alternative approach to building design that isolates the failed part of a building thereby preventing catastrophic collapse. Called ‘hierarchy-based collapse isolation’, the approach was inspired by the way lizards isolate and shed their tails to escape predators. The design allows for controlled fracture along predetermined borders in parts of the building, which stops the initial failure from propagating to the entire building. The team suggests that this can prevent full-scale collapse, limiting the affected area and allowing more inhabitants to be rescued.

Fossil fuels supply most of the world’s energy and are the basis of many key products used in everyday life, but they are also a major source of carbon dioxide emissions. Although renewable energy has the potential to replace fossil-fuel-generated energy, there will still be a need for the transport fuels and chemicals produced by oil refineries. In this week’s issue, Eelco Vogt and Bert Weckhuysen examine ways in which oil refineries could be reinvented to be completely fossil-free. They note that with sufficient long-term commitment and support, the science and technology for such a refinery could be developed, and they sketch a roadmap towards this goal.

It is no surprise that regular exercise is good for you, but the molecular mechanisms behind the health benefits remain poorly understood. In this week’s issue, the Molecular Transducers of Physical Activity Consortium (MoTrPAC) seeks to address this by profiling a range of changes that take place during endurance exercise. Working with male and female rats, the researchers measured changes to the transcriptome, epigenome, proteome, metabolome, lipidome and immunome in a broad array of tissues across eight weeks of treadmill-based exercise. They identified thousands of molecular changes that collectively offer insight into the benefits accrued to immune, metabolic and stress-response pathways as the body adapts to exercise.