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Earth is getting a second chance. At the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, the worlds leaders pledged to protect the planets climate and biodiversity. Since then, however, the situation has deteriorated further. Twenty years on, on the eve of the second Rio Earth Summit, we report on what went wrong and how things may yet be put right. Elsewhere in the issue, a series of Reviews and research papers explores how biodiversity loss is affecting ecosystems, and how much the consumption patterns of the developed world are to blame. Cover by Julene Harrison (photo: Samuel Acosta/Shutterstock).
The world has a surfeit of pledges, commitments and treaties. What it needs from the second Earth summit in Rio is firm leadership and a viable plan for success.
Aaron Koblin, head of the Data Arts Team in Google's Creative Lab, uses data visualization and crowdsourcing to reveal the changing relationship between people and technology. As he presents his work at the Eyeo Festival of digital creativity and prepares to release a collaboration with Google, London's Tate Modern and artist Chris Milk, he talks about the beauty of big data.
International trade is the underlying cause of 30% of threatened animal species extinctions, according to a modelling analysis of the impact of global supply chains and consumption patterns on biodiversity. See Letter p.109
A method commonly employed to study replicative ageing in yeast is laborious and slow. The use of miniaturized culture chambers opens the door for automated molecular analyses of individual cells during ageing.
An ingenious way of measuring the ages of stellar populations in the halo of the Milky Way will allow astronomers to obtain direct information on the timing of the Galaxy's evolution.
The cocktail of noble-gas isotopes in an Icelandic rock suggests that the upper mantle does not, and never did, receive gas from a deeper mantle reservoir. This challenges ideas of deep Earth's behaviour and formation. See Letter p.101
Two studies show how electrical coupling between sister neurons in the developing cerebral cortex might help them to link up into columnar microcircuits that process related sensory information. See Letters p.113 & p.118
Although automotive fuel-cell catalyst development has come a long way in the past fifteen years, more research is needed for oxygen reduction electrocatalysts to be successfully commercialized.
There is evidence that human influence may be forcing the global ecosystem towards a rapid, irreversible, planetary-scale shift into a state unknown in human experience.
Two decades ago the first Earth Summit raised the question of how biological diversity loss alters ecosystem functioning and affects humanity; this Review looks at the progress made towards answering this question.
Increasing population size and per capita impacts are making sustainability a difficult to goal to achieve; this Review explores possibilities for sustainable development.
SOX transcription factors converge on a cortex-specific enhancer to regulate the dynamic, cell-type-specific expression of Fezf2, a gene necessary for the formation of corticospinal system.
Using Ret-driven models of multiple endocrine neoplasia, it is shown that optimal kinase inhibition must aim to target an ideal spectrum of tumour-relevant kinases while avoiding ‘anti-targets’ that cause unwanted toxicity.
A riboswitch that binds fluoride was identified recently, which is surprising because both RNA and fluoride are negatively charged; here it is shown that the fluoride ion is coordinated to three positively charged magnesium ions, which are further encased in a negatively charged shell of RNA backbone phosphates and water molecules.
Using observations of four nearby white dwarf stars in the Milky Way halo, the age of local-field halo stars is measured to be nearly around 11 billion years.
Exposure of the Murchison meteorite to ultraviolet radiation is found to produce methane, suggesting a possible explanation for a substantial fraction of recently estimated Martian atmospheric methane.
Measurements from several ocean cores reveal that ocean warmth persisted throughout the late Miocene epoch despite CO2 levels of only 200–350 p.p.m.v., probably driven by a deep thermocline that isolated climate responses from CO2 variations.
Noble gas contents of the Iceland mantle plume show that neither the Moon-forming impact nor billions of years of mantle convection has erased the signature of Earth’s heterogeneous accretion and early differentiation.
Although loss of biodiversity is known to cause reduction in ecosystem function, it is not known how this threat compares to other environmental alterations such as climate change; this analysis of the data from over 100 published studies shows that biodiversity loss is as significant as other major drivers of change in ecosystem function.
Biodiversity threats from Red Lists are linked with patterns of international trade, identifying the ultimate instigators of the threats; developed countries tend to be net importers of implicated commodities, driving biodiversity decline in developing countries.
In the neocortex, microcircuits are assembled in a lineage-dependent manner through a distinct sequence of events that involves long-range electrical connections between sister neurons, leading to the formation of chemical synapses between these neurons.
It has been proposed that, during development, clonally related neurons migrate along the same radial glial fibre to form clusters of functionally similar cells; here, sister neurons in the same radial clone are shown to have similar orientation preferences in mice, providing support for this hypothesis.
The voltage-gated calcium channel protein subunit α2δ is shown to control both the abundance of voltage-gated calcium channels and their coupling to the vesicular release of neurotransmitters into the synapse; because the α2δ family is a known target of potent analgesics, this study offers a new link between basic synaptic physiology and pain research in the clinic.
The crystal structure of NavRh, a NaChBac orthologue from the marine Rickettsiales sp. HIMB114, defines an ion binding site within the selectivity filter, and reveals several conformational rearrangements that may underlie the electromechanical coupling mechanism.
X-ray crystal structures of a bacterial voltage-gated sodium channel in two ‘inactivated’ conformations are reported, revealing several conformational rearrangements that may underlie the electromechanical coupling of voltage sensor movement to inactivation of the pore.
High-quality, data-rich samples are essential for future research. But obtaining and storing these samples is not as straightforward as many researchers think.