Volume 7 Issue 4, April 2023

Transforming the rapidly growing ocean economy into a ‘blue economy’ based on principles of sustainability, equity and inclusivity is crucial. We contend that marine biotechnology is not on this trajectory and that a more holistic approach for people and nature is needed to bring marine biotechnology into the blue economy.

A large-scale field study finds that different bee species experience different levels of risk from pesticides, depending on how much land is farmed within their foraging range. For bumblebees and solitary bees, more seminatural habitat means less risk from pesticides, but this is not true for honeybees.

A mathematical model of eco-evolutionary dynamics estimates different birth rates of cells at the periphery of a tumour versus its centre, giving insight into locally stable evolutionary mechanisms that arise as a result of boundary-driven growth.

Using genome assemblies and comparative analyses, we identified evolutionary signatures of selection associated with repeated gains and losses of social behaviour in sweat bees. These signatures include changes in regulatory regions and young genes, as well as complementary patterns of positive and relaxed selection on proteins involved in juvenile hormone signalling.

In this Perspective, Karst et al. discuss how both the popular media and scientific literature have inflated the extent of evidence for various roles of mycorrhizal fungal networks in forests.

A meta-analysis of peer-review data from over 300,000 biological sciences manuscripts reveals worse review outcomes for authors from historically excluded groups, and limited data evaluating the effectiveness of interventions to address bias in peer review.

The authors incorporate mechanistic information about lizard physiological responses to heat into predictions of trait variation across time and space, finding that the range of functional traits is more constrained in locations where the local climate strongly selects for thermal performance.

Theoretical models of foraging efficiency suggest that lunge-filter-feeding marine vertebrates could be as small as 10 kg. However, here the authors show with bio-logged data from filter-feeding minke whales that in practice there are minimum body-size constraints on filter feeders, below which this becomes an unviable feeding strategy.

Analysing pesticide residues in pollen and nectar collected by three bee species along a land-use gradient, the authors show that extensive foragers like Apis mellifera have higher pesticide risk than species that forage at intermediate or limited ranges, irrespective of landscape context.

Leveraging independent gains and losses of eusociality, the authors identify complementary signatures of selection in sweat bee genomes, including two proteins that bind and transport juvenile hormone.

While a bioinformatic comparison of de novo genes and synthetic random sequence does not identify a difference in biophysical properties, in vitro expression shows higher solubility for the de novo proteins, suggesting better integration into the cellular system than random sequences.

A Bayesian state-dependent evolutionary phylodynamic model (SDevo) quantifies the difference in division rates between cells at the periphery and interior of a tumour. In simulations and using clinical hepatocellular carcinoma data, the authors use SDevo to interrogate spatial patterns in tumour growth.

The authors sequence genome-wide data from multiple human individuals in southern Spain and find long-lasting genetic continuity. Here, in contrast to regions elsewhere in Europe, a 23,000-year-old individual from Malalmuerzo carries genetic ancestry that connects earlier Aurignacian-associated individuals with western European hunter-gatherers long after the Last Glacial Maximum.

Integrating Australian Aboriginal art and narratives with soil excavation data suggests that the regularly spaced bare circles in Australian arid grasslands (sometimes known as ‘fairy circles’) are in fact linyji or mingkirri, termite pavement nests used by Aboriginal people for domestic and sacred purposes over generations.