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Data sets encapsulating the behaviour of the Earth system are one of the greatest technological achievements of our age — and one of the most deserving of future investment.
Theoreticians have combined their expertise to form a network to help other scientists design materials or understand biological pathways. Katharine Sanderson reports.
Technology will soon allow the world to be mapped in near-real time and at high resolution. Declan Butler investigates the potential for operational monitoring of the planet.
On-the-ground monitoring is unglamorous work, seldom rewarded by funding agencies or the science community. But we neglect it at our peril, warns Euan Nisbet.
Global surveillance is key to tracking potential pandemic viruses such as H5N1. But we need to share samples more rapidly, increase testing in endemic areas and track more than one virus, argues Walter Boyce.
Researchers have now probably pinpointed all the genes in the MHC genomic region that are risk factors in type 1 diabetes. As the MHC is unusually rich in genes involved in immunity, this is truly exciting.
Cooled to temperatures just above absolute zero, solid helium starts to behave very oddly. But its 'supersolid' behaviour might just be the result of imperfections that change the bulk properties of the crystal.
Is special relativity a clapped-out classical theory, to be replaced by a shiny new quantum model as soon as possible? On the contrary, it would seem: the theory still has a youthful ability to surprise us.
Progress comes from the latest investigations into a long-standing question in immunology — the role of the immune system in maintaining small, potentially cancerous lesions in a state of dormancy.
Many bacteria use chemical signals to coordinate group behaviour. A signal that suppresses virulence has been identified in the bacterium that causes cholera, and could be a new therapeutic target.
A coupled model of palaeoclimate and carbon cycling turns up the heat on the idea that Earth once became a giant snowball. It supports instead a milder 'slushball Earth' history — but piquant questions remain.
Modern life depends on the petrochemical industry — most drugs, paints and plastics derive from oil. But current processes for making chemical products are not sustainable in terms of resources and environmental impact. Green chemistry aims to tackle this problem, and real progress is being made.
A model study of the coupled evolution of the carbon cycle and the climate system during the Neoproterozoic is presented. This finds that more oxygen is taken up by a cooling ocean, which converts organic into inorganic carbon more efficiently, creating a negative feedback loop that stabilises low carbon dioxide levels and prevents total glaciation.
Tachycardia can be prevented by engrafting embryonic cardiomyocytes into mice. A protein resident at 'gap junctions', connexin 43, is also identified as being important for this protection. Expression of this protein in skeletal myoblasts achieves similar levels of protection. These results suggest a new approach to cell-based therapy for cardiac dysfunction.
Tumours promote Bv8 expression in myeloid cells in the bone marrow. Bv8 acts on endothelial cells to directly promote tumour angiogenesis as well as to promote the recruitment of CD11b+Gr1+ myeloid cells from the bone to tumours.
Cryo-electron tomography of vitreous section from human skin is used to investigate the architecture of cadherin molecules in desmosomes under near native conditions. Three-dimensional reconstructions and fitting of existing X-ray crystallography data reveal a regular array of molecules in desmosomes, that is consistent with data derived previously using different methods.
The presence of conformational substates of a catalytically competent 'closed' state in the ligand-free form of adenylate kinase is detected. Molecular dynamics simulations indicated that the partially closed conformations were sampled in nanoseconds, and NMR and single-molecule FRET experiments revealed the sampling of a fully closed conformation occurring on the microsecond-to-millisecond timescale.
The result of U–Pb dating of minerals in a lunar meteorite, Kalahari 009 is reported. Analyses of five grains associated with basaltic clasts give an age of 4.35 ± 0.15 billion years. These are thought to represent the crystallization ages of parental basalt magma, making Kalahari 009 one of the oldest known mare basalt. This suggests that mare basalt volcanism on the Moon started as early as 4.35 billion years ago.
Evidence for 'supersolidity' has been found in 4He from torsional oscillator measurements that suggest some of the solid decouples at low temperatures. Other signatures of superflow have not been seen, but there may be clues in the solid's mechanical behaviour. This study finds large increases in the shear modulus of solid 4He at low temperatures that appear closely related to the decoupling seen in the torsional oscillator experiments.
One of two papers that demonstrate that a single quantum dot placed within an optical cavity can directly block incoming photons when it is strongly coupled to the cavity's optical field. InAs quantum dots placed respectively inside photonic crystal vacancies and inside GaAs microdisks, observe strong coupling directly in the optical transmission signal.
One of two papers that demonstrate that a single quantum dot placed within an optical cavity can directly block incoming photons when it is strongly coupled to the cavity's optical field. InAs quantum dots placed respectively inside photonic crystal vacancies and inside GaAs microdisks, observe strong coupling directly in the optical transmission signal.
If a stable layer of dense melt formed at the base of the mantle early in Earth's history, it would have undergone slow fractional crystallization and could provide an unsampled geochemical reservoir hosting a variety of incompatible geochemical species (most notably the missing budget of heat producing elements).
Dormant stages of both the water flea Daphnia and its microparasites are conserved in lake sediments, providing an archive of past gene pools. This is used to reconstruct rapid coevolutionary dynamics in a natural setting and show that the parasite rapidly adapts to its host over a period of only a few years.
The isolation of the acidophilic bacterium Acidimethylosilex fumarolicum SolV from a fumarole is described. Unlike all previous methanotrophic isolates, which belong to the Alpha- or Gammaproteobacteria, it belongs to the widely distributed Verrumicrobia.
In spite of the fact that acidic environments support methane cycles, extreme acidophilic methanotrophs have so far resisted isolation. The isolation and initial genomic and physiological characterization of a bacterium belonging to the Verromicrobia displaying a growth and methane oxidation optimum of pH2—2.5 is described.
Vibrio cholerae, the causative agent of cholera, employs quorum sensing to repress virulence factor expression at high cell density. The nature of one of the major signals is now revealed as (S)-3-hydroxytridecan-4-one constituting a new class of bacterial quorum sensing signalling molecules.
New methods and larger sample groups are used to precisely determine the alleles in the HLA complex which contribute susceptibility to type 1 diabetes.
A large-scale study that analyses gene copy number changes in lung cancer identifies 31 recurrent focal events, which include amplification of the transcription factor NKX2.1 (also called TTF1), shown to act as an oncogene.
The protein component of the major urinary protein complex is identified as a potential pheromone ligand mediating male–male aggression via the accessory olfactory pathway.
Tumours are occasionally transferred from donor to recipients during organ transplantation. This paper shows in a mouse model that during latency tumours are actively held in check by the adaptive immune system.
Np95 recruits the DNA methyltransferase Dnmt1 to hemi-methylated DNA at replicating heterochromatic regions. It is required in vivo to maintain DNA methylation and repress transcription of retrotransposons and imprinted genes
Pico-to-nanosecond timescale atomic fluctuations in hinge regions of adenylate kinase facilitate the large-scale, slower lid motions that produce a catalytically competent state.
