Volume 494 Issue 7435, 7 February 2013

It is in Britain’s best interests to keep looking for a site for a deep nuclear-waste repository.

The identification of a long-dead king is not simply an academic event.

Because confidentiality of health data cannot be guaranteed, people should consider both the risks and advantages of sharing them, argues Misha Angrist.

The week in science: Richard III skeleton discovery confirmed; South Korea launches first satellite from home soil; and a keenly watched TB booster vaccine fails a major clinical trial.

NASA prepares to launch satellite that will continue historic record of global change.

Commissioners say that geological faults make some reactors too dangerous to restart.

Government moves to tighten oversight after string of hydrogen fluoride accidents.

Maintenance, improvement work and data analysis will keep scientists busy as collider’s planned closure begins.

Plush San Francisco medical hub seeks to safeguard academic research.

Proponents hope consortium will revive flagging industry.

Many tropical species never experience extreme heat or cold. That may doom them in a warming world.

As director of the NIH's bold new translational research centre, Christopher Austin has to show that he can jump-start a tortuous drug-discovery process.

Understanding the molecular behaviour of frozen water is essential for predicting the future of our planet, says Thorsten Bartels-Rausch.

Governments must offer incentives to drive a switch to biofuels and other renewables, argues Heinz Kopetz.

Philip Ball celebrates a classic work on the mathematics that shape living structures, from antlers to cells.

Historian Richard Rhodes writes on the roots of violence and warfare, in particular the development of nuclear weapons. He talks about Reykjavik — his play on nuclear disarmament — and his upcoming book on the Spanish Civil War, That Fine Place.

The 'grand dame' of immunology.

Our planet's soils teem with microorganisms that regulate processes from crop productivity to carbon sequestration. Molecular analysis contributes hugely to the characterization of microbial communities, but how can we better understand their ecological functions? Two microbiologists discuss the advantages of data-mining approaches versus targeted experiments.

By harnessing the way charge carriers move in a magnetic field, computing blocks based on semiconductor junctions have been made that are reconfigurable and can be interconnected to perform complex logic functions. See Letter p.72

Salt is important in health and disease, yet how mammals sense it is not completely clear. Evidence in worms suggests that TMC proteins, which are implicated in human hearing, are salt receptors involved in taste. See Letter p.95

Unusual strains of the pathogen Candida albicans have been found that contain a single set of chromosomes. Formation of such haploid strains weeds out damaged copies of genes to promote evolution in the human body. See Article p.55

When massive stars die as supernovae, these explosions can be seen out to the 'edge of the Universe'. But the stars' nature is often unclear. New observations provide insight into the life of one such star before it exploded. See Letter p.65

The current experimental and theoretical status of spin–orbit coupling in ultracold atomic systems is discussed, highlighting unique features that enable otherwise impossible physics.

Candida albicans is a prominent human fungal pathogen that until now was thought to be an obligate diploid; here it is shown that C. albicans can form viable haploids, that these haploids are able to mate to form heterozygous diploids, and that haploids and their auto-diploids are significantly less fit in vitro and in vivo than heterozygous progenitors or diploids formed by haploid mating pairs.

Crystal structures reveal insight into how interferon-induced proteins with tetratricopeptide repeats (IFITs) selectively recognize viral RNA.

A mass-loss event 40 days before the explosion of the type IIn supernova SN 2010mc has been detected; the outburst indicates that there is a causal relation between explosive mass-loss events seen in some massive stars before their explosion and the onset of the supernova explosion.

An imaging technique has been developed to characterize state mixtures caused by partial coherence and fluctuations in dynamical systems.

A microchannel made from InSb, which has current–voltage characteristics that are strongly dependent on the sign and magnitude of an applied magnetic field, is used to demonstrate that circuits made from such structures can be programmed — and reprogrammed — to perform elementary logic functions, such as AND, OR, NAND and NOR.

An efficient and scalable strategy with robust error correction is reported for encoding a record amount of information (including images, text and audio files) in DNA strands; a ‘DNA archive’ has been synthesized, shipped from the USA to Germany, sequenced and the information read.

Changes in ocean circulation are the most plausible explanation for the early Southern Hemisphere deglacial warming and its lead over Northern Hemisphere temperature.

Persistent anthropogenic disturbance is shown simultaneously to drive plant species loss and stabilize some attributes of ecosystem function, analogous to a high-yield, low-diversity agricultural system, but increase the likelihood of irreversible collapse after sudden environmental change.

Chronic inflammation is a feature of the ageing brain and some neurodegenerative diseases; the authors show that astrocytes normally suppress neuroinflammation through activation of their DRD2 receptor by CRYAB, potentially opening new avenues for treatments.

The membrane protein TMC-1 is required for salt avoidance behaviour in C. elegans, functions as an ion channel directly activated by NaCl in vitro and is a candidate salt chemosensor; the human homologue of TMC-1 is linked to deafness and may be the cochlear hair-cell mechanotransduction channel.

Immune rejection may limit the therapeutic use of induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs); here, terminally differentiated mouse iPSCs are shown to generate negligible immune rejection in their host.

This study demonstrates that an inheritable adult onset heart disease can be modelled in vitro within months with the help of metabolic maturation induction.

The livers of obese mice and humans show increased levels of miR-802 resulting in impaired glucose tolerance and decreased insulin sensitivity through silencing of Hnf1b, revealing a novel pathway with potential relevance for type 2 diabetes.

In mice, commensal bacteria are shown to provide critical signals that limit bacterial trafficking to the mesenteric lymph nodes by immune cells, thus preventing the induction of mucosal immune responses.

The crystal structure of prolyl tRNA synthetase simultaneously bound to its substrate ATP and its inhibitor halofuginone, a derivative of a compound used to treat malaria, indicates that (through interactions with ATP) halofuginone occupies both the amino acid and tRNA binding sites on the synthetase, revealing a new model for developing synthetase inhibitors.

Drosophila epithelial tracheal placode invagination is shown to be driven by mitotic cell rounding along with epithelial growth factor receptor signalling and myosin contractility in neighbouring cells, revealing a new cell-division-independent role for mitotic events in morphogenesis.

Physics- and engineering-based approaches are helping researchers stop the spread of cancer by anticipating tumour cells' moves and habits.

With ruthless revision, researchers can compose a punchy 'elevator speech' to sell their science to a neighbour, potential employer or politician.

Mentoring younger students helps to boost theoretical physicist's profile.

Contingent faculty members should have a say in setting university policy.

White men dominate UK professoriate.

US bans on affirmative action linked to reduction in number of minority graduate students in science.

Protect yourself.