Volume 561 Issue 7724, 27 September 2018

Stellar outburst

The cover image is a visualization of the turbulent envelope of a luminous blue variable star surrounding the central high-density core. As their name suggests, these massive, evolved stars display large variations in their luminosity and size. In this week’s issue, Yan-Fei Jiang and his collaborators report 3D models that suggest the mechanism behind this phenomenon. They find that helium opacity plays an important part in triggering the outbursts and in setting their effective temperature of around 9,000 kelvin. The team predicts that these stars should also show variability at the 10–30% level on a timescale of days.

Cover image: Joseph Insley/ALCF

This Week

Editorial

Editorial | 25 September 2018

The costs of climate inaction

A new analysis breaks down the likely social cost of carbon emissions by country and should make unhappy reading for politicians.
Editorial | 26 September 2018

Brexit is already damaging European science

With six months to go, uncertainty posed by the decision to leave the European Union is taking its toll.
Editorial | 25 September 2018

Discovery of Galileo’s long-lost letter highlights the value of physical repositories

Chance unearthing of a famous document reveals the scientist’s attempt to avoid the Inquisition.

World View

World View | 25 September 2018

No more first authors, no more last authors

If we really want transdisciplinary research, we must ditch the ordered listing of authors that stalls collaborative science, says Gretchen L. Kiser.
- Gretchen L. Kiser

Research Highlights

Research Highlight | 17 September 2018

The devastating death toll forecast for Himalayan quakes

Hundreds of thousands of lives are at risk as a result of population boom in seismic zone.
Research Highlight | 21 September 2018

How an atom forms a ‘ghost’ bond with a partner that isn’t there

Electric and magnetic pulses can fool an electron into reaching out for an illusory atom.
Research Highlight | 20 September 2018

Octopuses on ecstasy just want a cuddle

Molluscs’ reaction to popular party drug echoes humans’ response.
Research Highlight | 17 September 2018

Pathologists meet their match in tumour-spotting algorithm

Deep-learning model picks out two kinds of lung cancer by studying images of tissue.
Research Highlight | 18 September 2018

The exoplanet that could be Spock’s home world

A super-Earth orbits the star named by Star Trek’s creator as the host of the planet Vulcan.
Research Highlight | 21 September 2018

A daily aspirin might not be what the doctor ordered

A drug taken regularly by half of US adults might raise the risk of serious bleeding.
Research Highlight | 20 September 2018

The multitasking cell that can build the parts of a human skeleton

Cells sprout into bits of human bone when implanted in mice.

Seven Days

Seven Days | 26 September 2018

Gravity glitch, biodefence plan and an asteroid first

The week in science: 21–27 September 2018.

News in Focus

News

News | 21 September 2018

Discovery of Galileo’s long-lost letter shows he edited his heretical ideas to fool the Inquisition

Exclusive: Document shows that the astronomer toned down the claims that triggered science history’s most infamous battle — then lied about his edits.
- Alison Abbott
News | 18 September 2018

Prominent palaeontologist loses £1-million grant following bullying investigation

Nicholas Longrich has been disciplined by the University of Bath, UK, for breaching its anti-harassment policy.
- Holly Else
News | 21 September 2018

Discovery of vibrant deep-sea life prompts new worries over seabed mining

“Gummy squirrels,” single-celled organisms the size of softballs and strange worms thrive in a Pacific Ocean zone some considered an underwater desert.
- Amy Maxmen
News | 19 September 2018

Top US science agency unveils hotly anticipated harassment policy

The National Science Foundation’s rules for reporting harassment by grant recipients are the strictest yet instituted by a US government science agency.
- Alexandra Witze
News | 18 September 2018

Prehistoric children as young as eight worked as brickmakers and miners

Bones and artefacts suggest that kids laboured at skilled tasks thousands of years ago.
- Traci Watson
News | 18 September 2018

Reimagining of Schrödinger’s cat breaks quantum mechanics — and stumps physicists

In a multi-‘cat’ experiment, the textbook interpretation of quantum theory seems to lead to contradictory pictures of reality, physicists claim.
- Davide Castelvecchi

Features

News Feature | 26 September 2018

Why Chinese medicine is heading for clinics around the world

For the first time, the World Health Organization will recognize traditional medicine in its influential global medical compendium.
- David Cyranoski
News Feature | 26 September 2018

Six months to Brexit: how scientists are preparing for the split

Seven researchers and campaigners tell Nature how Britain’s break-up with the EU is affecting research.
- Ehsan Masood
- , Inga Vesper
- & Richard Van Noorden

Comment

Comment | 26 September 2018

Clear up this stem-cell mess

Confusion about mesenchymal stem cells is making it easier for people to sell unproven treatments, warn Douglas Sipp, Pamela G. Robey and Leigh Turner.
- Douglas Sipp
- , Pamela G. Robey
- & Leigh Turner
Comment | 24 September 2018

How do natural hazards cascade to cause disasters?

Track connections between hurricanes, wildfires, climate change and other risks, urge Amir AghaKouchak and colleagues.
- Amir AghaKouchak
- , Laurie S. Huning
- & Iman Mallakpour

Books and Arts

Books & Arts | 25 September 2018

Genetic determinism rides again

Nathaniel Comfort questions a psychologist’s troubling claims about genes and behaviour.
- Nathaniel Comfort
Books & Arts | 26 September 2018

The sex lives of vegetables, life in a heart beat, and the cold-war engineer who cracked supercomputing

Barbara Kiser reviews five of the week’s best science picks.
- Barbara Kiser

Correspondence

Correspondence | 26 September 2018

Mega mining project in French Guiana threatens Amazonian biodiversity
- François M. Catzeflis
Correspondence | 26 September 2018

How to deliver translational data-science benefits to science and society
- Chaitanya Baru
Correspondence | 24 September 2018

Swap outdated authorship listings for contributorship credit
- George Davey Smith
- , Marcus Munafò
- & Mika Kivimäki
Correspondence | 26 September 2018

Just a handful of publications can collect the prize
- Michele Carbone
Correspondence | 26 September 2018

Do boring speakers really talk for longer?
- Robert M. Ewers

Technology

Toolbox

Toolbox | 24 September 2018

Machine learning gets to grips with plankton challenge

Marine biologists are using artificial intelligence to help them identify objects in millions of images.
- Jeffrey M. Perkel
Collection:
- NatureTech

Technology Feature

Technology Feature | 25 September 2018

Cryo-electron microscopy shapes up

As the imaging technique produces ever-sharper protein structures, researchers are racing to develop tools to assess how accurate they are.
- Monya Baker
Collections:
- Challenges in irreproducible research
- NatureTech

Careers

Features

Career Feature | 26 September 2018

The quest for postdoctoral independence

How to step out from the shadow of your principal investigator.
- Chris Woolston

Columns

Career Column | 26 September 2018

The price of grief

Confronting loss can give rise to difficult career choices, says Summer Praetorius.
- Summer Praetorius
Collection:
- Science careers and mental health

Futures

Futures | 26 September 2018

Last contact

A missed appointment.
- Graham Robert Scott

Research

News & Views

News & Views | 26 September 2018

Flexible self-powered biosensors

Current biological sensors require bulky external power sources. Ultrathin solar cells have now been fabricated that can power flexible, wearable sensors for the precise and continuous monitoring of biological signals.
- Shiming Zhang
- & Fabio Cicoira
News & Views | 19 September 2018

A core problem in nuclear assembly

Chromosomes can exist outside the nucleus in rupture-prone structures called micronuclei. It emerges that micronuclei are fragile because their outer layer lacks some nuclear-envelope components.
- Matthias Samwer
- & Daniel W. Gerlich
News & Views | 26 September 2018

Antibodies pose a double threat to HIV

Drug treatments for HIV infection require the long-term use of daily medication that can have toxic side effects. A pair of HIV-targeting antibodies might offer an alternative therapeutic approach.
- Nancy L. Haigwood
News & Views | 26 September 2018

Complex mechanical motion guided without external control

Mechanical structures have been made that exhibit self-guided, multi-step sequences of shape changes in response to an applied force. Such structures could have applications in flexible electronics and soft robotics.
- Larry L. Howell
News & Views | 12 September 2018

Designer proteins activate fluorescent molecules

A computational method has been devised that allows a structural motif found in proteins, known as a β-barrel, to be designed to bind specifically to any small molecule, opening the door to biotechnological applications.
- Roberto A. Chica

Brief Communications Arising

Brief Communications Arising | 26 September 2018

The role of Olfr78 in the breathing circuit of mice
- Hortensia Torres-Torrelo
- , Patricia Ortega-Sáenz
- & José López-Barneo
Brief Communications Arising | 26 September 2018

Chang et al. reply
- Andy J. Chang
- , Noah S. Kim
- & Mark A. Krasnow

Articles

Article | 05 September 2018

Population dynamics of normal human blood inferred from somatic mutations

Analysis of blood from a healthy human show that haematopoietic stem cells increase rapidly in numbers through early life, reaching a stable plateau in adulthood, and contribute to myeloid and B lymphocyte populations throughout life.
- Henry Lee-Six
- , Nina Friesgaard Øbro
- & Peter J. Campbell
Article | 26 September 2018

Combination therapy with anti-HIV-1 antibodies maintains viral suppression

Combination therapy with the anti-HIV-1 monoclonal antibodies 3BNC117 and 10-1074 maintains long-term suppression in the absence of antiretroviral therapy in individuals with antibody-sensitive viral reservoirs.
- Pilar Mendoza
- , Henning Gruell
- & Michel C. Nussenzweig
Milestone:
- HIV research
Article | 12 September 2018

De novo design of a fluorescence-activating β-barrel

The elucidation of general principles for designing β-barrels enables the de novo creation of fluorescent proteins.
- Jiayi Dou
- , Anastassia A. Vorobieva
- & David Baker
Article | 12 September 2018

Cryo-EM structure of the active, G_s-protein complexed, human CGRP receptor

The structure of a complex containing calcitonin gene-related peptide, the human calcitonin gene-related peptide receptor and the G_s heterotrimer, determined using Volta phase-plate cryo-electron microscopy, provides structural insight into the regulation of G-protein-coupled receptors by receptor activity modifying protein 1.
- Yi-Lynn Liang
- , Maryam Khoshouei
- & Patrick M. Sexton

Letters

Letter | 26 September 2018

Outbursts of luminous blue variable stars from variations in the helium opacity

Three-dimensional simulations of the convective envelopes of massive stars suggest that it is the helium opacity that controls outbursts in luminous blue variable stars.
- Yan-Fei Jiang
- , Matteo Cantiello
- & James Stone
Letter | 10 September 2018

A topological source of quantum light

Topologically protected edge states realized in a square array of ring resonators are used to demonstrate a robust source of heralded single photons produced by spontaneous four-wave mixing.
- Sunil Mittal
- , Elizabeth A. Goldschmidt
- & Mohammad Hafezi
Letter | 10 September 2018

Extremely efficient terahertz high-harmonic generation in graphene by hot Dirac fermions

Efficient terahertz harmonic generation—challenging but important for ultrahigh-speed optoelectronic technologies—is demonstrated in graphene through a nonlinear process that could potentially be generalized to other materials.
- Hassan A. Hafez
- , Sergey Kovalev
- & Dmitry Turchinovich
Letter | 26 September 2018

Multi-step self-guided pathways for shape-changing metamaterials

A scheme for implementing multi-step topological reorganization of a mechanical metamaterial is demonstrated, which proceeds autonomously, without the need for external control.
- Corentin Coulais
- , Alberico Sabbadini
- & Martin van Hecke
Letter | 26 September 2018

Self-powered ultra-flexible electronics via nano-grating-patterned organic photovoltaics

Detection of biometric signals by self-powered electronic devices that are highly flexible and can be applied to skin.
- Sungjun Park
- , Soo Won Heo
- & Takao Someya
Letter | 26 September 2018

Multicomponent synthesis of tertiary alkylamines by photocatalytic olefin-hydroaminoalkylation

Complex tertiary alkylamines are prepared in one step from readily available amines, carbonyls and alkenes, via the visible-light-mediated reduction of in-situ-generated iminium ions to form alkyl-substituted α-amino radicals.
- Aaron Trowbridge
- , Dominik Reich
- & Matthew J. Gaunt
Letter | 19 September 2018

Transience of the North American High Plains landscape and its impact on surface water

The High Plains region of North America is in a transient state, with a younger, efficient network of river channels progressively cannibalizing an older, less efficient region, aiding water retention for wetlands and groundwater recharge.
- Sean D. Willett
- , Scott W. McCoy
- & Helen W. Beeson
Letter | 17 September 2018

The role of miniaturization in the evolution of the mammalian jaw and middle ear

Biomechanical analyses of mammaliaform and cynodont fossils demonstrate that miniaturization drove the evolutionary transformation of the mammalian jaw, which preceded the optimization of bite force-to-joint load in the mandible
- Stephan Lautenschlager
- , Pamela G. Gill
- & Emily J. Rayfield
Letter | 19 September 2018

Hydraulic diversity of forests regulates ecosystem resilience during drought

The diversity in the hydraulic traits of trees mediates ecosystem resilience to drought and will probably have an important role in future ecosystem–atmosphere feedback effects.
- William R. L. Anderegg
- , Alexandra G. Konings
- & Nicole Zenes
Letter | 17 September 2018

Sensation, movement and learning in the absence of barrel cortex

Mice can learn to detect objects with their whiskers and respond appropriately even in the absence of their primary somatosensory cortex.
- Y. Kate Hong
- , Clay O. Lacefield
- & Randy M. Bruno
Letter | 12 September 2018

Touch and tactile neuropathic pain sensitivity are set by corticospinal projections

Somatosensory corticospinal neurons facilitate touch sensitivity and touch-evoked neuropathic pain in mice.
- Yuanyuan Liu
- , Alban Latremoliere
- & Zhigang He
Letter | 19 September 2018

Nuclear envelope assembly defects link mitotic errors to chromothripsis

The mitotic spindle prevents normal nuclear envelope assembly on missegregated chromosomes, leading to spontaneous envelope disruption of micronuclei and subsequent genome instability.
- Shiwei Liu
- , Mijung Kwon
- & David Pellman
Letter | 19 September 2018

mRNA circularization by METTL3–eIF3h enhances translation and promotes oncogenesis

METTL3, the enzyme responsible for m⁶A modification, influences translation by interacting with eIF3h to mediate looping between the regions near the stop codon and 5′ cap of mRNA.
- Junho Choe
- , Shuibin Lin
- & Richard I. Gregory
Letter | 17 September 2018

Structure of the membrane-assembled retromer coat determined by cryo-electron tomography

The retromer complex (the vacuolar protein sorting heterotrimer Vps26–Vps29–Vps35) has been resolved in association with membranes and the sorting nexin protein Vps5 using cryo-electron tomography.
- Oleksiy Kovtun
- , Natalya Leneva
- & Brett M. Collins

Amendments & Corrections

Author Correction | 04 July 2018

Author Correction: Environment and host as large-scale controls of ectomycorrhizal fungi
- Sietse van der Linde
- , Laura M. Suz
- & Martin I. Bidartondo
Publisher Correction | 16 July 2018

Publisher Correction: Oxidized phospholipids are proinflammatory and proatherogenic in hypercholesterolaemic mice
- Xuchu Que
- , Ming-Yow Hung
- & Joseph L. Witztum
Publisher Correction | 21 June 2018

Publisher Correction: Cryo-EM structure of human rhodopsin bound to an inhibitory G protein
- Yanyong Kang
- , Oleg Kuybeda
- & H. Eric Xu

Nature Outlook

Nature Outlook | 27 September 2018

Brain cancer

Brain cancer is one of the most aggressive and difficult-to-treat malignancies. Moreover, in the almost 50 years since the start of the war on cancer, the prospects for people who develop brain cancer have improved much more slowly than those of individuals with other types of cancer.