Volume 614 Issue 7948, 16 February 2023

Now is not the time to undermine positive moves over the future of EU–UK science collaboration.

Research on blocking sunlight needs a dose of realpolitik.

Scientists identify a molecule key to the development of progeria, a lethal disease that causes hyper-accelerated ageing.

Neurons that help to rouse you from sound slumber are connected to those that receive signals from the spinal cord.

Infant ‘viromes’ are probably seeded by their diet, pathogens and other environmental factors.

Nylon coated with a non-toxic compound does not shed microfibres that can pollute the ocean.

Models show that four closely spaced eruptions would have interfered with Nile River patterns that aided farmers.

The bluestreak cleaner wrasse attacks composite images of its own body and another fish’s head — but not pictures of its own head on another fish’s body.

Chemicals in water that freezes into an icicle are crucial for that ridged profile.

Vaccination, infection with SARS-CoV-2 and a combination of both provide varying degrees of protection.

The 'amorphous' solid is denser and could be water ‘frozen in time’.

Analysis finds antimicrobial drug use in agriculture is much higher than reported.

Turkey and Syria’s buildings have always been vulnerable to earthquakes, but war has made things worse.

Analysis reveals the signature of the antiviral drug molnupiravir in SARS-CoV-2 sequences riddled with mutations.

Individual atoms trapped by optical ‘tweezers’ are emerging as a promising computational platform.

Some bacteria appear to encase their genomes in proteins called histones — which weren’t thought to exist in bacterial cells.

An audacious plan to ‘de-extinct’ dodos depends on huge leaps in biotechnology and resurrecting a lost habitat.

The approval of an antibody therapy that pauses the progression of type 1 diabetes is a first in the field, and some say a model for other drug developers.

The inclusion of women and people of colour in NASA’s astronaut cadet programme was unprecedented — and met sometimes fierce resistance.

Andrew Robinson reviews five of the best science picks.

Biologist who revolutionized the chromatin and gene-expression field.

Researchers investigating the impacts of social media on mental health must consider where exactly adolescents are in their cognitive and social development.

Faced with a deluge of papers, journal editors are struggling to find willing peer reviewers.

By sampling prehistoric sediments in the ocean floor, geologist Hartmut Schulz hopes to identify ancient analogues of today’s warming world.

A natural seed has inspired the design of a robot that can bury itself in soil when exposed to rainfall. The mechanism relies on the shape-changing properties of wood — a simple and elegant example of sustainable innovation.

Antibodies that activate stimulatory or inhibitory receptors are of great therapeutic interest for the treatment of cancer or autoimmune diseases. It emerges that such antibodies work better if they don’t bind to receptors too tightly.

An analysis of rare genetic variants reveals that they influence human traits through similar biological pathways to common ones. The work deepens our understanding of how this type of variant affects complex traits.

Experiments on ultracold atoms reveal that disorder doesn’t stop a quantum system of interacting particles from reaching thermal equilibrium. Instead, small thermalized regions ripple like an avalanche through the whole system.

Fixed moorings and underwater vehicles have uncovered varied patterns of melting and morphology under a West Antarctic glacier, offering insight into the potential for its collapse and highlighting key challenges for modelling.

A 319-million-year-old fossil provides the oldest known evidence of preserved vertebrate brain tissue. This specimen offers insights into the brain evolution of ray-finned fishes, the most diverse group of living vertebrates.

Examination of available evidence on whether anthropogenic global warming was preceded by a long-term warming trend or by global cooling provides support for a relatively mild millennial-scale global thermal maximum during the mid-Holocene.

Spectra taken after the kilonova associated with GW170817 show a high degree of spherical symmetry and a line shape is found that is consistent with a completely spherical expansion to within a few per cent.

The authors investigate the effect of small velocity in a superconducting Dirac flat band system, finding evidence for small pairs and that superfluid stiffness is not dominated by kinetic energy.

A minimal artificial Kitaev chain can be realized by using two spin-polarized quantum dots in an InSb nanowire strongly coupled by both elastic co-tunnelling and crossed Andreev reflection.

Through microscopic manipulation of radiofrequency fields, a new class of compact terahertz devices is proposed, setting the stage for next-generation ultrafast semiconductor electronics.

A universal interface connects soft, rigid and encapsulation modules together to form robust, stretchable devices in a plug-and-play manner by pressing without using pastes, which will simplify and accelerate development of on-skin and implantable devices.

A study describes a wood-based, three-tailed, biodegradable seed carrier that self-drills into the ground in response to moisture fluctuations with a success rate higher than that of natural self-drilling seeds.

Thwaites Eastern Ice Shelf observations from a new underwater vehicle show that high melt rates occur where ice is sharply sloped at the ocean interface, with lower melt where the ice is comparatively flat.

Despite observations from a hot-water-drilled access hole showing warm ocean waters beneath Thwaites Glacier Eastern Ice Shelf, the basal melt rate is strongly suppressed due to the low current speeds and strong density stratification.

A well-preserved 319-million-year-old brain of the extinct vertebrate Coccocephalus wildi provides insights into neural anatomy deep within the phylogeny of ray-finned fish.

 An analysis of rare coding variants across 22 common traits and diseases indicates that these variants will contribute substantially to biological insights but modestly to population risk stratification.

Somitoids and segmentoids—culture systems that recapitulate the formation of somite-like structures—reveal that an initial salt-and-pepper expression pattern of MESP2 in a newly formed segment is transformed into compartments of anterior and posterior identity through an active cell-sorting mechanism.

A 3D model of human segmentation and somitogenesis derived from induced pluripotent stem cells captures the oscillatory dynamics of the segmentation clock as well as morphological and molecular features of the developing embryonic axis and tail.

Convergent mutations in hotspots of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron receptor-binding domain can cause immune evasion and maintain sufficient ACE2-binding capability.

The production of eicosanoids by neutrophils during the neonatal period is necessary for the self-renewal and maintenance of alveolar macrophages during lung development.

In contrast to direct-targeting monoclonal antibodies, low affinity confers agonistic monoclonal antibodies with more potency.

Using imaging mass cytometry, the tumour and immunological spatial landscapes of 416 lung adenocarcinomas are characterized, which, when combined with deep learning, can predict clinical outcomes with high accuracy.

Imaging mass cytometry of human brain tumours provides spatial information that, combined with existing transcriptomic data, reveals the existence of a cellular neighbourhood containing a rare macrophage population associated with prolonged survival.

Frameshift mutations that create arginine-rich basic tails in transcription factors and other proteins can lead to altered phase separation in the nucleolus, which in turn leads to syndromes such as brachyphalangy, polydactyly and tibial aplasia.

Cryogenic-electron microscopy is used to determine the structure of TFEB as presented to mTORC1 for phosphorylation and an explanation is found for the strong dependence of TFEB phosphorylation on FLCN and the RagC GDP state.