Articles in 2014

The interaction between ferroelectricity and magnetism is of interest for the use in magnetic information storage devices. Here, the authors achieve the coupling of ferroelectric and ferromagnetic order in an oxide heterostructure by ultrashort optical pulses, offering the optical control of these effects.

The evolution of the visual system in vertebrates remains poorly understood. Here, the authors show well-preserved rod and cone photoreceptors in a Upper Carboniferous fossilized fish, suggesting that colour vision has evolved in fish at least 300 Myr ago.

Constitutive photomorphogenic 1 (COP1) plays a key role in photomorphogenesis by destabilizing transcription factors and photoreceptors. Here, Cho et al. show that COP1 also influences the global level of miRNAs in Arabidopsis by protecting the RNA-binding protein HYPONASTIC LEAVES 1 from proteolysis by an unknown protease.

Cancer cells within the same tumour are heterogeneous in their tumorigenic potential, differentiation status and sensitivity to treatments. Here Nguyen et al. use a sensitive DNA barcoding method to characterize the diversity of clonal growth behaviour within human breast tumours.

Synthetic compounds that alter circadian rhythms have been shown to modulate energy expenditure and systemic metabolism in rodents. Here, the authors study the psychological effects of such compounds, and find synthetic REV-ERB agonists increase wakefulness and reduce anxiety-like behaviour in mice.

In silkmoths, pheromones are used to find food, to evade predators and to locate mating partners. In this study, Namiki et al.use anatomical and electrophysiological approaches to identify four neural circuits that contribute to a neural pathway for pheromone processing in the protocerebrum of silkmoths.

Models for protein diffusion in cells assume a large macromolecular crowding effect. Here Di Rienzo et al.visualize GFP diffusion at the millisecond timescale to observe unobstructed Brownian motion in mammalian cells for distances up to 100 nm, revealing minimal influence of macromolecular crowding.

The bilaterian central nervous system is thought to have evolved from a cnidarian-like ancestor, but the mechanisms of neural induction in cnidarians are largely unknown. Here the authors study the cnidarian Nematostella vectensisand show that β-catenin signalling is crucial for the early induction of its embryonic nervous system, suggesting evolutionary roots for this pathway.

Mechanical activity predisposes muscle cell membranes to damage, which is repaired by a poorly defined Ca²⁺-dependent mechanism. Scheffer et al. describe the machinery for Ca²⁺-induced assembly of ESCRT III membrane remodelling complex at damaged cell membranes, which facilitates repair.

Halide perovskites are widely studied as components in photovoltaic cells. Here, the authors show that these materials also possess a tunable ferroelectric polarization as well as relativistic spin-splitting effects suggesting additional functionalities, for example, as spintronic and optoelectronic devices.

Chronic consumption of a Western-type diet leads to systemic inflammation of undefined origin, which contributes to metabolic disease. Here Progatzky et al. identify an immediate early step in the process by showing that dietary cholesterol rapidly activates inflammasomes in the gut epithelium.

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with a complex genetic basis. Here the authors carry out a fine-mapping analysis of the major histocompatibility complex region and identify amino acids that have a causal role in SLE aetiology.

High-temperature superconducting cuprates exhibit hour-glass shaped magnetic excitation spectra which are not well understood. Here, the authors show that the hour-glass shaped magnetic excitation spectra in an isostructural cobaltate arise from nanoscopic phase separation.

The European sea bass is an economically important fish species, which is subject to intense selective breeding. Here, the authors sequence the genome of the European sea bass and highlight gene family expansions underlying adaptation to salinity change, as well as the genomic architecture of speciation between two divergent sea bass lineages.

Genetic variation in the IFNλ locus has been associated with clearance of hepatitis C virus. Here, the authors show that a single amino-acid variant of IFNλ4 affects its antiviral activity and that patients carrying the impaired variant have better viral clearance rates.

Understanding how corals may react to ocean acidification is hampered due to a lack of insight into how corals source the inorganic carbon required to build their skeletons. Here, the authors show that corals are able to concentrate dissolved carbon and that bicarbonate contributes to the carbon pool used to build their skeletons.

Gephyrin is an adaptor molecule that binds to both GABA_A receptors and glycine receptors. Here Maric et al. present the structure between gephyrin and a peptide from GABA_Areceptor and identify key residues dictating the preference of gephyrin for glycine receptor.

Understanding unconventional superconductivity is a challenge in condensed matter physics. Ab initiocalculations by Takahiro Misawa and Masatoshi Imada reproduce many experimental features of the iron-based superconductor LaFeAsO, and suggest the mechanism is mediated by electron density fluctuations.

Targeted cancer therapy requires knowledge of driver aberrations. Here the authors perform large-scale transcriptome analysis, and show that gene fusions in NRG1, NF1and Hippo pathway genes are recurrent mostly among lung cancers lacking known driver mutations.

The histone demethylase Jmjd3 is involved in many biological processes. Here, the authors generate T cell-specific Jmjd3-deficient mice and show that Jmjd3 has a role in T-cell function and in the differentiation and interconversion of T-cell subsets in the intestine.