News & Comment

To highlight and support research in the important area of child health, the editors at Nature Communications and Communications Medicine invite submissions to a collection of papers on this subject, including infectious diseases, cancer, and neurodevelopment and neurodiversity.

We reflect on the extent to which the UK Events Research Programme adhered to four principles of design and evaluation in assessing risk of transmission from attending such mass events as football matches and festivals, and lessons learned.

A plethora of work has shown that AI systems can systematically and unfairly be biased against certain populations in multiple scenarios. The field of medical imaging, where AI systems are beginning to be increasingly adopted, is no exception. Here we discuss the meaning of fairness in this area and comment on the potential sources of biases, as well as the strategies available to mitigate them. Finally, we analyze the current state of the field, identifying strengths and highlighting areas of vacancy, challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

Kv3 channels enable neurons to fire at very high frequencies (>100 Hz) which is fundamental to brain development and our ability to make sense of the world at large. Cryo-EM and structure-function studies by Chi et al. now uncover Kv3 channel gating mechanisms and support new precision medicine approaches for CNS diseases.

Lockdowns due to the pandemic in the last two years forced a critical number of chip-making facilities across the world to shut down, giving rise to the chip shortage issues. Prof. Meng-Fan (Marvin) Chang (National Tsing Hua University, TSMC—Taiwan), Prof. Huaqiang Wu (Tsinghua University—China), Dr. Elisa Vianello (CEA-Leti—France), Dr. Sang Joon Kim (Samsung Electronics—South Korea) and Dr. Mirko Prezioso (Mentium Techn.—US) talked to Nature Communications to better understand whether and to what extent this crisis has impacted the development of in-memory/neuromorphic chips, an emerging technology for future computing.

In contrast to chemical industry, biotechnology is still not competitive for the production of chemicals, materials, and biofuels. Here, the authors discuss the underlying reasons and propose to address the problem through regulatory changes and risk management.

The prion hypothesis embodies the radical concept that prion proteins contain the necessary information for infectious replication within their shape, thus obviating the requirement for genomic material. Two elegant papers by Hoyt et al. and Manka et al. describing high-resolution structures of infectious prions bring us closer to answering the long-standing question of how different prion conformations produce heritably distinct diseases.

Diversity is a creative force that broadens views and enhances ideas; it increases productivity as well as the impact of our science, making our respective organisations more agile and timely. Equality of opportunity is a key to success for any research organisation. Here we argue that every research organisation, whether in academia or in industry, needs to have better inclusion policies to harness the benefits of diversity in research. Drawing from our personal experiences and perspectives as women in science, we share our suggestions on how to promote inclusion in academia and create a better research culture for all. Our shared experiences highlight the many hurdles women in science face on a daily basis. We stress that rules and regulations, as well as education for awareness, will play critical role in this much needed shift from a male-dominated scientific culture that dates from Victorian times to a modern focus on gender equality in science. The key ingredients of this new culture will be flexibility, transparency, fairness and thoughtfulness.

Why do males typically compete more intensely for mating opportunities than do females and how does this relate to sex differences in gamete size? A new study provides a formal evolutionary link between gamete size dimorphism and ‘Bateman gradients’, which describe how much individuals of each sex benefit from additional matings.

Chemical probes are selective small-molecule modulators, usually inhibitors, of their target protein’s function, that can be used in cell or even animal studies to interrogate the functions of their target proteins. Cheryl Arrowsmith, the leader of a new initiative called Target 2035, which seeks to identify a pharmacological modulator for most human proteins by the year 2035, and Paul Workman, the Executive Director of the nonprofit Chemical Probes Portal, an online resource dedicated to chemical probes, talked to Nature Communications about chemical probes, their respective paths to leadership positions in the field, the online resources available to those interested in the topic and the promise and value of open — collaborative — science. The below material is a modified transcript of a long discussion, preserving the conversational tone, but streamlined and edited for clarity, and thus we do not attribute the particular parts to Cheryl or Paul specifically except for when they shared their personal experiences.

Flooding is a pervasive natural hazard, with new research demonstrating that more than one in five people around the world live in areas directly exposed to 1-in-100 year flood risk. Exposure to such flood risk is particularly concentrated amongst lower income households worldwide.

Our peer review programme was launched in 2020 to support Early Career Researchers in building confidence to participate in peer review. The initiative has proved very successful and popular with both ECRs and editors and we are pleased to invite applicants to apply to our 2022 programme.

Habitability of exoplanet’s deepest oceans could be limited by the presence of high-pressure ices at their base. New work demonstrates that efficient chemical transport within deep planetary ice mantles is possible through significant salt incorporation within the high-pressure ice.

Diagonal integration of multimodal single-cell data emerges as a trending topic. However, empowering diagonal methods for novel biological discoveries requires bridging huge gaps. Here, we comment on potential risks and future directions of diagonal integration for multimodal single-cell data.

A Global Forum on Synthetic Biology is needed to engage policymakers with practitioners across borders at the highest level. The international community needs a global confidence-building measure focused on discussing policy futures for the age of engineering biology.

Writing in Nature communications, Seo and collaborators presented PICASSO as a method to achieve 15-color imaging of spatially overlapping proteins using no reference emission spectra in a single staining and imaging round. This accessible tool has the potential to be applied to diverse applications within the spatial biology field without neglecting accuracy.

Dense water production in the seas around Antarctica is a key process for century-scale carbon storage, slowing global warming. Results from an advanced new model reveal the prospect of system changes that may greatly reduce the efficiency of this carbon storage by the end of this century.

The impact of COVID-19 has been disproportionately felt by populations experiencing structural racial- and ethnicity-based discrimination. Here, the authors describe opportunities for COVID-19 response and recovery efforts to help build more equal and resilient societies.

Understanding gaps in academic representation while considering the intersectionality concept is paramount to promoting real progress towards a more inclusive STEM. Here we discuss ways in which STEM careers can be sown and germinated so that inclusivity can flourish.

This Q&A about technology transfer is intended as a useful resource to the Nature Communications readership, particularly academic scientists working in the life and physical sciences who have an interest in commercializing their research. We spoke to Dr. Andrea Crottini, Head of the Technology Transfer Office at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, who provided insights into the possible avenues to pursue.