Volume 467 Issue 7313, 16 September 2010

A proposed road through the Serengeti can be halted only by providing a viable substitute, not by criticism.

China needs to elaborate on plans to modernize its flagging academic journals.

The week in science.

Scientists face a rollercoaster ride as the NIH rushes to distribute funds.

Approval expected for genetically modified salmon.

Fired researcher's allegations of misconduct prompt university to investigate vaccine trial.

Weak publications will be 'terminated'.

Critics assail the US Department of the Interior's draft policy on scientific integrity.

Experts differ on the effects of biodiversity projects on improvements in living standards.

Nanotech medicines held up by lack of particle characterization.

Singularity University tries to breed world leaders by immersing students in futuristic concepts. Nicola Jones finds it a heady mix of grand claims, brilliant minds and cool gadgets.

The UK government is about to reveal a research spending plan that is too conservative for purpose, warns Colin Macilwain.

Tanzania's iconic national park must not be divided by a highway, say Andrew Dobson, Markus Borner, Tony Sinclair and 24 others. A route farther south would bring greater benefits to development and the environment.

Two books on ageing understate the challenges of prolonging a healthy lifespan, finds Caleb Finch.

Patients with disorders of the blood protein haemoglobin often depend on lifelong blood transfusions. That could change, given the success of gene therapy in a patient with one such disorder.

Jumps resulting from the measurement of discrete state changes in single quantum systems have fascinated scientists from the early days of quantum theory. They have now been observed in solid-state quantum bits.

Methods for generating embryonic-like stem cells have been established. The focus now is on finding ways to coax these cells into matching their natural counterparts as closely as possible, should this be desired.

Glaciers frozen to bedrock may have protected the southernmost Andes from erosion, providing an explanation for the mountains' topography and fresh constraints on possible links between climate and tectonics.

Mitochondria — the cell's power plants — increase their energy production in response to calcium signals in the cytoplasm. A regulator of the elusive mitochondrial calcium channel has now been identified.

Pioneer in understanding the weak force of particle physics.

Pluripotent stem cells can be generated in the laboratory through somatic cell nuclear transfer (generating nuclear transfer embryonic stem cells, ntESCs) or transcription-factor-based reprogramming (producing induced pluripotent stem cells, iPSCs). These methods reset the methylation signature of the genome — but to what extent? Here it is found that mouse iPSCs 'remember' the methylation status of their tissue of origin, but the methylation of ntESCs is more similar to that of naturally produced ES cells.

The uptake of calcium by mitochondria has a central role in cell physiology, and an imbalance can trigger cell death. Now the first protein that is localized to the mitochondrion and is specifically required for calcium uptake has been identified. This protein, mitochondrial calcium uptake 1 (MICU1), represents the founding member of a set of proteins required for high-capacity calcium uptake. Its discovery should aid in the full molecular characterization of the mitochondrial calcium uptake pathways.

A promising approach to realizing a practical quantum bit scheme is the optical control of single electron spins in quantum dots. The reliable preparation and manipulation of the quantum states of such spins have been demonstrated recently. The final challenge is to carry out single-shot measurements of the electron spin without interfering with it. A technique has now been developed that enables such measurement, by coupling one quantum dot to another to produce a quantum dot molecule.

It was demonstrated recently that passing electrons through a spiral stack of graphite thin films generates an electron beam with orbital angular momentum — analogous to the spiralling wavefronts that can be introduced in photon beams and which have found widespread application. Here, a versatile holographic technique for generating these twisted electron beams is described. Moreover, a demonstration is provided of their potential use in probing a material's magnetic properties.

There is much interest in graphene for applications in ultrahigh-speed radio-frequency electronics, but conventional device fabrication processes lead to significant defects in graphene. Here a new way of fabricating high-speed graphene transistors is described. A nanowire with a metallic core and insulating shell is placed as the gate electrode on top of graphene, and source and drain electrodes are deposited through a self-alignment process, causing no appreciable damage to the graphene lattice.

Climate change is often associated with an increase in the frequency of extreme weather events, such as heat waves or intense precipitation. Here, however, downscaled climate model simulations have been used to show that the frequency of North Atlantic polar lows — intense storms that are considerably smaller than the weather-dominating synoptic depressions — is projected to decrease by the end of the twenty-first century.

It has been suggested that glacial erosion has an important role in controlling mountain height. Here, spatial and temporal patterns of erosion in the glaciated Patagonian Andes have been assessed with the help of a low-temperature thermochronologic data set. The results show that, between 38° S and 49° S, accelerated erosion at the onset of widespread glaciation limits mountain height. But at higher latitudes, glaciation protects the landscape from erosion and leads to growth in mountain height and width.

Disorders caused by abnormal β-globin, such as β-thalassaemia, are the most prevalent inherited disorders worldwide. For treatment, many patients are dependent on blood transfusions; thus far the only cure has involved matched transplantation of haematopoietic stem cells. Here it is shown that lentiviral β-globin gene transfer can be an effective substitute for regular transfusions in a patient with severe β-thalassaemia.

In the adult brain, neural stem cells (NSCs) and neural progenitor cells (NPCs) are maintained in the subventricular zone. There, the Notch protein regulates the identity and self-renewal of NSCs, while epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) affects NPC proliferation and migration. Now it is found that these signalling pathways interact to maintain the balance between NSC and NPC populations.

Immune cells that recognize 'self' tissues need to be eliminated or controlled in order to prevent autoimmune diseases. Here, a T-cell population is delineated that is necessary to maintain self tolerance in mice. Genetic disruption of the inhibitory interaction between these CD8⁺ T cells and their target Qa-1⁺ follicular T-helper cells results in a lethal systemic-lupus-erythematosus-like autoimmune disease.

Cell death by apoptosis is crucial for tissue development and function, and occurs throughout life. Apoptotic cells must be cleared by phagocytic cells, but the mechanisms that regulate cell clearance in vivo remain unclear. Here, a conserved engulfment protein, ELMO1, is shown to be required for the phagocytic clearance of apoptotic germ cells by Sertoli cells in mouse testes. The findings make a compelling case for the relationship between engulfment and tissue homeostasis in vivo.

During haematopoiesis, multipotent progenitors differentiate into progressively restricted myeloid or lymphoid progenitors. A comprehensive genome-wide DNA methylation analysis of haematopoietic cell populations with well-characterized differentiation potentials reveals remarkable epigenetic plasticity during lymphoid and myeloid restriction.

Cell cycle checkpoints, such as the S-phase checkpoint, delay cell division to give the cell time to repair any damaged DNA. Here it is shown that the MLL gene — frequently disrupted in leukaemia — is part of the S-phase checkpoint. When DNA is damaged, MLL is phosphorylated by the ATR protein, causing MLL to accumulate on chromatin and methylate histone H3 on lysine 4. This delays DNA replication. MLL translocations, such as those that occur in leukaemia, disrupt this pathway and cause genomic instability.

The centromeres of chromosomes are specified epigenetically, and the histone H3 variant CENP-A is assembled into the chromatin of all active centromeres. Here, the crystal structure of CENP-A in a tetrameric complex with histone H4 reveals the physical features of centromeric chromatin. CENP-A seems to mark the centromere by altering nucleosome structure from within its folded histone core.

The oxidation of formate and water to bicarbonate and H₂ is relatively common in microorganisms under anaerobic conditions. But can this reaction sustain growth in an isolated species? Here it is shown that several individual Thermococcus species can use formate oxidation for growth. Moreover, the biochemical basis of this ability is delineated.

More young scientists should dedicate a portion of their attention to high-risk research despite the potential downside, argues Abraham Loeb.

Helen Amanda Fricker, a glaciologist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, has won the 2010 Martha T. Muse Prize for Science and Policy in Antarctica.

US industry experiences fewer staff losses.

Ambassador network targets physician-scientists.

Shift away from the track is damaging, claims report.

Time for a trip.