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Volume 505 Issue 7482, 9 January 2014

The elephant shark (Callorhinchus milii) is a cartilaginous fish native to the temperate waters off southern Australia and New Zealand, living at depths of 200 to 500 metres and migrating into shallow waters during spring for breeding. The genome sequence is published in this issue of Nature. Comparison with other vertebrate genomes shows that it is the slowest evolving genome of all known vertebrates � coelacanth included. Genome analysis points to an unusual adaptive immune system lacking the CD4 receptor and some associated cytokines, indicating that cartilaginous fishes possess a primordial gnathostome adaptive immune system. Also absent are genes encoding secreted calcium-binding phosphoproteins, in line with the absence of bone in cartilaginous fish. Cover: Rudie Kuiter/OceanwideImages.com

Editorial

  • As public pressure builds for drug companies to make more results available from clinical trials, the industry should not forget that it relies on collective goodwill to test new therapies.

    Editorial

    Advertisement

  • Teams aimed at preventing violence on campus can offer a lifeline to those in crisis.

    Editorial
  • How two world wars affected scientific research, and vice versa.

    Editorial
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World View

  • After his polar vessel became trapped in shifting sea ice, Chris Turney defends the scientific basis of the expedition.

    • Chris Turney
    World View
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Research Highlights

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Seven Days

  • The week in science: China crushes seized ivory, smuggled dinosaur skull recovered, and incoming asteroid spotted.

    Seven Days
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News

  • Swarms of small satellites set to deliver close to real-time imagery of swathes of the planet.

    • Declan Butler
    News
  • Reforms to commercial and academic research systems still needed despite reaching spending milestone, say scientists.

    • Richard Van Noorden
    News
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News Feature

  • Violent incidents at academic institutions have spurred universities to adopt formal procedures designed to keep campuses safer. But do the tactics work?

    • Brendan Maher
    News Feature
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Comment

  • Practical, interdisciplinary ways of working forged during the Second World War had a lasting impact on a generation of physicists and their findings, says David Kaiser.

    • David Kaiser
    Comment
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Books & Arts

  • David Adam applauds the autobiography of a high-flyer confronting his own nervous suffering head-on.

    • David Adam
    Books & Arts
  • Ben Sheldon relishes a study of the broad-ranging impact of ornithology on modern biology.

    • Ben Sheldon
    Books & Arts
  • Sound artist Daniel Fishkin tries to convey the experience of tinnitus. As the latest incarnation of his installation series Composing the Tinnitus Suites opens in Brooklyn, New York, he talks about building a mechanical model of the inner ear.

    • Jascha Hoffman
    Books & Arts
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Correspondence

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News & Views

  • Wnt signalling molecules are thought to direct the development of an organism by spreading through tissues. But flies grow with almost normal appendages even when their main Wnt protein cannot move. Two scientists discuss the implications of this finding for our understanding of development. See Article p.180

    • Ginés Morata
    • Gary Struhl
    News & Views
  • In flow batteries, energy is produced by passing solutions of 'electroactive' materials — often, metal salts — through an electrochemical cell. A non-metallic electroactive material opens the way to large-scale energy storage. See Letter p.195

    • Grigorii L. Soloveichik
    News & Views
  • Patients differ in their requirement for, and response to, various drug doses. A general platform that allows continuous monitoring of drug levels in the blood of rats may open the door to patient-specific dosing.

    • Richard M. Crooks
    News & Views
  • Superconducting quantum circuits are the core technology behind the most sensitive magnetometers. An analogous device has now been implemented using a gas of ultracold atoms, with possible applications for rotation sensing.

    • Charles A. Sackett
    News & Views
  • Two crystal structures reveal that the Vif and Vpx proteins of human and simian immunodeficiency viruses mediate evasion of host defences by reprogramming the cellular protein-degradation machinery. See Letters p.229 & p.234

    • Michael H. Malim
    News & Views
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Correction

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Article

  • Examination of demographic age trajectories for species from a wide range of taxonomic groups shows that these species have very diverse life-history patterns; mortality and reproduction vary greatly with age for both long- and short-lived species, and the relationships between ageing, mortality and reproduction are clearly complex.

    • Owen R. Jones
    • Alexander Scheuerlein
    • James W. Vaupel
    Article
  • Replacement of the wingless (wg) gene in Drosophila with one that expresses a membrane-tethered form of Wg results in viable flies with normally patterned appendages of nearly the right size; early wg transcription and memory of signalling ensure continued target-gene expression in the absence of Wg release, even though the spread of Wg could boost cell proliferation.

    • Cyrille Alexandre
    • Alberto Baena-Lopez
    • Jean-Paul Vincent
    Article
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Letter

  • Observations of local galaxy I Zw 18 imply that the dust mass in star-forming, metal-poor environments is much lower than expected, and, therefore, that the amount of dust in young galaxies of the early Universe, such as redshift-6.6 galaxy Himiko, is probably a factor of about 100 less than previously thought.

    • David B. Fisher
    • Alberto D. Bolatto
    • Karl Gordon
    Letter
  • High-quality graphene is grown on copper and then transferred to the underlying substrate, typically silicon oxide or quartz, by simply etching away the copper; the graphene is held in place during etching by capillary bridges.

    • Libo Gao
    • Guang-Xin Ni
    • Kian Ping Loh
    Letter
  • Flow batteries, in which the electro-active components are held in fluid form external to the battery itself, are attractive as a potential means for regulating the output of intermittent renewable sources of electricity; an aqueous flow battery based on inexpensive commodity chemicals is now reported that also has the virtue of enabling further improvement of battery performance through organic chemical design.

    • Brian Huskinson
    • Michael P. Marshak
    • Michael J. Aziz
    Letter
  • Drilling by the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program has recovered primitive, modally layered, orthopyroxene-bearing cumulate rocks from the lower plutonic crust formed at a fast-spreading ridge, leading to a better-constrained estimate of the bulk composition of fast-spreading oceanic crust.

    • Kathryn M. Gillis
    • Jonathan E. Snow
    • Robert P. Wintsch
    Letter
  • A comprehensive study into the effects of polymorphisms on gene expression dynamics during a 12-hour development period of Caenorhabditis elegans shows that both cis and trans expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) can increase and decrease gene expression, depending on the time point, and that trans eQTLs can act as modifiers of expression during a given period of development.

    • Mirko Francesconi
    • Ben Lehner
    Letter
  • HMGA2 promotes lung cancer progression in mice and humans; in mouse and human lung cancer cells, HMGA2 competes with mRNAs like TGFBR3 for the let-7 microRNA family, and in human non-small-cell lung cancer tissue, expression levels of HMGA2 and TGFBR3 are correlated, suggesting that HMGA2 functions both as a protein-coding gene and as a non-coding RNA.

    • Madhu S. Kumar
    • Elena Armenteros-Monterroso
    • Julian Downward
    Letter
  • Using long-term intravital photography to explore the cellular changes after compression-induced traumatic brain injury in a murine model, it is shown that parenchymal and meningeal inflammation as well as cell death can be modulated by topical treatment with purinergic receptor antagonists and glutathione.

    • Theodore L. Roth
    • Debasis Nayak
    • Dorian B. McGavern
    Letter
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Corrigendum

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Feature

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Q&A

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Futures

  • A matter of honour.

    • Grace Tang
    Futures
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