Volume 507 Issue 7492, 20 March 2014

The success of the $1,000 genome programme offers lessons for fostering innovation.

The recent Nature PastCast series is instructive as well as entertaining.

A mild-mannered man’s fiery resignation leaves a troubling vacancy at the world’s largest office for investigating scientific fraud, says Colin Macilwain.

The week in science: GM crop contamination; Swiss grants crisis; and Asian carp invasions.

Images of the infant Universe reveal evidence for rapid inflation after the Big Bang.

Papers describing acid-bath technique under more scrutiny after institute’s investigation finds errors in methodology.

Former Purdue University president France Córdova inherits an agency at a crossroads.

US–Mexico agreement paves the way for a rare environmental test.

Mental-health division will no longer fund research aiming to relieve symptoms without probing underlying causes.

Deep brain stimulation has shown promise in treating conditions such as Parkinson's disease. Now scientists are using the technology to eavesdrop on problem neural circuits.

With a unique programme, the US government has managed to drive the cost of genome sequencing down towards a much-anticipated target.

Brian D. Wright and colleagues present data challenging the assumption that corporate-funded academic research is less accessible and useful to others.

Low-carbon technologies are getting better and cheaper each year, but continued public-policy support is needed to sustain progress, says Jessika E. Trancik.

Richard G. Roberts is intrigued by the idea that early humans gained an edge by 'hunting' for lakes and rivers.

Daniel Cressey views the British Library's first science exhibition — a celebration of scientific illustration.

Electrons in Earth's magnetic field often exhibit a striped pattern of intensity as a function of electron energy and altitude. A model that factors in some unexpectedly important effects can now explain this feature. See Letter p.338

Genetic variation in a non-protein-coding region of the gene FTO is implicated in obesity. A study finds evidence that, rather than affecting FTO itself, variations in this region influence expression of a distant gene, IRX3. See Letter p.371

The first implementation of a fully photonics-based coherent radar system shows how photonic methods for radio-frequency signal generation and measurement may facilitate the development of software-defined radar systems. See Letter p.341

During the cell-death program known as apoptosis, cells break up into membrane-bound fragments. It emerges that this process is controlled by the protein pannexin 1 and can be deregulated by an antibiotic. See Article p.329

The identification of specialized endothelial-cell populations in the blood vessels of bones, and their signalling pathways, reveals how the vasculature contributes to bone formation. See Article p.323 & Letter p.376

This paper reports integrative molecular analyses of urothelial bladder carcinoma at the DNA, RNA, and protein levels performed as part of The Cancer Genome Atlas project; recurrent mutations were found in 32 genes, including those involved in cell-cycle regulation, chromatin regulation and kinase signalling pathways; chromatin regulatory genes were more frequently mutated in urothelial carcinoma than in any other common cancer studied so far.

Bone homeostasis and repair declines with ageing and the mechanisms regulating the relationship between bone growth and blood vessel formation have remained unknown; this mouse study identifies the endothelial cells that promote the formation of new bone, a small microvessel subtype that can be identified by high CD31 and high Emcn expression.

The pannexin 1 channel on the plasma membrane of apoptotic cells mediates the release of find-me molecular signals to attract phagocytic cells for clearance of the apoptotic cells; here the quinolone antibiotic trovafloxacin is identified as a direct inhibitor of pannexin 1, which results in dysregulated fragmentation of apoptotic cells and may partly explain quinolone toxicity.

At the lowest galactic mass scales, evidence of a merger between two galaxies is provided by the kinematic detection of a stellar stream — indicative of an accretion event — in the dwarf spheroidal galaxy Andromeda II, one of the satellite galaxies of Andromeda.

The distributions of energetic electrons across the entire spatial extent of Earth’s inner radiation belt are found to be organized in regular, highly structured and unexpected ‘zebra stripes’, produced by Earth’s rotation.

The next generation of radar systems must be photonic to obtain frequency flexibility and improved performance; here both generation and detection of radio signals are demonstrated in a successful field trial of a photonic-based radar system using aeroplanes.

Sulphide oxidation coupled to carbonate dissolution can provide a transient source of carbon dioxide to Earth’s atmosphere and so balance the Cenozoic increase in carbon dioxide consumption by silicate weathering, reconciling this increase with the need for mass balance in the long-term carbon cycle.

Sampling of extant and fossil amniotes reveals that the diversity of melanosome morphologies increased sharply around the time of the origin of pinnate feathers in maniraptoran dinosaurs (the lineage leading to birds) and independently in mammals; lizard, turtle and crocodilian skin as well as archosaur filamentous body covering shows a limited diversity of melanosome forms, a pattern consistent with convergent changes in the melanocortin system of endothermic animals.

In the modern human genome, elevated Neanderthal ancestry is found at genes affecting keratin filaments, suggesting that gene flow with Neanderthals helped modern humans to adapt to non-African environments; deficiencies of Neanderthal ancestry are also found, particularly on the X chromosome and in genes expressed highly in testes, suggesting that some Neanderthal mutations were not tolerated on a modern human genetic background as they reduced male fertility.

Using a combination of viral-tracing and in vivo imaging techniques, the authors show that there are several parallel pathways in the mouse visual system and that directional and orientation selectivity in the cortex may arise from the specialized tuning of retinal circuits.

Long-term in vivo imaging of Confetti-labelled Lgr5-expressing intestinal stem cells shows that a dynamically heterogeneous cell population is able to function long-term as an equipotent stem-cell pool.

B cells can secrete IL-35 upon activation, and subsequently contribute negatively to the regulation of immunity, such as T-cell-mediated autoimmunity or anti-microbial immunity, and a characterization of these cells raises new questions about possible independent roles for IL-10- and IL-35-expressing plasma cells as regulatory cells.

Obesity-associated noncoding sequences within FTO are functionally connected with IRX3, and long-range enhancers in this region recapitulate aspects of IRX3 expression, suggesting that the obesity-associated interval is part of IRX3 regulation; Irx3-deficient mice have lower body weight and are resistant to diet-induced obesity, suggesting IRX3 as a novel determinant of body mass and composition.

Blood vessel growth in bone is revealed to require Notch signalling and involve a specialized form of angiogenesis that does not involve endothelial sprouts.

The transcription start sites used during the maternal to zygotic transition in zebrafish are mapped, revealing that the transition is characterized by a switch between two different sequence signs to guide transcription initiation, which often co-exist in core promoters.

Mistakes are part of science. But setting the record straight promptly and clearly can help to avoid a career blot.

Graduate students face myriad financial challenges — some more obvious than others, says Susie Crowe.

Paradise revamped.