Volume 557 Issue 7707, 31 May 2018

Japan needs to demonstrate that a promising therapy for damaged hearts works as claimed.

A lie-detection system being used by Spanish police highlights concerns about algorithms.

Instead of arguing about whether results hold up, let’s push to provide enough information for others to repeat the experiments, says Philip Stark.

A material with both liquid and crystalline properties could yield better electronics.

A viral family tree shows the pathogen reached Central America surprisingly early.

Scouts opt to save on travel time rather than distance.

Solvent nanodroplets allow safe removal of old adhesive.

Forests perished after an asteroid strike wrought devastation worldwide.

Effort to measure the Milky Way’s disk yields a surprise.

Surprisingly few people express gratitude for small favours.

Higher global temperatures are forecast to change photosynthesis in waterways.

A subset of neurons helped two species to evolve distinct courting trills.

The week in science: 25–31 May 2018.

The latest clinical use of induced pluripotent stem cells excites researchers, but some fear the therapy will be rushed to market.

The ubiquitous particles are helping to map the innards of pyramids and volcanoes, and spot missing nuclear waste.

Diversity advocates seek strategies to correct alarming decrease.

Start-up firm NET Power is developing a new approach to capturing and storing carbon.

A federal court decision has left universities and companies working to preserve intellectual property rights worth billions.

Several projects are testing the idea of doling out funds that people can use however they want.

Theodore Hodapp and Erika Brown explain how the American Physical Society is helping to recruit and retain PhD students from under-represented minorities.

Alison Abbott considers a persuasive case for the link between body and mind.

Richard Rhodes finds resonance with today’s uneasy age.

Barbara Kiser reviews five of the week's best science picks.

Physicist who revolutionized data storage with work on magnetism in nanomaterials.

It is now easier than ever to interrogate vast realms of mapping information for your research.

Some disciplines need to implement reforms if parity is to be achieved.

Online petition seeks fresh standards for professional conduct.

A complex that includes the protein HP1 binds to specific regulatory DNA sequences to promote local compaction of genomic regions and inhibit associated genes that drive differentiation of specific cell lineages.

The microscopic behaviour of molecules can be difficult to model using ordinary computers because it is governed by quantum physics. A photonic chip provides a versatile platform for simulating such behaviour.

Metabolite molecules produced by the gut’s microbes activate immune cells in the brain called microglia, which signal to astrocyte cells to mediate responses to inflammation in the central nervous system.

Structural analysis reveals how a bacterial enzyme catalyses attachment of the protein tag ubiquitin to host proteins, illuminating a process that allows pathogenic bacteria to subvert host-cell function.

Long-sought evidence has been found of magnetism at the edges of graphene, a two-dimensional form of carbon. The findings might enable the development of the logic gates needed for quantum computers.

A redesigned yeast genome is being constructed to allow it to be extensively rearranged on demand. A suite of studies reveals the versatility of the genome-shuffling system, and shows how it could be used for biotechnology applications.

In 1968, a defect in DNA repair was found to underlie a disorder that makes people extremely sensitive to sunlight. This finding continues to influence research into the origins, diagnosis and treatment of cancer.

Analysis of 2002–2016 GRACE satellite observations of terrestrial water storage reveals substantial changes in freshwater resources globally, which are driven by natural and anthropogenic climate variability and human activities.

By mapping vibrations in molecules to photons in waveguides, the vibrational quantum dynamics of various molecules are simulated using a photonic chip.

Excitatory input onto inhibitory interneurons in the developing mouse cortex acts through PTEN to protect interneurons from cell death and thus regulate the balance between excitation and inhibition.

Crystal structures of the Legionella effector SdeA in a ligand-free state and in complex with ubiquitin and NADH provide insight into SdeA-mediated phosphoribosyl-linked ubiquitination.

ZNFX-1 and WAGO-4 localize to germ granules in early Caenorhabditis elegans embryogenesis and later separate to form independent liquid-like droplets, and the temporal and spatial ordering of these droplets may help cells to organize complex RNA processing pathways.

Calculations show that if some dark-matter particles—less than one per cent—have a tiny charge, their coupling to baryons could cool the baryons enough to explain puzzling astrophysical observations.

The rate of carbon burning—¹²C + ¹²C fusion—in stars is boosted by resonant behaviour at astrophysical energies.

By functionalizing molecular graphene nanoribbons with stable spin-bearing nitronyl nitroxide radical groups, delocalized magnetic edge states are observed, with microsecond-scale spin coherence times.

In metal–semiconductor junctions, interfacial bonding and disorder cause deviations from theoretical predictions for the energy barrier, but delicately transferring pre-fabricated metal films onto two-dimensional semiconductors can overcome this challenge.

A sodium ion hydrated with three (rather than one, two, four or five) water molecules diffuses orders of magnitude more quickly than the other ion hydrates owing to the interfacial symmetry mismatch.

Computed tomography scanning of the Triassic fossil Megachirella wachtleri combined with a broad morphological and molecular phylogenetic analysis of reptile relationships confirm it as the most primitive stem squamate.

A long-term biodiversity manipulation experiment using plant communities on thirty Swedish lake islands reveals the importance of environmental context for determining the consequences of species loss at the ecosystem level.

Muscle stem cell quiescence in mice is maintained by a Notch–Collagen V–CALCR signalling pathway that is activated and sustained in a cell-autonomous fashion.

Analyses of antibody dynamics and subclinical infections show that across the population, variability in the infection strength of dengue viruses results in large-scale temporal changes in infection and disease risk that correlate poorly with age.

TGFα and VEGF-B produced by microglia regulate astrocyte function in the experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis model of multiple sclerosis.

Crystal structures of the Legionella effectors SdeA and SdeD uncover the mechanism of a unique phosphoribosyl-ubiquitination reaction.

Structural and functional investigations demonstrate how bacterial enzymes ubiquitinate host proteins.

ADNP interacts with the chromatin remodeller CHD4 and the heterochromatin protein HP1 to form a complex termed ChAHP that represses gene expression independently of the histone H3K9me3 modification.