Volume 604 Issue 7907, 28 April 2022

The subject has a history in heavy industry and fossil fuels, but teachers should focus on sustainability and climate science.

Flexible approaches used to accelerate COVID-19 vaccines deserve wider uptake.

Genetic modification equips microbes to make precursor molecules for a nylon-like polymer with a smaller carbon footprint.

Atmospheric rivers prompt massive formations to ‘calve’ chunks of ice.

The engineered material takes inspiration from the way plants grow.

Ultra-chilled lithium atoms create an exotic state of matter that can be coaxed into a moving ring.

Snacks of skewered grapes are damaging the metabolism of vulnerable reptiles in the Bahamas.

Sugar-wafer-like layering could be key to how this antacid fights gastric discomforts.

Fragments from Guatemalan pyramid ruins suggest the system was already in use more than 2,200 years ago.

The latest science news, in brief.

In South Africa, a network of researchers is studying whether lineages BA.4 and BA.5 escape immunity from COVID-19 vaccines and previous infections.

Influential panel’s recommendation makes the ice giant a likely destination for a flagship space mission.

Oxitec reports that its insects behaved as planned — but a larger trial is needed to learn whether they can reduce wild mosquito populations.

Largest-ever study uncovers patterns of mutations that might pinpoint cancer’s causes.

Model suggests that a shift in weather patterns in southern Africa might have contributed to the rise of Homo sapiens.

Scientists cheer for the defeat of far-right candidate Marine Le Pen, but say President Emmanuel Macron’s plans for research are vague.

Hundreds of white-tailed deer in North America have tested positive for SARS-CoV-2. Here’s why scientists aren’t panicking, yet.

Data on disease were mined from the grisly records of the transatlantic trade in people.

The origins, politics and motivations of the people who sequence age-old genomes.

Andrew Robinson reviews five of the week’s best science picks.

Governments, donors and others must step up to protect current and future generations from the devastating effects of malnutrition, as well as to prevent acute food insecurity.

Principal investigators change institutions, take sabbaticals, retire and sometimes depart academia altogether — leaving their PhD students and postdocs to wonder what’s next.

Plant scientists are turning to genome-editing techniques to precisely tailor the productivity and consumer appeal of important crops.

Geographer Gregor Luetzenburg uses the latest iPhone’s LiDAR scanner to create 3D models of cliff surfaces.

A robotic jumper combines inspiration from biology with clever engineering to reach new heights. Crucial to the design is the combination of a rotary motor with a hybrid spring that maximizes stored energy density.

The inner workings of a family of proteins, known as adhesion G-protein-coupled receptors, have finally been visualized at high resolution — revealing the structural basis of their self-activation mechanism.

Birds and their dinosaur ancestors had feathers, and now it seems that a distantly related group called pterosaurs had them, too. The finding extends the origins of feathers back to long before birds evolved, and sheds light on their role.

Waste streams of the plastic poly(ethylene terephthalate) that can be recycled into material suitable for food packaging are limited, creating a shortfall of feedstocks. An enzyme has been discovered that widens the feedstock options.

Imaging before and after infection by the SARS-CoV-2 virus reveals substantial changes in the brain after infection. The work sets an example for the high standards required in large longitudinal neuroimaging studies.

A findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable (FAIR) data infrastructure is discussed to turn the large amount of research data generated by the field of materials science into knowledge and value.

Dynamical simulations of the early Solar System show that the giant planets’ instability was triggered by the dispersal of the Sun’s gaseous disk, constrained by astronomical observations to be a few to ten million years after the birth of the Solar System.

A study combining spectroscopy and mathematical topology  reports the observation of linked node loops in a quantum magnet, with properties suggesting a Seifert bulk–boundary correspondence.

A Josephson diode is made by fabricating an inversion symmetry breaking van der Waals heterostructure of NbSe₂/Nb₃Br₈/NbSe₂, demonstrating that even without a magnetic field, the junction can be superconducting with a positive current but resistive with a negative current.

A comparison of the energetics of jumping between biological and engineered systems shows that engineered systems can greatly increase energy limits using the process of work multiplication, and this analysis leads to the demonstration of a 30-centimetre device jumping over 30 metres.

Untreated, postconsumer-PET from 51 different thermoformed products can all be almost completely degraded by FAST-PETase in 1 week and PET can be resynthesized from the recovered monomers, demonstrating recycling at the industrial scale.

A forward-synthesis platform, Allchemy, computationally determines how to ‘close the circle’, or use waste chemicals to make valuable pharmaceutical or agrochemical products, ranking possible routes by environmental, geospatial, and other factors.

A study demonstrates that nitrous oxide can act as the source of O in a catalytic conversion of aryl halides to phenols, releasing N₂ as by-product.

Melanosomes preserved in the skin and feathers of a tapejarid pterosaur from the Early Cretaceous found in Brazil provide evidence of the early use of feathers for visual communication.

A comprehensive analysis of brain somatic mosaicism across the neocortex demonstrates the origins and distribution patterns of cells within the human brain.

After infection with SARS-CoV-2, individuals show a greater reduction in grey matter thickness and tissue contrast in the orbitofrontal cortex and parahippocampal gyrus; greater changes in markers of tissue damage in regions that are functionally connected to the primary olfactory cortex; and a greater reduction in global brain size.

During combined looking and reaching movements, neurons in the reach region of the brain can inhibit those in the saccade region to improve coordination.

Analyses of single-cell whole-genome sequencing data show that somatic mutations are increased in the brain of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease compared to neurotypical individuals, with a pattern of genomic damage distinct from that of normal ageing.

A large-scale single-cell transcriptomic atlas of the non-human primate Macaca fascicularis encompasses over 1 million cells from 45 adult tissues.

A study in which gut microbiomes of 8,208 individuals from 2,756 families were characterized and correlated to 241 host and environmental factors defines microbiome patterns shared across diverse diseases and shows that the microbiome is shaped largely by environment and cohabitation.

Single-cell profiling and fate-mapping experiments in the developing brain of mice and humans show that microglia and meningeal macrophages originate from a common prenatal precursor, but that perivascular macrophages are derived postnatally from meningeal macrophages.

Genome-scale CRISPR–Cas9-based synthetic lethality screens identify PKMYT1 as a potential therapeutic target in tumours with CCNE1 amplification.

Cryo-electron microscopy structures of GPR56 and latrophilin 3 show how the released tethered agonist peptide interacts with the transmembrane domain, suggesting a model for the activation mechanism of adhesion G-protein-coupled receptors.

Adhesion GPCRs involved in cell and matrix interactions signal through a distinct self-cleavage, self-activation mechanism.

Cryo-electron microscopy structures of three adhesion G protein-coupled receptors (aGPCRs) complexes provide insight into the tethered activation mechanism of aGPCRs and show the potential for rational design of agonists.

Cryo-electron microscopy structures of the adhesion G protein-coupled receptors ADGRD1 and ADGRF1 provide insight into how these receptors are activated in an intrinsic manner through a ‘stalk’ region that acts as a tethered agonist.