Featured
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News & Views |
The dream of electronic newspapers becomes a reality — in 1974
Efforts to develop an electronic newspaper providing information at the touch of a button took a step forward 50 years ago, and airborne bacteria in the London Underground come under scrutiny, in the weekly dip into Nature’s archive.
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News |
US funders to tighten oversight of controversial ‘gain-of-function’ research
New policy on high-risk biology studies aims to address criticism that previous rules were too vague.
- Max Kozlov
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News & Views Forum |
Dad’s gut microbes matter for pregnancy health and baby’s growth
Altering gut bacteria in male mice revealed that microorganisms are needed for normal sperm development and offspring health. Scientists discuss the implications in terms of understanding microbes, male fertility and pregnancy.
- Liisa Veerus
- , Martin J. Blaser
- & Eldin Jašarević
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News |
Chinese virologist who was first to share COVID-19 genome sleeps on street after lab shuts
Zhang Yongzhen shared the genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 with the world, speeding up the development of vaccines.
- Smriti Mallapaty
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News |
Scientists tried to give people COVID — and failed
Researchers deliberately infect participants with SARS-CoV-2 in ‘challenge’ trials — but high levels of immunity complicate efforts to test vaccines and treatments.
- Ewen Callaway
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News |
Controversial virus-hunting scientist skewered at US COVID-origins hearing
Lawmakers interrogated Peter Daszak over his ties to China and whether his organization, EcoHealth Alliance, has been a good steward of taxpayer dollars.
- Mariana Lenharo
- & Lauren Wolf
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Article
| Open AccessPaternal microbiome perturbations impact offspring fitness
Disturbances in the gut microbiota of male mice manifest as fitness defects in their offspring by affecting plancenta function, revealing a paternal gut–germline axis.
- Ayele Argaw-Denboba
- , Thomas S. B. Schmidt
- & Jamie A. Hackett
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News |
Bird flu virus has been spreading among US cows for months, RNA reveals
Genomic analysis suggests that the outbreak probably began in December or January, but a shortage of data is hampering efforts to pin down the source.
- Smriti Mallapaty
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News Explainer |
Bird flu in US cows: is the milk supply safe?
Pasteurized milk is probably not a threat to people, but fresh milk droplets on milking equipment could be spreading the virus in a herd.
- Julian Nowogrodzki
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News |
WHO redefines airborne transmission: what does that mean for future pandemics?
The World Health Organization was criticized for being too slow to classify COVID-19 as airborne. Will the new terminology help next time?
- Bianca Nogrady
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News |
Monkeypox virus: dangerous strain gains ability to spread through sex, new data suggest
A cluster of mpox cases in the Democratic Republic of the Congo sparks worries of a wider outbreak.
- Max Kozlov
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Outlook |
Exploring the lung microbiome’s role in disease
Unusual microbial communities in a person’s lower airways could influence the onset and progression of lung cancer and other conditions, and might point the way to therapies.
- Anthony King
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Spotlight |
Deadly diseases and inflatable suits: how I found my niche in virology research
Virologist Hulda Jónsdóttir studies some of the world’s most pathogenic viruses at the Spiez Laboratory in Switzerland.
- Nikki Forrester
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News & Views |
Bacteria deploy umbrella toxins against their competitors
Bacteria make protein toxins to compete with other bacteria in microbial communities. A study of a common soil bacterium has revealed a previously unknown type of antibacterial toxin that forms a striking umbrella-like structure.
- Sarah J. Coulthurst
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News Feature |
What toilets can reveal about COVID, cancer and other health threats
Wastewater testing grew tremendously during the pandemic. But is it ready to tackle the opioid crisis, air pollution and antibiotic resistance?
- Betsy Ladyzhets
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Article
| Open AccessDNA glycosylases provide antiviral defence in prokaryotes
A screen utilizing an environmental DNA library in Escherichia coli is used to identify Brig1, a previously unknown anti-phage defence system with homologues across distinct clades of bacteria.
- Amer A. Hossain
- , Ying Z. Pigli
- & Luciano A. Marraffini
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Article
| Open AccessStreptomyces umbrella toxin particles block hyphal growth of competing species
Streptomyces are discovered to produce antibacterial protein complexes that selectively inhibit the hyphal growth of related species, a function distinct from that of the small-molecule antibiotics they are known for.
- Qinqin Zhao
- , Savannah Bertolli
- & Joseph D. Mougous
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News |
US COVID-origins hearing puts scientific journals in the hot seat
Politicians spar over whether academic publishers colluded with government scientists to suppress the lab-leak hypothesis.
- Max Kozlov
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News |
Scientists discover first algae that can fix nitrogen — thanks to a tiny cell structure
A newly discovered ‘organelle’ that converts nitrogen gas into a useful form could pave the way for engineered plants that require less fertilizer.
- Carissa Wong
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News & Views |
Blocking cell death limits lung damage and inflammation from influenza
Animals that receive an inhibitor of an antiviral cell-death response called necroptosis are less likely to die of influenza even at a late stage of infection. This has implications for the development of therapies for respiratory diseases.
- Nishma Gupta
- & John Silke
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Article
| Open AccessDistal colonocytes targeted by C. rodentium recruit T-cell help for barrier defence
The murine enteropathogen Citrobacter rodentium targets a specific subset of absorptive intestinal epithelial cells in the mid–distal colon, which stimulate T cells to produce sustained IL-22 signals to mitigate further spread of the pathogen.
- Carlene L. Zindl
- , C. Garrett Wilson
- & Casey T. Weaver
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News Explainer |
Bird flu outbreak in US cows: why scientists are concerned
A virus that has killed hundreds of millions of birds has now infected cattle in six US states, but the threat to humans is currently low.
- Max Kozlov
- & Smriti Mallapaty
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News Feature |
Long COVID still has no cure — so these patients are turning to research
With key long COVID trials yet to yield results, people with the condition are trying to change how clinical trials are done.
- Rachel Fairbank
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News |
Gut bacteria break down cholesterol — hinting at probiotic treatments
Species in the human microbiome have enzymes that can metabolize a potentially dangerous lipid.
- Julian Nowogrodzki
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Technology Feature |
How synthetic biologists are building better biofactories
Artificial electron donors and acceptors expand researchers’ metabolic engineering options — if only cells would cooperate.
- Sara Reardon
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News Feature |
The ‘Mother Tree’ idea is everywhere — but how much of it is real?
A popular theory about how trees cooperate has enchanted the public and raised the profile of forest conservation. But some ecologists think its scientific basis has been oversold.
- Aisling Irwin
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News |
Google AI could soon use a person’s cough to diagnose disease
Machine-learning system trained on millions of human audio clips shows promise for detecting COVID-19 and tuberculosis.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Article
| Open AccessCompensatory evolution in NusG improves fitness of drug-resistant M. tuberculosis
In Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the fitness cost of rifampicin resistance is partially due to excessive RNA polymerase pausing and is rescued by mutations in the pro-pausing transcription factor NusG.
- Kathryn A. Eckartt
- , Madeleine Delbeau
- & Jeremy M. Rock
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News & Views |
Whittling down the bacterial subspecies that might drive colon cancer
Understanding the factors that drive formation of particular types of cancer can aid efforts to develop better diagnostics or treatments. The identification of a bacterial subspecies with a connection to colon cancer has clinical relevance.
- Cynthia L. Sears
- & Jessica Queen
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News |
COVID’s toll on the brain: new clues emerge
A leaky blood–brain barrier and inflammation might account for some of the cognitive symptoms of COVID-19.
- Claudia López Lloreda
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News Feature |
These ‘movies’ of proteins in action are revealing the hidden biology of cells
A burgeoning technique called time-resolved cryo-EM is granting insights into the tiny motors and devices that power life.
- Ewen Callaway
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Article
| Open AccessA distinct Fusobacterium nucleatum clade dominates the colorectal cancer niche
A study reveals that Fusobacterium nucleatum subspecies animalis is bifurcated into two distinct clades, and shows that only one of these dominates the colorectal cancer niche, probably through increased colonization of the human gastrointestinal tract.
- Martha Zepeda-Rivera
- , Samuel S. Minot
- & Christopher D. Johnston
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Article |
Structure and assembly of a bacterial gasdermin pore
Cryo-electron microscopy and molecular dynamics studies of a Vitiosangium gasdermin pore reveal insights into the assembly of this large and diverse family of membrane pore-forming proteins.
- Alex G. Johnson
- , Megan L. Mayer
- & Philip J. Kranzusch
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Article |
A host–microbiota interactome reveals extensive transkingdom connectivity
A new technology for proteome-scale assessment of human exoproteome–microbiome interactions exposes an extensive network of transkingdom connectivity.
- Nicole D. Sonnert
- , Connor E. Rosen
- & Noah W. Palm
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Obituary |
Anthony Epstein (1921–2024), discoverer of virus causing cancer in humans
Pathologist whose finding that viruses can trigger tumours in humans transformed medical research.
- Alan Rickinson
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News & Views |
Mobile delivery of COVID-19 vaccines improved uptake in rural Sierra Leone
A trial that took mobile health services to rural Sierra Leone finds that this initiative increased COVID-19 vaccine uptake. But more must be done to expand the coverage of health services in low-income countries.
- Alison Buttenheim
- & Harsha Thirumurthy
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News & Views |
Epstein–Barr virus at 60
The 1964 discovery of Epstein–Barr virus shed light on factors that contribute to human cancer. Subsequent studies set the stage for finding ways to diagnose and treat cancer, and revealed how immune defences control viral infection.
- Lawrence S. Young
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News |
Massive public-health experiment sends vaccination rates soaring
The rate of vaccination against COVID-19 rose sharply in villages in Sierra Leone where health officials held mobile vaccination clinics.
- Max Kozlov
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Article
| Open AccessAnoxygenic phototroph of the Chloroflexota uses a type I reaction centre
Cultivation of a new anoxygenic phototrophic bacterium from Boreal Shield lake water—representing a transition form in the evolution of photosynthesis—offers insights into how the major modes of phototrophy diversified.
- J. M. Tsuji
- , N. A. Shaw
- & J. D. Neufeld
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Article |
Dopamine receptor D2 confers colonization resistance via microbial metabolites
In a mouse model of enteric pathogen infection, tryptophan metabolites protect against infection via activation of dopamine receptor D2 and regulation of actin cytoskeletal organization in intestinal epithelial cells.
- Samantha A. Scott
- , Jingjing Fu
- & Pamela V. Chang
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Article |
Structures and activation mechanism of the Gabija anti-phage system
Structures of complexes containing GajA and GajB proteins of the prokaryotic Gabija anti-phage defence system reveal the mechanism of its activation after DNA cleavage upon ATP depletion.
- Jing Li
- , Rui Cheng
- & Longfei Wang
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Outlook |
Could the gut give rise to alcohol addiction?
Microorganisms in the gut might make a person more vulnerable to substance-use disorders.
- Tammy Worth
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Article |
The hyphal-specific toxin candidalysin promotes fungal gut commensalism
Both the yeast and hyphal forms of Candida albicans enable colonization of the mammalian gut, with hyphal cells secreting the toxin candidalysin to inihibit bacteria and support fungal commensalism.
- Shen-Huan Liang
- , Shabnam Sircaik
- & Richard J. Bennett
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Article |
The structure and physical properties of a packaged bacteriophage particle
Multiresolution computational simulations generate all-atom models of a complete packaged virus particle.
- Kush Coshic
- , Christopher Maffeo
- & Aleksei Aksimentiev
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News |
Brazil’s record dengue surge: why a vaccine campaign is unlikely to stop it
A vaccine shortage and persistent sanitation problems threaten the success of the world’s first public vaccination campaign against dengue virus.
- Mariana Lenharo
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Article
| Open AccessIncomplete transcripts dominate the Mycobacterium tuberculosis transcriptome
A study reveals that most transcripts in Mycobacterium tuberculosis are incomplete, likely because of the tendency of the transcription machinery in this species to pause on genomic DNA.
- Xiangwu Ju
- , Shuqi Li
- & Shixin Liu
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Correspondence |
Speed up relief for long COVID through grassroots clinical trials
- Marc Jamoulle
- , Elena Louazon
- & Johan Van Weyenbergh
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News |
The surprising link between gut bacteria and devastating eye diseases
Finding raises hopes that antibiotics could treat some genetic diseases that can cause blindness — but also prompts doubts.
- Saima Sidik
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Comment |
Save lives in the next pandemic: ensure vaccine equity now
The proposed Pandemic Agreement must ensure that COVID-19 vaccine nationalism is never repeated; 290 scientists call for action.
- Colin Carlson
- , Daniel Becker
- & Alexandra Phelan
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