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Understanding collective behaviour is an important aspect of managing the pandemic response. Here the authors show in a large global study that participants that reported identifying more strongly with their nation reported greater engagement in public health behaviours and support for public health policies in the context of the pandemic.

Analysis combining multiple global tree databases reveals that whether a location is invaded by non-native tree species depends on anthropogenic factors, but the severity of the invasion depends on the native species diversity.

Andrew Robinson reviews five of the best science picks.

Polygenic scores for body mass index and obesity constructed using data from 5 million people with different ancestries were associated with distinct weight gain trajectories from early childhood to adulthood.

The Southern Ocean seasonal ice zone can be divided into 3 dynamical regimes based on the magnitude and sign of the mean submesoscale vertical heat flux using instrumented seal data.

A revised ‘Doughnut’ providing a visual assessment of trends in social deprivation and planetary degradation over the past two decades shows more than doubling of global GDP accompanied by accelerating ecological overshoot but only a modest reduction in human deprivation.

Here the authors show that MRAP2 tunes the melanocortin-4 receptor by boosting its G-protein signaling while limiting β-arrestin2 interaction and destabilizing receptor oligomers, shaping appetite regulation.

The Perseverance rover detected polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons preserved within sulfates in the fan and floor of Jezero crater on Mars, offering new insights into past habitability and the preservation of organic matter on Mars.

Pressure overload in the heart, such as from aortic stenosis, triggers early molecular changes before visible damage occurs. Here, the authors show that combining proteomics, transcriptomics, and genetic data reveals key drivers of heart failure, highlighting potential targets for treatment.

Multivariate genome-wide association analyses of the latent genetic architecture of frailty identify one general factor of genetic overlap across all frailty deficits and six factors indexing a shared genetic signal across specific groups of deficits.

SCIFER detects clonal selection in whole-genome sequencing data using a population genetics model. Applied to a range of somatic tissues, SCIFER quantifies stem cell dynamics and infers clonal ages and sizes without requiring knowledge of driver events.

Species’ traits and environmental conditions determine the abundance of tree species across the globe. Here, the authors find that dominant tree species are taller and have softer wood compared to rare species and that these trait differences are more strongly associated with temperature than water availability.

Cryogenic electron microscopy structures and functional analyses reveal that NCLX functions as a H⁺/Ca²⁺ rather than a Na⁺/Ca²⁺ exchanger, and uncover its transport mechanism with implications for therapies treating cardiac and neurodegenerative disorders related to abnormal mitochondrial Ca²⁺.

The number of individuals in a given space influences animal interactions and network dynamics. Here the authors identify general rules underlying density dependence in animal networks and reveal some fundamental differences between spatial and social dynamics.

Monkeypox virus genomic data from Nigeria and Cameroon, sampled between 2018 and 2023, indicate that the virus spread through repeated zoonoses in Cameroon, whereas in Nigeria, it spread mainly through human–human transmission, predominantly originating in Rivers State.

Chronic care manages long-term, progressive conditions, while acute care handles short-term ones. Here, authors show chronic conditions account for most of the global health burden, with 68% of DALYs and 93% of YLDs attributed to chronic care needs.

A large genome-wide association study of more than 5 million individuals reveals that 12,111 single-nucleotide polymorphisms account for nearly all the heritability of height attributable to common genetic variants.

Analysis of samples from the asteroid Ryugu provide evidence of late fluid flow in a carbonaceous asteroid, indicating that such bodies may have retained two to three times more water than previously thought.

There’s an emerging body of evidence to show how biological sex impacts cancer incidence, treatment and underlying biology. Here, using a large pan-cancer dataset, the authors further highlight how sex differences shape the cancer genome.

Here, the authors characterize the tempo and mode of lemur speciation with a phylogenomic dataset that also includes lorisiforms. They find that lemurs exhibited multiple bursts of diversification (without subsequent decline in diversification rate) with the highest diversification rates accompanied by high introgression rates.

An analysis of prescription medications shows that several non-antibiotic drugs, such as the heart medication digoxin, can reduce the immune response to pathogens and increase the risk of gastrointestinal infections by altering the composition of the microbiome.

The flagship paper of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes Consortium describes the generation of the integrative analyses of 2,658 cancer whole genomes and their matching normal tissues across 38 tumour types, the structures for international data sharing and standardized analyses, and the main scientific findings from across the consortium studies.

Many tumours exhibit hypoxia (low oxygen) and hypoxic tumours often respond poorly to therapy. Here, the authors quantify hypoxia in 1188 tumours from 27 cancer types, showing elevated hypoxia links to increased mutational load, directing evolutionary trajectories.

With the generation of large pan-cancer whole-exome and whole-genome sequencing projects, a question remains about how comparable these datasets are. Here, using The Cancer Genome Atlas samples analysed as part of the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes project, the authors explore the concordance of mutations called by whole exome sequencing and whole genome sequencing techniques.

Analyses of 2,658 whole genomes across 38 types of cancer identify the contribution of non-coding point mutations and structural variants to driving cancer.

In somatic cells the mechanisms maintaining the chromosome ends are normally inactivated; however, cancer cells can re-activate these pathways to support continuous growth. Here, the authors characterize the telomeric landscapes across tumour types and identify genomic alterations associated with different telomere maintenance mechanisms.

Whole-genome sequencing data from more than 2,500 cancers of 38 tumour types reveal 16 signatures that can be used to classify somatic structural variants, highlighting the diversity of genomic rearrangements in cancer.

A pan-cancer genomic analysis reports the effects of structural variations on chromatin domains (TADs). Most TAD disruptions do not result in appreciable changes in expression of nearby genes.

An analysis of 2,954 genomes from 38 cancer subtypes identified 19,166 retrotransposition events in 35% of samples. Aberrant LINE-1 retrotranspositions can lead to the deletion of tumor-suppressor genes as well as the amplification of oncogenes.

Some cancer patients first present with metastases where the location of the primary is unidentified; these are difficult to treat. In this study, using machine learning, the authors develop a method to determine the tissue of origin of a cancer based on whole sequencing data.

In this study the authors consider the structural variants (SVs) present within cancer cases of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium. They report hundreds of genes, including known cancer-associated genes for which the nearby presence of a SV breakpoint is associated with altered expression.

An analysis of 18 metagenomic datasets of individuals with colorectal cancer, adenomas and healthy controls yields improved cancer prediction accuracy based solely on gut metagenomics, as well as the identification of new species associated with the development of cancer.

Strontium isotope analysis can be applied to animal and plant tissues to help determine their provenance. Here, the authors generate a strontium isoscape of sub-Saharan Africa using data from 2266 environmental samples and demonstrate its efficacy by tracing the African roots of individuals from historic slavery contexts.

Analysis of soundscape data from 139 globally distributed sites reveals that sounds of biological origin exhibit predictable rhythms depending on location and season, whereas sounds of anthropogenic origin are less predictable. Comparisons between paired urban–rural sites show that urban green spaces are noisier and dominated by sounds of technological origin.

The RNA editing enzyme ADAR1 blocks interferon responses triggered by cytosolic RNA sensors, and has been proposed as a potential target in immuno-oncology. Here, the authors report that BRCA1/2 and ADAR1 are synthetic lethal, showing that ADAR1 depletion in BRCA1-mutant cells causes autocrine interferon poisoning

Understanding deregulation of biological pathways in cancer can provide insight into disease etiology and potential therapies. Here, as part of the PanCancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) consortium, the authors present pathway and network analysis of 2583 whole cancer genomes from 27 tumour types.

Integrative analyses of transcriptome and whole-genome sequencing data for 1,188 tumours across 27 types of cancer are used to provide a comprehensive catalogue of RNA-level alterations in cancer.

Viral pathogen load in cancer genomes is estimated through analysis of sequencing data from 2,656 tumors across 35 cancer types using multiple pathogen-detection pipelines, identifying viruses in 382 genomic and 68 transcriptome datasets.

Analysis of cancer genome sequencing data has enabled the discovery of driver mutations. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium the authors present DriverPower, a software package that identifies coding and non-coding driver mutations within cancer whole genomes via consideration of mutational burden and functional impact evidence.

Whole-genome sequencing data for 2,778 cancer samples from 2,658 unique donors across 38 cancer types is used to reconstruct the evolutionary history of cancer, revealing that driver mutations can precede diagnosis by several years to decades.