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Polygenic risk scores can help identify individuals at higher risk of type 2 diabetes. Here, the authors characterise a multi-ancestry score across nearly 900,000 people, showing that its predictive value depends on demographic and clinical context and extends to related traits and complications.

Massive tabular icebergs broke off of the UK during the last ice age. The widespread break-up of the ice shelves which produced these giant icebergs can be traced to around 18,000 years ago, and likely enhanced rates of ice retreat across the North Sea.

Antarctic supraglacial lakes (SGLs) have been linked to ice-shelf collapse and the subsequent acceleration of inland ice flow, but observations of SGLs remain relatively scarce and their interannual variability is largely unknown. This new study shows that lake area and volume vary substantially from year-to-year around the East Antarctic Ice Sheet and between ice shelves.

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.

A new phylogenomic tree for butterflies is constructed using 391 genes from 2,300 species, representing 92% of genera. It suggests that butterflies originated around 100 million years ago in what is now the Americas and originally fed on Fabaceae.

Computational methods are becoming an increasingly important part of biological research. Using the Rosetta framework as an example, the authors demonstrate how community-driven development of computational methods can be done in a reproducible and reliable fashion.

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.

Combined single-molecule spectroscopy, hydrogen–deuterium exchange and molecular dynamics approaches reveal that agonist activation of metabotropic glutamate receptors entails population of several intermediary states before G protein coupling.

Genomic evidence reveals that Mycobacterium ulcerans recovered from Aedes notoscriptus mosquitoes are genetically identical to bacteria from possums and humans, implicating mosquitoes as a vector for Buruli’s ulcer transmission in southeastern Australia.

The atomic nucleus can adopt a variety of shapes, and instances where a single nucleus exhibits multiple shape profiles are termed shape coexistence. Here, using a combined experimental and theoretical analysis, the authors claim a rare case of shape coexistence between two states with the same spin/parity quantum numbers in the neutron-rich isotope ⁷⁰Co.

Wastewater surveillance could provide a means of monitoring SARS-CoV-2 prevalence that does not rely on testing individuals. Here, the authors report results from England’s national wastewater surveillance program, use it to estimate prevalence, and compare estimates with those from population-based prevalence surveys.

A vesicle trafficking Rab11 effector switch is important for ciliogenesis. Here, the authors report a ciliopathy-related disorder caused by variants in WDR44, a Rab11 effector. WDR44 variants show higher affinity for Rab11 and can impair ciliogenesis.

Aspergillus fungi classified within the section Flavi include harmful and beneficial species. Here, Kjærbølling et al. analyse the genomes of 23 Flavi species, showing high genetic diversity and potential for synthesis of over 13,700 CAZymes and 1600 secondary metabolites.

Analysis of two-million-year-old ancient environmental DNA from the Kap København Formation in North Greenland shows there was an open boreal forest with diverse plant and animal species, of which several taxa have not previously been detected at the site, representing an ecosystem that has no present-day analogue.

Blood pressure (BP) is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease and more than 200 genetic loci associated with BP are known. Here, the authors perform discovery GWAS for BP in East Asians and meta-analysis in East Asians and Europeans and report ancestry-specific BP SNPs and selection signals.

Data from over 700,000 individuals reveal the identity of 83 sequence variants that affect human height, implicating new candidate genes and pathways as being involved in growth.

By comparing neural responses to diverse visual stimuli measured with a standardized two-photon imaging pipeline, the authors reveal response specializations within the mouse visual cortex.

Sparse labelling and whole-brain imaging are used to reconstruct and classify brain-wide complete morphologies of 1,741 individual neurons in the mouse brain, revealing a dependence on both brain region and transcriptomic profile.

Exome-wide analysis identifies rare and low-frequency coding variants associated with body mass index. Gene-based meta-analysis and functional studies implicate 13 genes, eight of which are novel, and neuronal pathways as factors in human obesity.

Muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC) is a potentially lethal disease. Here the authors characterize diverse genetic alterations in MIBC that convergently lead to constitutive activation of PPARgamma/RXRalpha and result in immunosurveillance escape by inhibiting CD8+ T-cell recruitment.

A randomized trial in patients hospitalized with COVID-19 showed no benefit and potentially increased harm associated with the use of convalescent plasma, with subgroup analyses suggesting that the antibody profile in donor plasma is critical in determining clinical outcomes.

Over 170 susceptibility loci have been identified by genome-wide association studies in breast cancer. Here, the authors interrogated the role of risk-associated variants from non-breast tissue, and using expression quantitative trait loci, identify potential target genes of known breast cancer susceptibility variants, as well as 11 regions not previously known to be associated with breast cancer risk.

Several nickel-rich and helium-rich lava samples from ocean islands and large igneous provinces suggest that mantle plume material formed by core–mantle interaction during the crystallization of a melt-rich layer or basal magma ocean.

The largest meta-analysis of GWASs of hepcidin and sTfR identified 43 genomic loci, of which 15 new. Mendelian randomisation revealed associations of systemic iron status and iron-related loci with selected health outcomes across multiple domains.

As phase 1 of the Earth Microbiome Project, analysis of 16S ribosomal RNA sequences from more than 27,000 environmental samples delivers a global picture of the basic structure and drivers of microbial distribution.

Verification efforts of density-functional theory (DFT) calculations are of crucial importance to evaluate the reliability of simulation results. In this Expert Recommendation, we suggest metrics for DFT verification, illustrating them with an all-electron reference dataset of 960 equations of state covering the whole periodic table (hydrogen to curium) and discuss the importance of improving pseudopotential codes.

Müller et al. provide a comprehensive resource depicting cellular substrates, localization and interacting partners of RhoGEF and RhoGAP proteins regulating the canonical Rho family of GTPases.

Genetic analysis of breakthrough infections in people vaccinated against HIV-1 show that vaccine efficacy increased by up to 80% against viruses carrying two mutations in Env V2, but also raises the possibility of population-level adaptation to the vaccine.

The development of therapeutic approaches that target BRCA-mutant tumours has led to the possibility of expanding the range of patients who may benefit from such strategies. Tumours with 'BRCAness', a similar phenotype to germline BRCA-mutant tumours, are increasingly being identified, and this Opinion article discusses the advances and challenges in this context.