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The role of opioids in the neural systems of maladaptive behavioral suppression is unclear. Here, authors identify a thalamoaccumbal brain circuit that is required for the suppression of reward seeking and is rapidly disengaged by opioids leading to unrestricted behavioral actions.

How molecular crowding affects membrane protein diffusion and function is not known. Here the authors measure diffusion of variant surface glycoprotein on trypanosomes and discover a molecular crowding threshold that limits diffusion, and find that N-linked glycans help to prevent retarding intermolecular interactions.

Together with an accompanying paper presenting a transcriptomic atlas of the mouse lemur, interrogation of the atlas provides a rich body of data to support the use of the organism as a model for primate biology and health.

This overview of the ENCODE project outlines the data accumulated so far, revealing that 80% of the human genome now has at least one biochemical function assigned to it; the newly identified functional elements should aid the interpretation of results of genome-wide association studies, as many correspond to sites of association with human disease.

The authors combine fire–vegetation models, a chemical transport model and a health risk model to link human mortality from fire emissions to climate change. They estimate that 12.8% of mortalities in 2010 were linked to climate change, with South America, Australia, Europe and boreal forests most impacted.

The goals, resources and design of the NHLBI Trans-Omics for Precision Medicine (TOPMed) programme are described, and analyses of rare variants detected in the first 53,831 samples provide insights into mutational processes and recent human evolutionary history.

Roger Milne and colleagues conduct a genome-wide association study for estrogen receptor (ER)-negative breast cancer combined with BRCA1 mutation carriers in a large cohort. They identify ten new risk variants and find high genetic correlation between breast cancer risk for BRCA1 mutation carriers and risk of ER-negative breast cancer in the general population.

Association analysis identifies 65 new breast cancer risk loci, predicts target genes for known risk loci and demonstrates a strong overlap with somatic driver genes in breast tumours.

Genome-wide association analyses identify risk loci for spontaneous coronary artery dissection and implicate arterial integrity and tissue-mediated coagulation in the disease etiology. Several risk variants show opposite effects on coronary artery disease risk.

Nutrients important for plants were more abundant and evenly distributed in the Cretaceous period, probably due to the presence of large herbivorous dinosaurs, than in the Pennsylvanian subperiod, which had no tetrapod herbivores.

Activation of ESCRT prevents potentially lethal outcomes of minor perturbations in lysosomal integrity. Here authors show that Ca2 + -activated scrambling of sphingomyelin and its cytosolic turnover drives lysosomal repair independently of ESCRT.

Variant detection in problematic genes is facilitated with a curated benchmark.

1000 Genomes imputation can increase the power of genome-wide association studies to detect genetic variants associated with human traits and diseases. Here, the authors develop a method to integrate and analyse low-coverage sequence data and SNP array data, and show that it improves imputation performance.

An integrative genomic analysis of several hundred endometrial carcinomas shows that a minority of tumour samples carry copy number alterations or TP53 mutations and many contain key cancer-related gene mutations, such as those involved in canonical pathways and chromatin remodelling; a reclassification of endometrial tumours into four distinct types is proposed, which may have an effect on patient treatment regimes.

This paper describes molecular subtypes of cervical cancers, including squamous cell carcinoma and adenocarcinoma clusters defined by HPV status and molecular features, and distinct molecular pathways that are activated in cervical carcinomas caused by different somatic alterations and HPV types.

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.

A global dataset of the satellite-tracked movements of pelagic sharks and fishing fleets show that sharks—and, in particular, commercially important species—have limited spatial refuge from fishing effort.

Sekar Kathiresan et al. report genome-wide association studies for polygenic dyslipidemia. From a meta-analysis of seven genome-wide association studies and follow-up in five replication studies, they identify 11 new genetic associations for LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol and triglycerides.

Previous studies identified an association between the 2q35 locus and breast cancer. Here, the authors show that a SNP at 2q35, rs4442975, is associated with oestrogen receptor positive disease and suggest that this effect is mediated through the downregulation of a known breast cancer gene, IGFBP5.

Schmid and colleagues show that pancreatic cancer cell colonization of the liver is accompanied by low-grade tissue injury and efferocytosis, which promotes reprogramming of macrophages and upregulation of arginase.

A reactive astrocyte subtype termed A1 is induced after injury or disease of the central nervous system and subsequently promotes the death of neurons and oligodendrocytes.

Numerous genetic variants, including those located in the non-coding regions of the genome, are known to be associated with blood cells traits. Here, Frontini and colleagues investigate their potential regulatory functions using epigenomic data and promoter long-range interactions.

From 1980 to 2018, the levels of total and non-high-density lipoprotein cholesterol increased in low- and middle-income countries, especially in east and southeast Asia, and decreased in high-income western countries, especially those in northwestern Europe, and in central and eastern Europe.

A combination of genome-scale CRISPR-Cas9 screening and focused small-molecule sensitivity profiling enables the discovery of therapeutically targetable tumor dependencies in rare tumors.

The transition between conducting and non-conducting states of K⁺ channels has been explained by conformational changes at the intracellular entrance to the conduction pathway. Here authors demonstrate that control over K⁺ currents in Kir channels is not explained by the canonical pore-gating model, as conduction is not impaired by a constricted inner helix bundle.

Many heritage sites are threatened by rising sea levels under climate change as they lie within the coastal zone. A continental assessment of exposure of 284 African heritage sites shows that 20% of sites are currently at risk, which more than triples under moderate and high emission scenarios.

Genome-wide analysis identifies 32 loci associated with breast cancer susceptibility, accounting for estrogen receptor, progesterone receptor and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 status and tumor grade.

Genetic and phenotypic analysis reveals expression quantitative trait loci in human induced pluripotent stem cell lines associated with cancer and disease.

Christopher Haiman and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for estrogen receptor (ER)-negative breast cancer in women of African and European ancestry. They identify a variant at the TERT-CLPTM1L locus on 5p15 as associated with ER-negative and triple-negative breast cancer. This locus also harbors multiple variants associated with a range of other cancers.

de Vries, Conomos, Singh and Nicholson et al. identify two additional loci associated with coronary artery calcification (ARSE and MMP16) via a genome-wide association study in 22,400 participants from multiple ancestral groups and prove that ARSE is a mediator of vascular smooth muscle cell calcification and phenotype switching.

Endometrial cancer is the most common invasive gynaecological cancer in developed countries. Here a meta-analysis identifies an additional nine novel endometrial cancer risk loci and eQTL analysis reveals risk variants associate with reduced expression of negative regulators of oncogenic signal transduction proteins.

Previous work has identified several genes where mutations lead to breast cancer, but other genetic and environmental factors must still be accounted for. A large study of genetic association with breast cancer points to four novel genes and many more genetic markers that should be pursued for their link to cancer susceptibility.

Genotype and exome sequencing of 150,000 participants and whole-genome sequencing of 9,950 selected individuals recruited into the Mexico City Prospective Study constitute a valuable, publicly available resource of non-European sequencing data.

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) shows a striking bias towards higher prevalence in females. Here, the authors perform fine-mapping of an SLE-associated locus at Xp21.2 and characterise a candidate gene, CXorf21, as IFN-responsive in immune cells that shows sexually dimorphic expression.

Exploiting both pulsed resonant excitation and a large Purcell enhancement, a single quantum dot coupled to a photonic crystal nanostructure can deterministically produce highly indistinguishable single photons for on-chip quantum optical applications.

Cancers often harbor mutations in genes encoding important regulatory proteins, but therapeutic targeting of these molecules proves difficult due to their high structural similarity to their non-mutated counterpart. Here authors show the engineering of T cell engaging bispecific protein able to selectively target cancer cells with a high-frequency mutation in the KRAS oncogene.

Serological analysis and infection outcomes of participants in the multi-center, prospectively enrolled OCTAVE cohort, comprising 2,686 participants with immune-suppressive diseases who recieved two COVID-19 vaccines, reveals specific clinical phenotypes that might benefit from specific COVID-19 therapeutic strategies.

Mammary morphogenesis is a complex process. Here the authors describe how stem cells build a three-dimensional self-organizing multi-lineage tissue by showing that positional signals from the extracellular matrix through the collagen receptor DDR1 lead stem cells to differentiate into multi-lineage committed multi-layered progeny.

Physical realizations of qubits are often vulnerable to leakage errors, where the system ends up outside the basis used to store quantum information. A leakage removal protocol can suppress the impact of leakage on quantum error-correcting codes.

Systemic dissection of sexually dimorphic phenotypes in mice is lacking. Here, Karp and the International Mouse Phenotype Consortium show that approximately 10% of qualitative traits and 56% of quantitative traits in mice as measured in laboratory setting are sexually dimorphic.

A comparison of electron scattering from the mirror nuclei hydrogen-3 and helium-3 reveals that proton–proton pairs have a much larger contribution to short-range correlations in helium-3 than in heavier nuclei, implying an unexpected nuclear structure.

The Structural Variation Analysis Group of The 1000 Genomes Project reports an integrated structural variation map based on discovery and genotyping of eight major structural variation classes in 2,504 unrelated individuals from across 26 populations; structural variation is compared within and between populations and its functional impact is quantified.

Republican voters in the US who support climate change action tend to self-censor because they anticipate social conflict, although they are aware that they hold a majority view, according to a survey of 1000 representative Republican voters.

A cryo-electron microscopy structure of the β1-adrenoceptor coupled to β-arrestin 1 and activated by the biased agonist formoterol, as well as the crystal structure of a related formoterol-bound adrenoreceptor, provide insights into biased signalling in these systems.