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The effect of soil structure is not included in most Earth System Models. The authors here introduce and evaluate the consequences at local and global scale of modifying hydraulic properties of soils in response to biological activity—a process significantly changing soil structure.

Storing and protecting organic carbon in agricultural soils requires knowledge on their saturation capacity. Identification of similar pedo-climatic zones allows for creating a risk index informed by the zone-specific effective saturation capacity.

Here, the authors compare HP1 from fission yeast, fly and mouse, and find that the propensity of HP1 to phase-separate and to cluster heterochromatin decrease in this order, suggesting an evolutionary adaptation of HP1 function.

The authors show that brain inflammation in COVID-19 correlates with viral load, systemic inflammation and virus-sensing pattern recognition receptors. Microglial dysfunction occurs at sites of vascular inflammation with myelin injury and synapse loss.

A phylogenetic tree of 5,284 fungal species is used to infer patterns of extinction, diversification and morphological innovation in mushroom-forming fungi.

Gelabert et al. examine genomic and archaeological data from Europe’s earliest farming communities in Central Europe (5500–5000 bce). They find differentiated genetic networks but no evidence of unequal access to resources linked to sex or kin.

The authors introduce PharmacoSTORM single-molecule imaging that uses fluorescent ligands and immunolabeling for cellular and subcellular nanoscale molecular pharmacology. They demonstrate its capabilities by visualizing cariprazine binding to D3 dopamine receptors on Islands of Calleja granule cell axons.

Heiko Witt, Miklós Sahin-Tóth and colleagues show that loss-of-function variants in CPA1 are strongly associated with early onset chronic pancreatitis. On the basis of their findings, they propose that the mechanism may involve misfolding-induced endoplasmic reticulum stress rather than elevated trypsin activity.

2′-Deoxy-ADPR, formed from the combined action of NMNAT and CD38 in response to H₂O₂ signaling, activates TRPM2 ion channel currents more potently than the known agonist ADPR via a deceleration of channel inactivation and a higher average open probability.

Although common in ants and termites, worker differentiation into physical castes is rare in social bees and unknown in wasps. Here, Grüter and colleagues find a guard caste in ten species of stingless bees and show that the evolution of the guard caste is associated with parasitization by robber bees.

Meiotic cells deliberately break their DNA to allow chromosomes to swap genetic material. Here, authors reveal genetically separable pathways controlling the seeding and growth of chromosome-bound protein condensates responsible for DNA breaks.

A detailed and systematic neutron scattering study uncovers a spiral spin-liquid state in the quantum magnet MnSc₂S₄.

Inspired by the alternating chirality backbone pattern of some effective peptide antimicrobials, here authors design lysine-rich heterochiral peptides that show antimicrobial activity.

Nonreciprocal optical devices traditionally rely on magnetic fields and magnetic-free approaches are rather recent. Here, Bernier et al. propose and demonstrate a purely optomechanical circulator with reconfigurable transmission without the need for direct coupling between input and output modes.

A microwave cavity optomechanics experiment investigates the interplay between the electromagnetic and mechanical modes and how their roles can be reversed in engineered dissipation.

SpCas9 off-targets are a safety concern. Here the authors report a cleavage rule that governs the on-target and off-target cleavage of increased(/high)-fidelity SpCas9 variants: the variants have differences in fidelity small enough to comprise an optimal variant for each target, irrespective of its cleavability ranking.

Zinc finger protein transcription factors are developed for the selective silencing of the mutant huntingtin gene in human neurons in vitro and multiple animal models of Huntington’s disease in vivo while preserving expression of the wild-type allele.

The synaptonemal complex is a meiosis-specific proteinaceous structure that supports homologous chromosome pairs during meiosis. Here, the authors show that SIX6OS1 (of previously unknown function) is part of the synaptonemal complex central element and upon deletion in mice, causes defective chromosome synapsis and infertility.

Mutations to SpCas9 can improve fidelity and mitigate off-target effects. Here the authors generate ‘Blackjack’ mutations that improve fidelity while retaining effectiveness with 21G-sgRNAs.

Crossing over is a critical process during meiosis, although the regulation of this process still remains somewhat elusive. Here, the authors show that PRR19 partners with CNTD1 to enable formation of crossover-specific recombination complexes in mouse germ cells.

Observations of a meteoroid coming from the Oort cloud show that it is made of rocky and not icy material, constraining the ratio of rocky to icy objects impacting Earth from the Oort cloud to \({6}_{-5}^{+13}\)%.

Pseudorabies viruses encoding fluorescent proteins are a powerful method for mapping neuronal circuits. Now a series of pseudorabies virus strains encoding fluorescent sensors and time-shifted florescent proteins allow dissection of complex circuits with concurrent activity analysis while defining an analysis period during which the neurons are still healthy.

PIWI-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) are regulatory RNAs that bind to PIWI proteins to control transposons and maintain genome integrity. Here the authors characterized their binding specificity and reveal the 5′ nucleotide bias of the Drosophila Piwi protein, through mutation of its specificity loop.

Nucleosomes compact the genome and regulate access to specific DNA sequences. Here the authors employ single-molecule FRET studies to characterize nucleosome dynamics at different salt concentrations and dissect nucleosome disassembly into elementary steps.

Genomic and epidemiological analysis of carbapenem-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae across Europe finds increased transmissibility of four clonal lineages, especially between hospitals within countries.

A workflow combining optogenetic perturbations with spatial transcriptomics to program spatiotemporal gene expression patterns in organoids.

Female naked mole rats are long lived and show little or no decline in fertility over their lifespan. Here Brieño-Enríquez et al., demonstrate that naked mole-rats establish an exceptionally large ovarian reserve and undergo postnatal oogenesis.

It is not clear whether and how incoming HIV-1 Tat accumulates in uninfected cells. Here, Chopard et al. show that, in uninfected cells, incoming Tat is palmitoylated on Cys31 by DHHC-20, which increases its affinity for PI(4,5)P₂ and results in its accumulation at the plasma membrane.

Continuous-variables EPR states present a resource for applications to quantum information processing and metrology, but these states have been created until now only with photon pairs. Here, the authors report the creation of an EPR-correlated two-mode squeezed states in an ultracold atomic ensemble.

During neurogenesis, neural stem and progenitor cells can either proliferate or produce neurons. Here, the authors show that proliferating neural stem and progenitor cells have a longer S-phase portion of the cell cycle than cells committed to neuron production, suggesting that this may enable faithful DNA replication.

Theoretically predicted fractional antiferromagnetic skyrmions are experimentally realized in MnSc₂S₄ and are found to originate from anisotropic couplings over nearest neighbours in the crystal lattice.

A nonlinear time-series analysis was used to identify antibiotic use thresholds that are associated with the emergence of antibiotic resistance.