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This study reports widespread loss of mountain vegetation worldwide from 2000 to 2020, with ∼89% attributable to human expansion, primarily agriculture. Over half of this loss occurred within protected areas and other biodiversity-rich areas, threatening conservation efforts.

Cell death contributes to tissue homeostasis and plays critical roles in inflammation and host defense. Our increasing understanding of the physiological importance of cell death underlines the need to more fully elucidate its underlying mechanisms in health and disease. Molecular and structural insight into the cell death apparatus could provide strategies to target the loss of cells in pathophysiological contexts. We asked experts studying a range of cell death types to share with us what they are most excited to tackle and what the field needs for progress.

Engineering of semiconductor nanocrystals requires a detailed understanding of their formation. Here, the authors use signal-enhanced NMR and theoretical calculations to decode the structural transition from metastable CdSe clusters to mature quantum dots.

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.

Federated learning (FL) algorithms have emerged as a promising solution to train models for healthcare imaging across institutions while preserving privacy. Here, the authors describe the Federated Tumor Segmentation (FeTS) challenge for the decentralised benchmarking of FL algorithms and evaluation of Healthcare AI algorithm generalizability in real-world cancer imaging datasets.

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.

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.

Spatial cell distribution within a tissue microenvironment is a rapidly advancing field. Here, authors assess three commercially available single-cell resolution spatial transcriptomics approaches (CosMx, MERFISH, and Xenium) to inform which technology outperforms for immune profiling of solid tumors using patient samples.

AI copilots are integrated into brain–computer interfaces, enabling a paralysed participant to achieve improved control of computer cursors and robotic arms. This shared autonomy approach offers a promising path to increase BCI performance and clinical viability.

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.

An aromatic metallo-annulene, comprising a 15-carbon macrocycle enclosing an osmium complex, with the metal residing within the plane of the macrocycle is reported.

Multi-omics datasets pose major challenges to data interpretation and hypothesis generation owing to their high-dimensional molecular profiles. Here, the authors develop ActivePathways method, which uses data fusion techniques for integrative pathway analysis of multi-omics data and candidate gene discovery.

This study reveals neuronal targets of Lac-Phe in the hypothalamus that mediate its suppression of food intake.

The authors demonstrate strain-induced morphotropic phase boundary-like nanodomains in lead-free NaNbO₃ thin films, enabling multi-state switching and large enhancements in dielectric susceptibility and tunability over a broad frequency range.

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.

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.

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.

The transcription factors TCF1 and LEF1 promote self-renewal and regulatory functions in B-1a cells.

A study reports whole-genome sequences for 490,640 participants from the UK Biobank and combines these data with phenotypic data to provide new insights into the relationship between human variation and sequence variation.

To better understand the etiology of frailty, the authors perform a large genetic study. They identified 45 additional variants and implicated MET, CHST9, ILRUN, APOE, CGREF1 and PPP6C as potential causal genes, linking frailty to immune regulation, metabolism and cellular signaling.

Xu, Meng, St-Germain et al. report that S1P in HDL induces a calcium signalling cascade involving E-Syt1 that ultimately promotes the formation of contact sites between the endoplasmic reticulum and the plasma membrane, as well as HDL-derived cholesterol transport.

Olfactory perception of food-derived odors influences feeding behavior, but the underlying neural pathways remain unclear. Here, the authors show that prolonged exposure to food odor suppresses food intake and body weight gain by activating an olfactory bulb–hypothalamus circuit.

The International Brain Laboratory presents a brain-wide electrophysiological map obtained from pooling data from 12 laboratories that performed the same standardized perceptual decision-making task in mice.

TUG protein localizes to the endoplasmic reticulum-Golgi intermediate compartment, forms biomolecular condensates, and organizes and stabilizes these membranes to support their function in diverse secretory and degradative trafficking pathways.

Observations of a fast X-ray transient reveal that it is a gamma-ray-burst explosion from a very distant galaxy that emits light with the wavelength necessary to drive cosmic reionization, the last major phase change in the history of the Universe.

DeepMVP is a deep learning framework for predicting PTM sites and variant-induced alterations across six modification types, including phosphorylation, acetylation, methylation, sumoylation, ubiquitination and N-glycosylation.

Estimating the risk of long COVID is challenging because many of its symptoms are associated with other conditions. Here, the authors conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of studies that estimate long COVID risk while accounting for background symptoms using comparator control populations.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

The authors present SVclone, a computational method for inferring the cancer cell fraction of structural variants from whole-genome sequencing data.

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.

The characterization of 4,645 whole-genome and 19,184 exome sequences, covering most types of cancer, identifies 81 single-base substitution, doublet-base substitution and small-insertion-and-deletion mutational signatures, providing a systematic overview of the mutational processes that contribute to cancer development.

Cancers evolve as they progress under differing selective pressures. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium, the authors present the method TrackSig the estimates evolutionary trajectories of somatic mutational processes from single bulk tumour data.

Magic state distillation is achieved with logical qubits on a neutral-atom quantum computer using a dynamically reconfigurable architecture for parallel quantum operations.

ERα^vlVMH neurons mediate the inhibitory role of 17β-oestradiol on prolactin production, and this inhibition is lifted in lactating mice to promote lactation-associated metabolic adaptations.

This flagship study from the European Solve-Rare Diseases Consortium presents a diagnostic framework including bioinformatic analysis of clinical, pedigree and genomic data coupled with expert panel review, leading to 500 new diagnoses in a cohort of 6,000 families with suspected rare diseases.

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.