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Bosonic qubits can be engineered to feature intrinsic protection against certain kinds of errors, which makes quantum error correction across many bosonic qubits possible with less overhead.

The formation of porphyry copper deposits in regions of thickened continental crust remains enigmatic. Insights from the Laramide Porphyry Province in Arizona suggest a link between shallow-slab subduction and copper mineralization.

A giant planet candidate roughly the size of Jupiter but more than 14 times as massive is observed by TESS and other instruments to be transiting the white dwarf star WD 1856+534.

Machine learning-assisted robots produce MXene aerogels containing cellulose, gelatin, and glutaraldehyde, fabricating 162 compositions. Inverse design from resulting properties affords tailored compression-stable materials for Joule heating.

Thermal contraction effect increases with time dominates the long-term deformation trend of the Heber geothermal field, while pressure effects of pressure fluctuation and poroelastic responses keep relatively stable and drive short-term changes.

Genetic and testing data from England show that the SARS-CoV-2 variant of concern B.1.1.7 has a transmission advantage over other lineages.

The hippocampus in mammalian brain varies in size across individuals. Here, Hibar and colleagues perform a genome-wide association meta-analysis to find six genetic loci with significant association to hippocampus volume.

A global network of researchers was formed to investigate the role of human genetics in SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 severity; this paper reports 13 genome-wide significant loci and potentially actionable mechanisms in response to infection.

Early diagnosis can significantly improve treatment options and prevent severe organ damage in individuals with autoimmune diseases. Here, the authors develop a machine learning model that uses electronic health records to identify patients with clinical suspicion of autoimmune diseases.

The oxidative pentose-phosphate pathway (oxPPP) is a major NADPH producer. Here the authors show that malic enzyme or isocitrate dehydrogenase can support the growth of cells lacking the oxPPP, but the oxPPP is necessary to maintain a normal NADPH/NADP ratio, DHFR activity and folate metabolism.

Though memristors can potentially emulate neuron and synapse functionality, useful signal energy is lost to Joule heating. Here, the authors demonstrate neuro-transistors with a pseudo-memcapacitive gate that actively process signals via energy-efficient capacitively-coupled neural networks.

The authors explore a lithography-like technique in roll-to-roll processing for high-throughput manufacturing of flexible thin-film micro-patterns. They introduce a sputtering-co-evaporation method that enhances both patterning and performance of Bi-Sb-Te-based thermoelectrics.

In primate area LIP, target selection and the accumulation of sensory evidence are considered a single process. Here, the authors use urgent choice tasks to show that spatial selection in LIP is distinct from, and may even conflict with, evidence accumulation.

Newberry and Plotkin show that the frequency of a cultural trait can influence its tendency to be copied. They develop a method to measure frequency-dependent selection and describe how it relates to the dynamics and diversity of first names and dog breed preferences, in different countries and cultures.

Exposure to a novel experience can ‘reset’ connections between the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex in mice, allowing them to overcome an existing learned behaviour and to replace it with a new one.

The Cancer Genome Atlas Research Network reports an integrative analysis of more than 400 samples of clear cell renal cell carcinoma based on genomic, DNA methylation, RNA and proteomic characterisation; frequent mutations were identified in the PI(3)K/AKT pathway, suggesting this pathway might be a potential therapeutic target, among the findings is also a demonstration of metabolic remodelling which correlates with tumour stage and severity.

Post-international travel quarantine has been widely implemented to mitigate SARS-CoV-2 transmission, but the impacts of such policies are unclear. Here, the authors used linked genomic and contact tracing data to assess the impacts of a 14-day quarantine on return to England in summer 2020.

The ages and geochemical compositions of inclusions of sublithospheric diamonds indicate additions to the mantle keel of Gondwana by the underplating of buoyant subducted material, originating from 300–700-km depth, which may have contributed to supercontinent stability during long-distance migration.

In this study, Aggarwal and colleagues perform prospective sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 isolates derived from asymptomatic student screening and symptomatic testing of students and staff at the University of Cambridge. They identify important factors that contributed to within university transmission and onward spread into the wider community.

Acute stress transiently disrupts reward-seeking behaviour and repeated stress exposure produces lasting anhedonia-like behaviour in rodents. Here, the authors show that stress triggers GABAergic activity in the ventral tegmental area which blunts reward-seeking behaviour in mice.

Abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) is a potentially fatal and often asymptomatic disease whose causes remain unclear. Here the authors show that a microRNA, miR-24, and its target, the glycoprotein chitinase 3-like 1, represent key regulators of AAA development.

Random segregation of extrachromosomal DNA contributes to intratumoral heterogeneity and facilitates the rapid adaptation of human tumor cells to anticancer drugs.

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.

Integrating independent large-scale pharmacogenomic screens can enable unprecedented characterization of genetic vulnerabilities in cancers. Here, the authors show that the two largest independent CRISPR-Cas9 gene-dependency screens are concordant, paving the way for joint analysis of the data sets.

Marais and colleagues report that checkpoint inhibitor treatment of patients with melanoma leads to dynamic changes in peripheral T cells and expansion of immune effector cells. This awakening of the immune system occurs early after treatment and could be exploited in the clinic.

A study of the evolution of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in England between September 2020 and June 2021 finds that interventions capable of containing previous variants were insufficient to stop the more transmissible Alpha and Delta variants.

In a GWAS study of 32,438 adults, the authors discovered five novel loci for intracranial volume and confirmed two known signals. Variants for intracranial volume were also related to childhood and adult cognitive function and to Parkinson's disease, and enriched near genes involved in growth pathways, including PI3K-AKT signaling.

Post-infectious myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (PI-ME/CFS) is a disabling disorder, yet the clinical phenotype is poorly defined and the pathophysiology unknown. Here, the authors conduct deep phenotyping of a cohort of PI-ME/CFS patients.

Certain shorelines can be modeled with prediction accuracies comparable to satellite observations, according to benchmarking results using satellite-derived shoreline datasets for model calibration and evaluation.

Hall et al. discovered the molecular mechanism for the polarity of the CRISPR roadblock to transcription: RNA polymerase progression can collapse the R-loop formed by a bound dCas to allow read-through from the PAM-distal side. Guide RNA modifications allow modulation of the dCas R-loop stability.

Maintenance of NADPH levels during environmental stress can prolong cell survival. Ding et al. identify MESH1 as a cytosolic NADPH phosphatase that is required for the metabolic commitment to ferroptosis in cancer cell lines.

Muscle fibers have diverse properties—for example, slow and fast twitch. Groups of fibers are activated by motoneurons. Marshall et al. found that motoneurons are used flexibly, presumably allowing us to intelligently employ fibers suited to each task.

The Omicron variant evades vaccine-induced neutralization but also fails to form syncytia, shows reduced replication in human lung cells and preferentially uses a TMPRSS2-independent cell entry pathway, which may contribute to enhanced replication in cells of the upper airway. Altered fusion and cell entry characteristics are linked to distinct regions of the Omicron spike protein.

Bacteria adapt to changing environmental conditions through signal transduction mediated by the two-component system (TCS). Here, the authors combine X-ray crystallography and NMR studies to characterize a pH-gated conformational switch that regulates the phosphatase activity of TCS bifunctional histidine kinases.

Enhancers for endodermal organs are primed at the chromatin level prior to lineage induction by FOXA pioneer transcription factors; how pervasive this is, is not well known. Here the authors show that only a small subset of organ-specific enhancers are bound and primed by FOXA prior to lineage induction, whereas the majority do not undergo chromatin priming and engage FOXA upon lineage induction.

Cellular lysine residues can be both methylated and acetylated on the same sidechain to form N^ε-acetyl-N^ε-methyllysine (Kacme), which is found on histone H4 across a range of species and across mammalian tissues and is associated with active chromatin.

Perilipin 5 is a lipid droplet protein that interacts with PGC1α in the nucleus to regulate mitochondrial metabolism. Here the authors use genetically engineered mouse models to determine the physiologic role of Perilipin 5, and show that it regulates mitochondrial adaptations to cold, as well as systemic energy metabolism.

Whole-genome sequencing, transcriptome-wide association and fine-mapping analyses in over 7,000 individuals with critical COVID-19 are used to identify 16 independent variants that are associated with severe illness in COVID-19.

Association analyses in over 1 million individuals identify 535 new loci influencing blood pressure traits. The results provide new insights into blood pressure regulation and highlight shared genetic architecture between blood pressure and lifestyle exposures.

White matter hyperintensities (WMH) are a common brain-imaging feature of cerebral small vessel disease. Here, the authors carry out a GWAS and followup analyses for WMH-volume, implicating several variants with potential for risk stratification and drug targeting.

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.

Vaccines against the WA1 SARS-CoV2 strain confer protection against other variants. However, the mechanisms underlying cross-protection are not fully understood. Here, the authors develop a method for rapid analysis of single B cells from patient samples and show that infection with a variant elicits convergent, public B cell responses to other variants.

The civil war in Mozambique led to the collapse of large-mammal populations and the spread of the invasive plant Mimosa pigra. Experimental exclosures and DNA metabarcoding are used to show how trophic rewilding since the end of the war has reduced the invasive population.

The detection of cardiomyocyte death is a critical aspect in the diagnosis and monitoring of heart diseases. Here the authors show that cardiomyocyte-specific methylation patterns of circulating cell-free DNA may serve as a biomarker of cardiac cell death in infarcted and septic patients.