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Australian archaeological finds of 12,000-year-old fireplaces and artefacts match nineteenth-century GunaiKurnai ritual practices. They represent approximately 500 generations of cultural transmission of this ritual.

This study demonstrates that renewable energy expansion, green hydrogen deployment, and carbon offsetting strategies targeting the European Union’s natural gas reliance can simultaneously advance its climate goals and long-term energy security.

Multi-year field experiments across six continents suggest that insects have an important contribution to decomposition and carbon release from forest deadwood.

Here, the authors produce an updated termite classification with genomic scale analyses, highlighting thirteen family-level lineages and resilience of their classification to future termite research.

Decentralized natural resource governance is thought to aid conservation and reduce poverty, but its heterogeneous local effects are under-explored. A study in Nepal shows that forest governance decentralization reduces poverty but the benefits are greater for dominant ethnic and caste groups compared with minority ones.

Data from 2 million individual trees spanning 1,781 species reveal that tropical forests can be grouped into four size-dependent life-history survival modes, the application of which in demographic simulations predicts biomass change.

This long-term study in rural Rwanda finds that nearly half of the households in grid-covered communities remain unconnected after electrification, suggesting the need to reconsider the economic case for grid investments in rural areas.

Genomic analyses applied to 14 childhood- and adult-onset psychiatric disorders identifies five underlying genomic factors that explain the majority of the genetic variance of the individual disorders.

Over 20 species of geographically and phylogenetically diverse bird species produce convergent whining vocalizations towards their respective brood parasites. Model presentation and playback experiments across multiple continents suggest that these learned calls provoke an innate response even among allopatric species.

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.

Here the authors provide an explanation for 95% of examined predicted loss of function variants found in disease-associated haploinsufficient genes in the Genome Aggregation Database (gnomAD), underscoring the power of the presented analysis to minimize false assignments of disease risk.

Chronic care manages long-term, progressive conditions, while acute care handles short-term ones. Here, authors show chronic conditions account for most of the global health burden, with 68% of DALYs and 93% of YLDs attributed to chronic care needs.

The roots of psychopathology take shape during adverse parent-infant interactions, shown through infant attachment quality. Using rodents, the authors show that blunted infant cortical processing of the mother determines attachment quality through a stress hormone-dependent mechanism.

The relationships that control seed production in trees are key to understand evolutionary pressures that have shaped forests. A global synthesis of fecundity data reveals that while seed production is not constrained by a strict size-number trade-off, it is influenced by taxonomy and nutrient allocation.

Data from millions of trees in thousands of locations are used to show that certain key traits affect competitive ability in predictable ways, and that there are trade-offs between traits that favour growth with and without competition.

The presence of earthworms is known to enhance the quality and moisture of soil in cool and wet climates. Evanset al. show that termites and ants can improve soil quality in warmer and drier climates—their presence results in elevated water infiltration and nitrogen content, leading to increased wheat yields.

Mature parts of the shallow megathrust beneath Costa Rica are characterized by striking corrugations that may channel fluids, according to seismic images. Nascent sections of the subduction zone plate boundary appear only weakly corrugated.

Which combination of current genome sequencing and assembly approaches results in high-quality, complete diploid genome assemblies is determined.

The authors examine the impact of monthly unconditional cash transfers starting at childbirth on families with low incomes. Transfers had minimal effects on family processes and maternal wellbeing, but improved family incomes and time mothers spent doing enriching activities with their child.

Import restrictions on deforestation-linked commodities, like oil crops, could cut land-use emissions but risk emissions leakage globally and economic losses for producers. Direct forest protection may be more effective than import restrictions.

Mangrove canopy height varies strongly around the globe in response to climatic factors, according to a global analysis of remote sensing and field data.

Drought has a major influence on plant distribution. Here, Swenson et al. show that a similar gene expression response to experimental drought outperforms traditional functional traits and phylogenetic relatedness as a predictor of co-occurrence of tree species in a natural stand.

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.

Rewetting of plant litter accumulated in dry riverbeds releases pulses of CO₂, reveals a global analysis of intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams.

Artificial reefs provide important ecosystem services in marine environments. Accurate knowledge of the area covered by such reefs can help evaluate benefits and risks of such structures. This study describes the physical footprint of artificial reefs deployed in coastal waters of the United States.

Optical dating of sediments containing stone artefacts newly excavated at Madjedbebe, Australia, indicate that human occupation began around 65,000 years ago, thereby setting a new minimum age for the arrival of people in Australia.

Thousands of varieties of wine grapes have been recorded and described in historical accounts, some going back as far as the Middle Ages, but genetic relationships between ancient and modern varieties were unknown. Genomic sequencing of 28 seeds, dating back as far as the Iron Age, finds close relationships to today’s cultivars, including a genetic match to Savagnin Blanc from 1100 ce.

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.

An analysis of above-ground biomass recovery during secondary succession in forest sites and plots, covering the major environmental gradients in the Neotropics.

In wildlife tagging, stress from capture and handling can alter post- release behavior and potentially study interpretations. This study of 42 mammal species shows that these effects diminish within 4–7 days, and quicker for animals in high human activity areas indicating adaptation to disturbance.

Transition metal carbides are attractive for electrochemical energy storage and catalysis, but cost effective preparation on a large scale is challenging. Here the authors use a direct pattern method to fabricate transition metal carbides for supercapacitors and solar energy harvesting for steam generation.

Visceral pain and anxiety in mice are found to be associated with gut enterochromaffin cells, and genetic models for eliciting visceral hypersensitivity and studying the sex bias of gut pain are proposed.

Longitudinal clinical and multi-omics data from 108 healthy individuals are analyzed to identify putative biomarkers and diagnostics of early disease states.

This report presents themes highlighted during the eclectic and stimulating Metchnikoff's Legacy in 2008 meeting hosted at the Institut Pasteur in April 2008 in honor of the 100^th anniversary of the 1908 Nobel Prize.

Many of the measures required to reduce emissions of short-lived climate pollutants contribute to achieving the sustainable development goals while complementing decarbonization efforts required to reduce long-term climate change.

The response to infectious and inflammatory challenges differs among people but the reasons for this are poorly understood. Here the authors explore the impact of variables such as age, sex, and the capacity for controlling inflammation and maintaining immunocompetence, linking this capacity to favourable health outcomes and lifespan.

Seshadri, Davis and colleagues show that individuals who do not develop an infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), despite exposure to the bacteria and expansion of CD4⁺ T cell clones specific to Mtb antigens, show enrichment of T_H17 cell and T regulatory functional programs.

The authors investigate the broad-scale climatological and soil properties that co-vary with major axes of plant functional traits. They find that variation in plant size is attributed to latitudinal gradients in water or energy limitation, while variation in leaf economics traits is attributed to both climate and soil fertility including their interaction.

Antiretroviral therapy (ART) for the treatment of HIV-1 requires life-long daily adherence to supress viral replication, and nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors that are commonly used in ART have not been converted into long-acting agents. Here, the authors report two lipophilic tenofovir (TVF) ProTide nanoformulations, NM1TFV and NM2TFV, which sustain drug levels above therapeutic concentrations for two months after a single intramuscular dose in rats.