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High resolution observations of exceptionally preserved trilobite specimens from New York State suggest fine-grained micritic mud supported the delicate limb structures, even as the carcasses decayed, allowing calcite casts to form.

An expert elicitation survey estimates yield losses for the five major food crops worldwide, suggesting that the highest losses are associated with food-deficit regions with fast-growing populations and frequently with emerging or re-emerging pests and diseases.

Genomic and phenomic screens of 827 wheat landraces from the A. E. Watkins collection provide insight into the wheat population genetic background, unlocking many agronomic traits and revealing haplotypes that could potentially be used to improve modern wheat cultivars.

Accurately detecting cancer mutational profiles from circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA) remains a challenging task. Here, the authors develop MisMatchFinder, an algorithm that can detect mutational signatures in shallow whole-genome sequencing data from ctDNA across multiple cancer types.

More political and public awareness of the plight of the world’s crops when it comes to fungal disease is crucial to stave off a major threat to global food security.

Using data from a single time point, passenger-approximated clonal expansion rate (PACER) estimates the fitness of common driver mutations that lead to clonal haematopoiesis and identifies TCL1A activation as a mediator of clonal expansion.

Pathogenic fungi are increasingly contributing to the global emerging disease burden, threatening biodiversity and imposing increasing costs on ecosystem health, hence steps must be taken to tighten biosecurity worldwide to reduce the rate of fungal disease emergence.

Proteins have been used in the synthesis of magnetic nanoparticles but issues with aggregation limit this application. Here, the authors report on the synthesis of coiled proteins that display the active loop of the natural proteins to avoid aggregation and investigate the application in nanoparticle synthesis.

Emerging fungal and oomycete pathogens pose a significant risk to global food security. This Review summarizes factors affecting pathogen introduction and spread and current disease control strategies, and highlights the direction that research must take to face the challenge of emerging crop pathogens.

The advantage of living in cities compared with rural areas with respect to height and BMI in children and adolescents has generally become smaller globally from 1990 to 2020, except in sub-Saharan Africa.

Functional interplay of sex hormones in estrogen receptor–positive breast cancer unveils the therapeutic potential of androgen receptor agonists.

Analysis of HbA1c and FPG levels across 117 population-based studies demonstrates regional variation in prevalence of previously undiagnosed screen-detected diabetes using one or both measures and suggests that use of elevated FPG alone could underestimate diabetes prevalence in low- and middle-income countries.

The authors model the impact of future temperature changes on infection risk for 12 major crops from 80 fungal and oomycete plant pathogens. They find increased risk, as well as crop yield, at higher latitudes and predict major shifts in pathogen assemblages in the United States, Europe and China.

A randomized controlled trial showed that a home-based, telemedicine-supported lifestyle intervention, which consisted of exercise training, nutrition recommendations and health literacy training, reported improved glycemic control after 6 months in patients with coronary heart disease and type 2 diabetes compared to usual care.

A sunflower pan-genome determined by sequencing about 500 accessions, including wild, landrace and cultivated lines, showed that introgression from the wild species has profoundly shaped the cultivar gene pool and contributed disease resistance genes.

Lima bean is an important crop for improving food security in Latin America and elsewhere. Here, the authors assemble its genome, conduct population genomics analysis using genotyping-by-sequencing data, and identify differentially expressed genes between two pod developmental stages.

Exome sequencing and copy number analysis are used to define genomic aberrations in early sporadic pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma; among the findings are mutations in genes involved in chromatin modification and DNA damage repair, and frequent and diverse somatic aberrations in genes known as embryonic regulators of axon guidance.

Age-associated B cells (ABC) have been shown to be associated with autoimmunity and ageing. Here the authors examine whether ABC are transcriptionally or functionally altered in participants with reduced immune cell function and show that, being transcriptionally similar, high pre-vaccine levels are associated with poor vaccine response.

Epidemiological analyses coupled with immunological phenotyping suggest that humoral immunity induced by COVID-19 vaccines wanes more rapidly in individuals with severe obesity compared to individuals with a BMI within the normal range.

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.

This Review delves into the fungal kingdom, exploring the relationships among fungi, animals, plants and the environment, and investigating both the threats posed by fungi and their potential benefits.

RET tyrosine kinase is essential for various developmental processes, and loss-of-function ret missense mutations cause Hirschsprung's disease (HSCR). Structural studies identified residues that constitute a crucial folding bottleneck relevant to the maturation of RET in the endoplasmic reticulum, and the maturation efficiency of ret mutants correlates well with their severity in patients with HSCR disease.

Risk loci for breast cancer have been identified by genome-wide association studies. Here, the authors use Capture Hi-C to identify 110 putative target genes at 33 loci and assessed associations of gene expression, SNP genotype, and survival, providing evidence of mechanisms that may influence the prognosis and risk of breast cancer.

Following cell division, phase separation of the transmembrane adaptor LEM2 ensures that the ESCRT machinery remodels microtubules and seals the nuclear envelope.

Contrary to the view that urbanization is a major driver of the global rise in obesity, the global increase in body-mass index is shown to be mostly due to increases in the body-mass indexes of rural populations.

The Coronary Artery Disease Genetics Consortium report a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies for coronary artery disease (CAD) in discovery and replication cohorts including both European and South Asian studies. They identify five loci newly associated with CAD.

Identification of AvrStb6, the fungal avirulence effector that triggers Stb6-mediated resistance in wheat, here demonstrates that neither host resistance nor fungicide treatment suppresses fungal sexual reproduction, thus unveiling implications of fungal sex in plant disease control.

A variety of quantum programming languages have been developed over the past few years, enabling newcomers and seasoned practitioners alike. This Review gives a brief introduction to quantum programming, overviewing some of the existing languages and the ecosystem around them.

An in vivo transposon screen in a pancreatic cancer model identifies frequent inactivation of Usp9x; deletion of Usp9x cooperates with Kras^G12D to accelerate rapidly pancreatic tumorigenesis in mice, validating their genetic interaction.

Rajesh Thakker and colleagues show that missense mutations affecting codon 15 of AP2S1 cause familial hypocalciuric hypercalcemia type 3, a disorder of calcium homeostasis. AP2S1 encodes a protein involved in clathrin-mediated endocytosis, and the mutations probably cause disease by disrupting internalization of the calcium-sensing receptor CaSR.

David Adams and colleagues identify inactivating mutations in CUX1 in diverse human cancers. They validate CUX1 as a tumor suppressor using mouse and Drosophila cancer models, and show that CUX1 deficiency activates phosphoinositide 3-kinase signaling through transcriptional downregulation of a PI3K inhibitor.