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A single-cell multiomic immune cell atlas from 235 Japanese, including patients with COVID-19 and healthy individuals, linked with host genetics including germline and somatic mutation, plasma proteomics and metagenomics data reveals that immune cells are dynamically regulated in a cell state-dependent manner.

Analysis of samples from the asteroid Ryugu provide evidence of late fluid flow in a carbonaceous asteroid, indicating that such bodies may have retained two to three times more water than previously thought.

Fujioka et al. show that, under starvation, yeast Atg1 forms droplets that concentrate autophagy factors, boosting Atg8 lipidation and clustering vesicles. These droplets likely serve as hubs that generate membrane seeds for autophagosome formation.

The radiation-damage-free structure of the photosystem II membrane protein complex, which oxidizes water into dioxygen in an oxygen evolving complex, has been determined by an X-ray free electron laser at a resolution of 1.95 Å; one of the substrate oxygen atoms in this reaction is now identified.

Genetic mechanisms influencing COVID-19 susceptibility are not well understood. Here, the authors analyzed whole blood RNA-seq data of 465 Japanese individuals with COVID-19, highlighting thousands of fine-mapped variants affecting expression and splicing of genes, as well as the presence of COVID-19 severity-interaction eQTLs.

A genome-wide association study highlights a variant in DOCK2, which is common in East Asian populations but rare in Europeans, as a host genetic risk factor for severe COVID-19.

Analysis of the blood DNA virome in patients with COVID-19 and autoimmune disease associates endogenous HHV-6 (eHHV-6) and high anellovirus load with increased disease risk, most notably for systemic lupus erythematosus. eHHV-6 carriers show a distinct immune response.

Saturable absorption is a widely used process in optical-wavelength laser technologies that arises when the transmittance of a material increases upon high-intensity light illumination. Here, Yoneda et al.tightly focus free-electron laser light and demonstrate hard X-ray saturable absorption in iron.

X-ray-free electron lasers produce X-ray pulses for use in applications such as the determination of molecular structures or the study of materials. Here, Mimura and colleagues demonstrate a two-stage focusing scheme to achieve unprecedented laser power densities of over 10²⁰ W cm⁻².

To study the dynamics of materials and biological samples at ultrafast time scales it is beneficial to use two short laser pulses, ideally at different energies. Here, the authors demonstrate the generation of two femtosecond hard X-ray laser pulses in a free electron laser, with more than 30% energy separation.

The composition of the Earth's core, particularly the light elements present, is not well constrained. Here, the authors report sound velocities of liquid iron-carbon alloy as measured at very high pressures using inelastic X-ray scattering and suggest that carbon cannot be predominant in the outer core.

Laser-matter interaction has been intensively studied in equilibrium states, but irreversible processes in a highly nonequilibrium state at nanoscales remains elusive due to experimental challenges. Here, Ihm et al. image heterogeneous melting of gold nanoparticles with nanometer and picosecond resolution.

Peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 73 Japanese patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and 75 healthy controls were analyzed using single-cell transcriptomics. Combining these data with genotyping data highlights the interplay between host genetics and the immune response in modulating disease severity.

Free-electron lasers can produce powerful pulses of radiation at very short wavelengths, even in the hard-X-ray region. In general, however, they comprise facilities several kilometres in length. A 55-m-long laser could open up the technology to a broader range of researchers.

Here, the authors identify six risk SNPs for systemic sclerosis by performing GWAS on Japanese patients and meta-analyzing Japanese and European GWAS datasets. Downstream analyses indicate that B cells contribute to pathogenesis.

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.

A cross-ancestry genomic and transcriptomic cohort of gastric cancer highlights significantly mutated genes and mutational signatures, some of which are ancestry-specific.

Stress-independent autophagy is less understood than stress-induced autophagy and is important for thymic self-tolerance. Here the authors show that a mitochondrial protein C15ORF48 is important for stress-independent autophagy and alters glutathione metabolism and C15orf48 knockout mice develop autoimmunity and changes to thymic epithelial cells.

Using more than 100 independent iPSC lines derived from patients with Alzheimer’s disease, the authors discovered loci associated with the neuronal production of amyloid β and confirmed their influence using RNA interference.

A nearly Fourier-limited X-ray free-electron laser beam is generated by a self-seeding scheme. The beam in the first half of the undulators is monochromatized via Bragg reflection, and is subsequently amplified in the remaining undulators.

A comparison of copper and zinc isotopic measurements between the Ryugu samples and various carbonaceous chondrites excludes any genetic link between the two except for the CI (Ivuna-type) chondrites. Ryugu-like material might have accounted for ~5% of Earth’s mass.

Researchers report sub-ångström fundamental-wavelength lasing at the SPring-8 Angstrom Compact Free-Electron Laser in Japan. The output has a maximum power of more than 10 GW, a pulse duration of 10⁻¹⁴ s and a lasing wavelength of 0.634 Å.

A copper target is used to achieve an atomic laser in the hard-X-ray regime with strong amplified spontaneous coherent emission at a wavelength ten times shorter than previous lasers have achieved.

By combining the use of relatively large crystals and an X-ray free-electron laser, a radiation damage–free three-dimensional structure of a radiation-sensitive protein (bovine cytochrome oxidase) was solved at 1.9-Å resolution.

Conventionally, the smallest object you can see with light at a certain wavelength λ is about λ/2 in size. Researchers have now broken this wavelength–resolution link. Combining ultraviolet and X-ray photons in a nonlinear process enabled the optical properties of diamond to be mapped down to a resolution of λ/380.

X-ray sources such as free-electron lasers offer the potential to study matter at unprecedented spatial and temporal resolution. But that potential is limited by the poor quality of conventional X-ray optical elements. An in situ technique that corrects for wavefront aberrations and allows X-rays to be focused to a spot just 7 nm wide could provide a solution.

Multiphoton superradiance is observed in a nuclear system excited by an X-ray free-electron laser. Tracking the system decay photon by photon shows strong enhancement of the first photon’s decay rate, in good agreement with Dicke’s formulation.

The first observation of a third-order process induced by an X-ray beam from a free-electron laser is realized in germanium using a 5.6-keV X-ray beam. Two-photon absorption is confirmed, suggesting that X-ray analogues of other third-order nonlinear processes may be available for exploitation in X-ray experiments.

Researchers focus 10 keV X-ray free-electron laser radiation to an area of 0.95 µm × 1.20 µm with near-100%-efficiency using reflective optics. This approach increases the fluence by a factor of 40,000 and provides a power density of 6 × 10¹⁷ W cm⁻².