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This study shows that human-induced weakening of the Walker Circulation tends to occur earlier in the middle-upper troposphere than at the surface, attributed to the stronger weakening response to CO₂ radiative forcing in those heights.

When 100 social and behavioural science claims were examined, 34% of reanalyses closely matched the original results, with 74% reaching the same conclusion, revealing limited robustness of single-path analyses and the need to address analytical uncertainty.

The Pacific trade winds have strengthened since the late 1990s, and there has been related strengthening of the atmospheric Walker circulation. Although the impacts of these changes are becoming known, their cause has not been identified. This study, using observations and models, shows that warming of the Atlantic sea surface and corresponding displacement of atmospheric pressure centres are key drivers.

Understanding collective behaviour is an important aspect of managing the pandemic response. Here the authors show in a large global study that participants that reported identifying more strongly with their nation reported greater engagement in public health behaviours and support for public health policies in the context of the pandemic.

Precision oncology requires access to high quality data, as well as the application of current technologies. Here, the authors use federated learning to predict clinical outcomes in anal cancer patients across 16 centres as part of the atomCAT consortium.

Reforestation is a key climate change mitigation strategy, but global maps of its potential are widely criticized. This study shows that addressing those critiques substantially refines estimates of the places with reforestation potential.

An analysis of 24,202 critical cases of COVID-19 identifies potentially druggable targets in inflammatory signalling (JAK1), monocyte–macrophage activation and endothelial permeability (PDE4A), immunometabolism (SLC2A5 and AK5), and host factors required for viral entry and replication (TMPRSS2 and RAB2A).

Changes to the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) will have substantial regional impacts but more remote effects are unclear. Here, model analysis shows that AMOC collapse causes excess heat to accumulate in the tropical south Atlantic Ocean, resulting in atmospheric changes globally.

Accurately characterizing natural versus forced sea surface temperature variability in observations is needed to validate and verify climate models used for projections of future climate change. This study successfully resolves previous large discrepancies in estimated tropical Indo-Pacific twentieth-century trends between observationally based sea surface temperature reconstructions.

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.

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.

cellSTAAR advances noncoding rare variant association analysis by integrating single-cell genomics data.

The loading of the replicative helicase is vital for replication fork assembly. Here the authors identify Mcm4 as the key ATPase in this process and show that helicase ring closure around DNA promotes Mcm4 ATPase dependent Cdt1 release, while defective ring closure leads to complex disassembly.

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.

Model simulations suggest that the 2023–2024 El Niño was mainly driven by oceanic processes and that this type of El Niño may become more frequent with warming.

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.

Atmospheric Walker circulation results in a two-way interaction between decadal-scale sea surface temperature variability in the Atlantic and Pacific, according to pacemaker climate modelling experiments.

This Resource paper presents a global SARS-CoV-2 phylogenetic tree of 4,471,579 high-quality genomes consistently constructed by Viridian, an efficient amplicon-aware assembler.

The loading of the replicative helicase MCM2-7 is vital for replication fork assembly. Here, the authors reconstituted human MCM2-7 loading and identified the roles of Cdc6 in complex resolution and cancer-associated mutations in Mcm3 recruitment.

Whole-genome sequencing analysis of individuals with primary immunodeficiency identifies new candidate disease-associated genes and shows how the interplay between genetic variants can explain the variable penetrance and complexity of the disease.

Chronic infection with SARS-CoV-2 leads to the emergence of viral variants that show reduced susceptibility to neutralizing antibodies in an immunosuppressed individual treated with convalescent plasma.

Drug-induced liver injury is a major cause of patient harm, trial failures, and drug withdrawals. Here, the authors show that a toxicogenomics resource of 300 drugs enables the prediction of liver injury with 88% sensitivity at 100% specificity and reveals mechanisms for safer drug development.

Sera from vaccinated individuals and some monoclonal antibodies show a modest reduction in neutralizing activity against the B.1.1.7 variant of SARS-CoV-2; but the E484K substitution leads to a considerable loss of neutralizing activity.

Topological phases are unusual states of matter whose properties are robust against small perturbations. Using a photonic quantum walk system, Kitagawaet al. simulate one-dimensional topological phases and reveal novel topological phenomena far from the static or adiabatic regimes.

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.

De novo structural variants are an important cause of rare disorders but remain poorly understood. Here, the authors analyse over 12,000 families and reveal the prevalence, diversity, and clinical impact of complex de novo structural variants.

This study found E. coli phylogenetic background shapes TEM-1 beta-lactamase expression and co-amoxiclav resistance. Phylogeny alone shifted isolates from susceptible to resistant, stressing a need for lineage-sensitive genotype-phenotype prediction.

Adherent-invasive strains of E. coli are commonly isolated from patients with Crohn’s disease. Here, the authors show that an AIEC harbours a hybrid Type IV secretion system (T4SS) that mediates pilin polymerization and biofilm formation in vivo.

Data collected from more than 2,000 taxa provide an unparalleled opportunity to quantify how extreme wildfires affect biodiversity, revealing that the largest effects on plants and animals were in areas with frequent or recent past fires and within extensively burnt areas.

A long way from home.

Bacterial type IVa pili are protein filaments used for motility and protein secretion. Here the authors present crystal structures of theGeobacter metallireducensPilB ATPase in two nucleotide states, and suggest a clockwise rotation of the central sub-pores of PilB that would support the assembly of a right-handed helical pilus.

Here the authors develop a genetic priority score to predict side effects by integrating multiple lines of genetic evidence. By applying this score, they provide evidence of known side effects and suggest ones with no clinical trial evidence.

Here, the authors perform large trans-ancestry fine-mapping analyses identifying large numbers of association signals and putative target genes for colorectal cancer risk, advancing our understanding of the genetic and biological basis of this cancer.

Several moons in the outer Solar System have oceans encased beneath an ice shell. If the ice shell thins, ocean pressure decreases. Modelling shows that on Mimas, Enceladus, and Miranda, the ocean can boil. On larger bodies, instead, compressional forces form tectonic features.

Adjuvants are an important component of modern vaccines. Here, the authors employ a phenotypic screen of ~200k compounds and identify PVP-057, a TLR3 agonist with a simple scalable 3-step synthesis, as an adjuvant that induces durable humoral and cellular immunity to varicella-zoster virus (VZV) gE in mice.

Whole-genome sequencing and phenotype data sharing are introduced in a national health system to streamline diagnosis and to discover coding and non-coding variants that cause rare diseases.

Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) onsets in COVID-19 patients with manifestations similar to Kawasaki disease (KD). Here the author probe the peripheral blood transcriptome of MIS-C patients to find signatures related to natural killer (NK) cell activation and CD8+ T cell exhaustion that are shared with KD patients.

The examination of changes in tropical Pacific atmospheric circulation since the mid-nineteenth century using observations and a suite of global climate model experiments reveals a weakening of the Walker circulation, consistent with theoretical predictions.

MultiSTAAR provides a general and flexible statistical framework for functionally informed multi-trait rare variant analysis of biobank-scale sequencing studies by jointly analyzing multiple traits and incorporating annotation information.

What is the state of trust in scientists around the world? To answer this question, the authors surveyed 71,922 respondents in 68 countries and found that trust in scientists is moderately high.

Using well-calibrated statistical methods the authors jointly analyze Undiagnosed Diseases Network genomes, identifying known and novel disease genes. Software is publicly available to support future cross-cohort rare disease discovery efforts.

Determining the emergent climate change signals in the tropical Pacific—mean state and El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO)—is crucial for climate action. Model simulations show that the mean sea surface temperature signal is already detectable, and that mean rainfall and ENSO-related signals could emerge around 2040.

High-depth sequencing of non-cancerous tissue from patients with metastatic cancer reveals single-base mutational signatures of alcohol, smoking and cancer treatments, and reveals how exogenous factors, including cancer therapies, affect somatic cell evolution.

Diversity in medical fields is beneficial to both clinicians and patients, and Nature Reviews Urology is committed to improving the diversity of our specialty and supporting Black and under-represented minority urologists. In this Viewpoint, 12 medical students who are embarking on a career in urology describe their reasons for choosing the specialty, explain what they think can be done to increase the number of Black urologists, and describe what has led them to apply to specific programmes.

Wastewater surveillance could provide a means of monitoring SARS-CoV-2 prevalence that does not rely on testing individuals. Here, the authors report results from England’s national wastewater surveillance program, use it to estimate prevalence, and compare estimates with those from population-based prevalence surveys.