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Birthweight has been found to associate with later-life health outcomes. Here the authors perform a meta-analysis of epigenome-wide association studies of 8,825 neonates from 24 birth cohorts in the Pregnancy And Childhood Epigenetics Consortium, identifying differentially methylated CpGs in neonatal blood that associate with birthweight.

Julie Williams, Michael Owen and colleagues report staged follow-up and meta-analyses of genome-wide association studies for Alzheimer's disease from the GERAD+ consortium. They identify common variants at ABCA7 and MS4A6A/MS4A4E associated with Alzheimer's disease and support for several additional susceptibility loci.

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.

The chronology and mode of parallel evolution remain unclear. Here, the authors compare mid-Holocene and contemporary bottlenose dolphin adaptations between pelagic and coastal ecosystems with paleogenomics, finding rapid adaptation to newly emerged habitat from standing genetic variation.

There is a pressing need for techniques that can be used for the noninvasive assessment of response to therapy and staging of disease. As many pathological conditions are associated with disordered glucose metabolism, such as diabetes, stroke and cancer, Simon Walker-Samuel and his colleagues have developed a noninvasive MRI-based method for imaging glucose uptake in vivo termed glucose chemical exchange saturation transfer (glucoCEST). This potentially cost-effective approach does not require the use of radiolabeled glucose analogs or ionizing radiation and allows nonlabeled glucose to be imaged at physiological quantities.

Injury repair is characterized by the generation of transient cell states important for tissue recovery. Here, the authors present a single cell RNA-seq map of recovery from bleomycin lung injury in mice and uncover a Krt8+ transitional stem cell state that precedes the regeneration of AT1 cells and persists in human lung fibrosis.

Microtubule-destabilizing drugs and oncolytic viruses are two unrelated approaches to battle cancer. Here the authors show that microtubule-destabilizing drugs potentiate the efficiency of oncolytic rhabdoviruses by altering the cytokine production and response of the tumour cells.

Kathryn Lunetta and colleagues report a meta-analysis of 22 genome-wide association studies for age at menopause. They identify 13 loci newly associated with age at natural menopause, including several candidate genes with roles in DNA repair and immune function.

Genome-wide association meta-analyses of waist-to-hip ratio adjusted for body mass index in more than 224,000 individuals identify 49 loci, 33 of which are new and many showing significant sexual dimorphism with a stronger effect in women; pathway analyses implicate adipogenesis, angiogenesis, transcriptional regulation and insulin resistance as processes affecting fat distribution.

Oncolytic viruses can serve as self-replicating anticancer agents. Le Bœuf et al. combine synthetic modelling and molecular biology approaches to create a virus with enhanced oncolytic activity in vitro and in vivodue to its expression of an interferon antagonist.

Reduced glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) is a hallmark of chronic kidney disease. Here, Pattaro et al. conduct a meta-analysis to discover several new loci associated with variation in eGFR and find that genes associated with eGFR loci often encode proteins potentially related to kidney development.

Results for the final phase of the 1000 Genomes Project are presented including whole-genome sequencing, targeted exome sequencing, and genotyping on high-density SNP arrays for 2,504 individuals across 26 populations, providing a global reference data set to support biomedical genetics.

The goal of the 1000 Genomes Project is to provide in-depth information on variation in human genome sequences. In the pilot phase reported here, different strategies for genome-wide sequencing, using high-throughput sequencing platforms, were developed and compared. The resulting data set includes more than 95% of the currently accessible variants found in any individual, and can be used to inform association and functional studies.

Siew et al. using multi-omic, physiological & imaging approaches have demonstrated that spaceflight causes kidney remodelling, suggesting a contribution to kidney stone formation, & that space radiation causes kidney damage & early signs of dysfunction.

Missense variants in RNA-binding proteins underlie many diseases. Here the authors report an oculopharyngeal muscular dystrophy caused by heterozygous frameshift mutations in HNRNPA2B1 that alter its nucleocytoplasmic transport dynamics and result in cytoplasmic accumulation of hnRNPA2 protein.

Designing reliable, scalable and energy efficient data storage systems that can operate in extreme temperatures, remains a challenge. Here, the authors demonstrate a nanoelectromechanical relay that does not exhibit pull-in instability for reliable reprogrammable non-volatile memory operation.

Global environmental change is largely indifferent to political boundaries, but meeting the challenges they pose in the future will inevitably require cross-border cooperation. We talk to David Lehrer, Executive Director at The Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, about how this challenge is at the heart of their academic mission.

Christopher Newton-Cheh and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for blood pressure traits as part of the Global BPgen consortium. They report eight loci with replicated association to systolic and/or diastolic blood pressure, with each also showing association to hypertension.

Daniel Benjamin, Meike Bartels, Philipp Koellinger and colleagues report a genome-wide association meta-analysis of subjective well-being, depressive symptoms and neuroticism. The study leverages a large sample size together with genetic correlations between the phenotypes to identify, with high confidence, loci associated with each phenotype.

A network of parallel ridges on the northwestern border of Sputnik Planitia on Pluto are the traces of debris material deposited by a glaciation of icy nitrogen that happened early in Pluto’s history, and left there once the N₂ ice disappeared by sublimation.

Comprehensive integration of gene expression with epigenetic features is needed to understand the transition of kidney cells from health to injury. Here, the authors integrate dual single nucleus RNA expression and chromatin accessibility, DNA methylation, and histone modifications to decipher the chromatin landscape of the kidney in reference and adaptive injury cell states, identifying a transcription factor network of ELF3, KLF6, and KLF10 which regulates adaptive repair and maladaptive failed repair.

Sven van der Lee, Julie Williams, Gerard Schellenberg and colleagues identify rare coding variants in PLCG2, ABI3 and TREM2 associated with Alzheimer's disease. These genes are highly expressed in microglia and provide additional evidence that the microglia-mediated immune response contributes to the development of Alzheimer's disease.

Julie Williams and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for Alzheimer's disease. They identify variants at the CLU and PICALM loci associated with susceptibility to late-onset Alzheimer's disease.

Recording from neurosurgical patients undergoing epilepsy monitoring, the authors find specific responses to pictures of animals in the right amygdala.

The mechanical properties of the metazoan nucleus can be influenced by the nuclear lamina. Here, Schreiner et al.show that untethering chromatin from the inner nuclear membrane results in highly deformable, softer nuclei, revealing an important role for chromatin in modulating nuclear mechanics.

Carotid intima-media thickness (cIMT) and plaque are associated with subclinical atherosclerosis and coronary heart disease (CHD). Here, the authors identify and prioritize genetic loci for cIMT and plaque by GWAS and colocalization approaches and further demonstrate genetic correlation with CHD and stroke.

MPHOSPH8 loss inhibits acute myeloid leukemia (AML) development by reactivating LINE-1 retrotransposons. LINE-1 suppression is associated with therapy resistance and poor prognosis in patients with AML.

Alternative RNA splicing varies across the brain. Its mapping at single cell resolution is unclear. Here, the authors provide a spatial and single-cell splicing atlas reporting brain region- and cell type-specific expression of different isoforms in the postnatal mouse brain.

John Perry, Ken Ong and colleagues analyze genotype data on ∼370,000 women and identify 389 independent signals that associate with age at menarche, implicating ∼250 genes. Their analyses suggest causal inverse associations, independent of BMI, between puberty timing and risks for breast and endometrial cancers in women and prostate cancer in men.

We present a consensus-based checklist to improve and document the transparency of research reports in social and behavioural research. An accompanying online application allows users to complete the form and generate a report that they can submit with their manuscript or post to a public repository.

A new GWAS of schizophrenia (11,260 cases and 24,542 controls) and meta-analysis identifies 50 new associated loci and 145 loci in total. The common variant association signal is highly enriched in mutation-intolerant genes and in regions under strong background selection.

Using a dynamic time-course approach to model developmental trajectories in autism spectrum disorder, Schafer et al. identified aberrant gene network dynamics as a part of an ongoing process that is primed early in development.

Single nuclei RNA-seq has been used to characterize transcriptional signature of environment-related activity in cells of the dentate gyrus. Here the authors use this approach to show that whether a neuron will be reactivated in response to re-exposure to a previous environment can be predicted by its transcriptional signature.

The theme of UN World Wildlife Day 2017 was ‘Listen to the young voices’. We talk to Mya-Rose Craig (@BirdgirlUK), a young naturalist, environmentalist and writer, who was appointed European Green Capital Ambassador for her home town of Bristol, UK, in 2015.

Paul Elliott, Martin Tobin, Cornelia van Duijn and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for pulse pressure and mean arterial pressure, identifying six new loci influencing these two traits.

Patients with oligometastases who develop a small number of metastatic lesions might achieve long-term survival with the use of ablative surgery or stereotactic radiotherapy. More patients are receiving aggressive treatment for oligometastatic disease, yet long-term survival might not be due to the treatments themselves, but rather to the selection of patients with slow-growing indolent disease. The authors examine the key evidence supporting or refuting the existence of an oligometastatic state and its appropriate treatment.