This press release contains:
· Summaries of newsworthy papers:
Physics: Tropical cyclones obey the law
Nature: Evolutionary genomics: Chicken surprise
Geoscience: Sea-level patterns in the Indian Ocean
Immunology: A successful pathogen
Genetics: Ventricular fibrillation during myocardial infarction
Chemistry: Seeing uranium nitride in a new light
Chemical Biology: GPCR assemblies in view
Immunology: Regulating development with RNA-binding proteins
Chemical Biology: Protein Structure 101
And finally…Neuroscience: Mixing up the training regimen
· Mention of papers to be published at the same time with the same embargo
· Geographical listing of authors
PDFs of all the papers mentioned on this release can be found in the relevant journal’s section of http://press.nature.com. Press contacts for the Nature journals are listed at the end of this release.
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[1] Physics: Tropical cyclones obey the law
DOI: 10.1038/nphys1725
The discovery of an empirical law that governs tropical cyclones is reported online in Nature Physics this week. The effect of climate change on tropical cyclones is highly controversial, because such storms are not fully understood; therefore this work has implications for the debate.
Prior to satellite imaging of storms, historical records were incomplete. Álvaro Corral and co-workers solve this problem by focusing on the total energy released by individual storms, for which the methods developed for the physics of critical behaviour are available. They find that although small storms greatly outnumber large storms, the relative proportion of small to large ones is the same across four different ocean basins over several decades in time. They also note that the maximum energy is set by the size of the basin.
What is affected by the rising sea surface temperature is the proportion of large cyclones. However, despite the increased hurricane activity in the North Atlantic during 1995–2005, individual hurricanes have not released more energy when compared to other active periods before 1970.
Author contact:
Álvaro Corral (Centre de Recerca Matemàtica, Barcelona, Spain)
Tel: +34 9 358 12201
E-mail: [email protected]
[2] Nature: Evolutionary genomics: Chicken surprise
DOI: 10.1038/nature09172
For nearly 100 years, sex-chromosome evolution has been thought to involve dramatic modification of sex-specific chromosomes but only modest changes to the chromosomes shared by both sexes. This idea has been turned on its head by a study in this week’s Nature.
In birds, the sex chromosomes of males are ZZ and females are ZW, whereas in mammals, males are XY and females are XX. So, according to the theory, W and Y will have been much more heavily modified by evolution than Z and X.
Yet this isn’t what David Page and colleagues found on sequencing the chicken Z chromosome — the first Z chromosome from any animal to be sequenced. In fact, on comparing the chicken Z chromosome with the human X chromosome, and then comparing both to the genomes of four teleost fish species, Page and his group have unearthed several surprises.
The Z and the X chromosomes appear to have evolved independently from separate pairs of ordinary (non-sex) chromosomes. Yet over the course of evolution, both have been substantially remodelled in convergent ways to become specialized sex chromosomes. In both, a high density of interspersed repeats and long distances between coding sequences have resulted in a relatively low density of genes. Also, both chromosomes have gained multiple copies of gene families that are expressed in testis.
Author contact:
David Page (Whitehead Institute, Cambridge, MA, USA)
Tel: +1 617 258 5203
E-mail: [email protected]
[3] Geoscience: Sea-level patterns in the Indian Ocean
DOI: 10.1038/ngeo901
The coasts of Indonesia, Sumatra and the north Indian Ocean could be exposed to significantly higher sea-level rise than the global average, whereas the Seychelles Islands and the eastern coasts of Kenya and Tanzania could see little or no change. This study, published online in Nature Geoscience, notes patterns of regional sea-level change that have been detected for the past half century, and suggests that they are linked to human-induced climate warming.
Weiqing Han and colleagues investigated regional trends in Indian Ocean sea levels since the 1960s, using ocean observations, satellite data and climate-model simulations. They identified a distinct pattern of sea-level change, with a sea-level fall in the south tropical Indian Ocean and an increase elsewhere. The researchers attribute these regional differences to an increasingly vigorous atmospheric overturning circulation in both north–south and east–west directions. This is partly caused by climate warming, suggesting that a similar pattern of sea-level change may occur in the future.
Author contact:
Weiqing Han (University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA)
Tel: +1 303 735 3079
E-mail: [email protected]
[4] Immunology: A successful pathogen
DOI: 10.1038/ni.1904
How Mycobacterium tuberculosis—which causes tuberculosis—regulates host cell death during infection greatly alters immune cell responses, according to a report published online in Nature Immunology.
Cells can die through two distinct processes. Apoptosis preserves membrane integrity of the cell, while in necrosis the cellular membrane is broken and its content can reach surrounding cells. Pathogens manipulate these cellular death pathways to ensure their survival and propagation. M. tuberculosis, one of the most efficient human pathogens, is known to inhibit apoptosis and promote necrosis of its host cells—the lung macrophages; necrosis allows the bacteria to spread to healthy neighboring cells.
Samuel Behar and colleagues show that apoptosis is beneficial for the host not just by containing pathogens, but also because vesicles derived from apoptotic cells can enhance the activation of T cells, the main immune system apparatus that fight M. tuberculosis infections. Thus, by inhibiting host cell apoptosis, virulent strains of M. tuberculosis enhance pathogen spread and delay the recruitment of specialized killer cells to the site of infection, with direct consequences in controlling bacterial burden in the lung.
Author contact:
Samuel Behar (Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard
Medical School, Boston, MA, USA)
Tel: +1 617 525 1033
E-mail: [email protected]
[5] Genetics: Ventricular fibrillation during myocardial infarction
DOI: 10.1038/ng.623
Genetic variants associated with ventricular fibrillation (VF)—uncoordinated contractions of the ventricles in the heart—during myocardial infarction are reported this week in Nature Genetics. This suggests new pathways that may be involved in ventricular fibrillation and sudden cardiac death.
VF occurring during an acute myocardial infarction is one of the leading causes of cardiac-related and overall mortality. Connie Bezzina and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for susceptibility to ventricular fibrillation in 972 individuals with a first time acute myocardial infarction. They replicated these results in additional studies including 146 out-of-hospital cardiac arrest patients that had confirmed myocardial infarction and VF when admitted to the hospital, and 391 individuals with a history of myocardial infarction. Bezzina and colleagues identify a genomic locus associated with VF in myocardial infarction that has not previously been implicated in cardiac related traits.
Author contact:
Connie Bezzina (Academic Medical Center, Amsterdam, Netherlands)
Tel: +31 20 5665403
E-mail: [email protected]
[6] Chemistry: Seeing uranium nitride in a new light
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.705
A uranium complex that is activated by exposure to light to lose nitrogen and produce a uranium nitride complex is reported in a study published online this week in Nature Chemistry. The ability to generate and study well-defined terminal uranium nitride compounds could provide important insights into generating and reprocessing a potentially alternative form of nuclear fuel.
Nuclear power is a key element of our energy supply and uranium nitride is a promising form nuclear fuel that has great potential for the future of nuclear power; however, very little is known about the uranium–nitrogen triple bond, which is a key part of the material.
Jaqueline Kiplinger and colleagues created a uranium–nitrogen complex that interacts with light to generate a terminal uranium–nitrogen triple bond. This is the first such compound to be generated using light. The short-lived complex is reactive and cleaves a strong carbon–hydrogen bond to form new nitrogen–hydrogen and nitrogen–carbon bonds. This demonstrates that the uranium–nitrogen triple bond is not inert and can undergo reactions with strong bonds.
Author contact:
Jaqueline Kiplinger (Los Alamos National Laboratory, NM, USA)
Tel: +1 505 665 9553
E-mail: [email protected]
[7] Chemical Biology: GPCR assemblies in view
DOI: 10.1038/nchembio.396
Methodological improvements to fluorescence microscopy have confirmed the presence of assemblies of G protein-coupled receptor (GPCRs)—the largest protein family—in isolated mammary gland for the first time in a study published online this week in Nature Chemical Biology. Since GPCRs play a central role in cellular communication and a number of diseases and disease treatments, understanding the proximity of GPCRs in the physiological environment will provide important new insights for therapy.
The presence of GPCR assemblies in tissue was previously unconfirmed due to the difficulty of showing them in a native environment. Thierry Durroux, Jean-Philippe Pin, Bernard Mouillac and colleagues now report improved fluorescently labeled ligands allowed the detection of several receptor dimers in the mammary gland tissues. The authors used a microscopic technique that allows observation of the pairing of fluorescent molecules at specific time points. This methodology allows studies on GPCRs to be carried out in tissues, and does not require transgenic expression of GPCRs.
Author contacts:
Thierry Durroux, (Institut de Génomique Fonctionnelle,
Montpellier, France)
Tel: +33 467 142 916
E-mail: [email protected]
Jean-Philippe Pin, (Institut de Génomique Fonctionnelle, Montpellier, France)
Tel: +33 467 142 916
E-mail: [email protected]
Bernard Mouillac, (Institut de Génomique Fonctionnelle, Montpellier, France)
Tel: +33 467 142 916
E-mail: [email protected]
[8] Immunology: Regulating development with RNA-binding proteins
DOI: 10.1038/ni.1901
One important mechanism by which protein production in cells can be directed is through the action of RNA-binding proteins (RBPs). A study, published online this week in Nature Immunology, identifies for the first time how RBPs regulate the normal maturation of one of the immune system’s key arms, the T cells.
Martin Turner and colleagues demonstrates that mice lacking particular RBPs show aberrant development of T cells. The absence of these RBPs furthermore results in the appearance of an aggressive type of leukemia. The authors identified the target of these RBPs as Notch1—a key protein involved in controlling T cell development. Specific RBPs bind to elements of Notch1 RNA and thereby control expression of the Notch1 protein. These findings could shed light on T cell development and the prevention of malignant transformation.
Author contact:
Martin Turner (The Babraham Institute, Cambridge, UK)
Tel: +44 1223 496403
E-mail: [email protected]
[9] Chemical Biology: Protein Structure 101
DOI: 10.1038/nchembio.406
A comparison of computational calculations and a survey of high resolution structures confirm the presence of a new interaction that is globally relevant to protein structure. The results, published online this week in Nature Chemical Biology, prove that an unexpected interaction along the protein backbone, called an n→pi* interaction is fundamental to protein structure, stability and folding.
Ronald T. Raines, Derek N. Woolfson and colleagues used calculations to find the most likely candidates for significant
n→pi* interactions and then analyzed a database of high resolution crystal structures. They found compelling evidence that n→pi* interactions are ever-present in proteins, particularly in basic units of secondary structure, such as alpha-helices and poly-proline helices. The importance of these local, n→pi* interactions in proteins is essential to understanding the mechanisms of protein folding and stabilizing folded protein structures.
Author contacts:
Ronald T. Raines, (University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI, USA)
Tel: +1 608 262 8588
E-mail: [email protected]
Derek N. Woolfson, (University of Bristol, UK)
Tel: +44 117 954 6347
E-mail: [email protected]
[10] And finally…Neuroscience: Mixing up the training regimen
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2596
The training regimen used to learn a motor skill determines where in the brain the memory of the skill is stored, reports a study published online this week in Nature Neuroscience.
Carolee Winstein and colleagues trained participants to push a lever to one of four targets. In one condition, they practiced one target at a time, repeating the same movement many times before moving on to the next target. In the other condition, the participants practiced moving to all four targets during the same training session.
After training, transcranial magnetic stimulation—a noninvasive procedure that disrupts brain activity—was applied over either the primary motor cortex—at the top of the brain—or the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex—at the front part of the brain—to selectively disrupt the area. Disruption of primary motor cortex impaired only learning by repeated movements, whereas disruption of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex disrupted only the interleaved training. These results suggest that the brain areas supporting the retention of motor skills may depend on the training regimen under which they were learned.
Author contact:
Carolee Winstein (University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA)
Tel: +1 323 442 2903
E-mail: [email protected]
*************************************************
Items from other Nature journals to be published online at the same time and with the same embargo:
NATURE
[11] Histone H4K20/H3K9 demethylase PHF8 regulates zebrafish brain and craniofacial development
DOI: 10.1038/nature09261
[12] PHF8 mediates histone H4 lysine 20 demethylation events involved in cell cycle progression
DOI: 10.1038/nature09272
[13] A novel pathway regulates memory and plasticity via SIRT1 and miR-134
DOI: 10.1038/nature09271
NATURE BIOTECHNOLOGY
[14] Genome sequence of the model mushroom Schizophyllum commune
DOI: 10.1038/nbt.1643
NATURE CELL BIOLOGY
[15] Telomere-independent Rap1 is an IKK adaptor and regulates NF-kB-dependent gene expression
DOI: 10.1038/ncb2080
[16] Mammalian RAP1 controls telomere function and gene expression through binding to telomeric and extratelomeric sites
DOI: 10.1038/ncb2081
[17] Germline self-renewal requires cyst stem cells but stat regulates niche adhesion in Drosophila testes
DOI: 10.1038/ncb2086
NATURE CHEMISTRY
[18] The role of steps in surface catalysis and reaction oscillations
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.728
[19] Highly enantioselective synthesis and cellular evaluation of spirooxindoles inspired by natural products
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.730
[20] Crystal structure of a metal ion-bound oxoiron(IV) complex and implications for biological electron transfer
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.731
NATURE GENETICS
[21] Genome-wide association study identifies sequence variant within the DAB2IP gene conferring susceptibility to abdominal aortic aneurysm
DOI: 10.1038/ng.622
[22] Genome-wide association studies identify IL23R-IL12RB2 and IL10 as Behçet’s disease susceptibility loci
DOI: 10.1038/ng.624
[23] Genome-wide association study identifies variants in the MHC class I, IL10, and IL23R-IL12RB2 regions associated with Behçet’s disease
DOI: 10.1038/ng.625
NATURE IMMUNOLOGY
[24] N-linked glycosylation selectively regulates autonomous precursor BCR function
DOI:10.1038/ni.1903
NATURE MATERIALS
[25] Multimaterial Piezoelectric Fibres
DOI: 10.1038/nmat2792
[26] Perpendicular anisotropy CoFeB-MgO magnetic tunnel junction
DOI: 10.1038/nmat2804
[27] Aluminum at terapascal pressures
DOI: 10.1038/nmat2796
NATURE MEDICINE
[28] Lipid accumulation and dendritic cell dysfunction in cancer
DOI: 10.1038/nm.2172
NATURE METHODS
[29] Imaging brain electric signals with genetically-targeted fluorescence protein probes
DOI: 10.1038/nmeth.1479
[30] Genome-wide chromatin maps derived from limited numbers of hematopoietic progenitors
DOI: 10.1038/nmeth.1478
NATURE NANOTECHNOLOGY
[31] Rationally designed logic integration of regulatory signals in mammalian cells
DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2010.135
NATURE NEUROSCIENCE
[32] Adaptive, behaviorally-gated, persistent encoding of task-relevant auditory information in ferret frontal cortex
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2598
[33] Visualizing retinotopic half-wave rectified input to the motion detection circuitry of Drosophila
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2595
NATURE PHOTONICS
[34] Non-Gaussian Operation Based on Photon- Subtraction Using a Photon-Number-Resolving Detector at a Telecommunication Wavelength
DOI: 10.1038/nphoton.2010.161
[35] Two-photon interference of photons from electrically tunable remote quantum dots
DOI: 10.1038/nphoton.2010.158
[36] Broadband terahertz wave remote sensing using coherent manipulation of fluorescence from asymmetrically ionized gases
DOI: 10.1038/nphoton.2010.165
NATURE PHYSICS
[37] Excited-state spin coherence of a single nitrogen-vacancy centre in diamond
DOI: 10.1038/nphys1716
[38] Instability in a quantum spin liquid in an organic triangular-lattice antiferromagnet
DOI: 10.1038/nphys1715
NATURE STRUCTURAL & MOLECULAR BIOLOGY
[39] Lys11-linked ubiquitin chains adopt compact conformations and are preferentially hydrolyzed by the deubiquitinase Cezanne
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1873
[40] Conserved Structural Elements in the V3 Crown of HIV-1 gp120
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1861
[41] Structural basis of Fic mediated adenylylation
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1867
[42] Nuclear-localized tiny RNAs are associated with transcription initiation and splice sites in metazoans
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1841
*************************************************
GEOGRAPHICAL LISTING OF AUTHORS
The following list of places refers to the whereabouts of authors on the papers numbered in this release. The listing may be for an author's main affiliation, or for a place where they are working temporarily. Please see the PDF of the paper for full details.
AUSTRALIA
Camperdown: 32
St. Lucia: 42
AUSTRIA
Linz: 21
BELGIUM
Liege: 21
CANADA
Montreal: 4
Ottawa: 21
Quebec: 36
CHINA
Nanjing: 13
CZECH REPUBLIC
Praha: 7
DENMARK
Copenhagen: 21
Gentofte: 21
Odense: 21
Viborg: 21
FINLAND
Kuopio: 21
Turku: 14
FRANCE
Grenoble: 18
Marseille: 14
Montpellier: 7
Paris: 5, 29
Strasbourg: 22
Villeneuve d’Ascq: 7
GERMANY
Berlin: 8
Dortmund: 19
Freiburg: 24
Goettingen: 14
Jena: 14
Konstanz: 19
Martinsried: 33
Munich: 5, 32
Neuherberg: 5
Teltow: 8
ICELAND
Akureyri: 21
Reykjavik: 21
ISRAEL
Jerusalem: 23
ITALY
Rome: 21
Verona: 21
JAPAN
Hokkaido: 22
Ibaraki: 35
Kanagawa: 22
Kyoto: 38
Nagano: 22
Osaka: 20
Saitama: 29, 38
Sendai: 26
Tokyo: 22, 26, 35
KOREA
Daejeon: 23
Seoul: 20, 22, 23
NETHERLANDS
Amsterdam: 5
Eindhoven: 5
Groningen: 21
Leiden: 5, 14, 18
Nijmegen: 21
Utrecht: 14, 21
NEW ZEALAND
Dunedin: 21
SPAIN
Barcelona: 1, 21
Bellaterra: 18
Madrid: 16, 24
Murcia: 21
Valencia: 21
SWEDEN
Malmo: 21
Stockholm: 21
SWITZERLAND
Basel: 31
Lausanne: 8
St. Gallen: 14
TURKEY
Istanbul: 23
UNITED KINGDOM
Birmingham: 23
Bristol: 9
Cardiff: 21
Cambridge: 8, 27, 34, 39
Durham: 21
London: 21, 23, 27, 28
Manchester: 23
Oxford: 16
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Arizona
Phoenix: 15
California
Berkeley: 37, 41, 42
La Jolla: 12, 15, 40, 41
Los Angeles: 5, 10
Riverside: 14
San Diego: 15
San Francisco: 8
Santa Barbara: 37
Santa Clara: 11
Walnut Creek: 14
Colorado
Boulder: 3
Connecticut
Fairfield: 14
Florida
Gainesville: 15
Miami: 5
Tampa: 28
Georgia
Atlanta: 21
Decatur: 21
Illinois
Edwardsville: 14
Iowa
Ames: 37
Kansas
Pittsburgh: 21, 28
Maryland
Baltimore: 5, 7
Bethesda: 11, 23
College Park: 32
Massachusetts
Boston: 4, 11, 30, 31
Cambridge: 2, 11, 13, 25, 30, 31
Missouri
Girardeau: 14
St Louis: 2
New Hampshire
Hanover: 14
Lebanon: 21
New Jersey
Princeton: 11
New Mexico
Albuquerque: 25
Los Alamos: 6
New York
New York: 7, 8, 12, 36, 40
Schenectady: 14
Ohio
Columbus: 3
Toledo: 7
Pennsylvania
Danville: 21
Philadelphia: 17, 21
Tennessee
Nashville: 5
Texas
College Station: 11
Houston: 23
Richardson: 31
Washington
Richland: 14
Wisconsin
Madison: 9
PRESS CONTACTS…
For media inquiries relating to embargo policy for all the Nature Research Journals:
Rachel Twinn (Nature London)
Tel: +44 20 7843 4658
E-mail: [email protected]
Neda Afsarmanesh (Nature New York)
Tel: +1 212 726 9231
E-mail: [email protected]
Ruth Francis (Head of Press, Nature, London)
Tel: +44 20 7843 4562
E-mail: [email protected]
For media inquiries relating to editorial content/policy for the Nature Research Journals, please contact the journals individually:
Nature Biotechnology (New York)
Michael Francisco
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Nature Cell Biology (London)
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Tel: +44 20 7843 4656
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Nature Chemical Biology (Boston)
Sarah Daniels
Tel: +1 617 475 9241
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Chemistry (London)
Stuart Cantrill
Tel: +44 20 7014 4018
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Genetics (New York)
Myles Axton
Tel: +1 212 726 9324
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Geoscience (London)
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Tel: +44 20 7843 4042
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Nature Immunology (New York)
Laurie Dempsey
Tel: +1 212 726 9372
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Nature Materials (London)
Vincent Dusastre
Tel: +44 20 7843 4531
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Nature Medicine (New York)
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Nature Methods (New York)
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Tel: +1 212 726 9627
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Nature Nanotechnology (London)
Peter Rodgers
Tel: +44 20 7014 4019
Email: [email protected]
Nature Neuroscience (New York)
Kalyani Narasimhan
Tel: +1 212 726 9319
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Nature Photonics (Tokyo)
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Tel: +81 33267 8776
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Nature Physics (London)
Alison Wright
Tel: +44 20 7843 4555
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Structural & Molecular Biology (New York)
Sabbi Lall
Tel: +1 212 726 9326
E-mail: [email protected]
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