This press release contains:
• Summaries of newsworthy papers:
Neuroscience: Boosting regeneration in the mouse spinal cord
Genetics: Variants associated with meningococcal disease
Genetics: Variants associated with tuberculosis
Chemical Biology: Metaling in Meiosis
Nature: Addicted to microRNA?
Chemical Biology: Biotin’s mystery solved
And finally…Methods: Making maps of oxygen in the brain
• 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.
Warning: This document, and the Nature journal papers to which it refers, may contain information that is price sensitive (as legally defined, for example, in the UK
Criminal Justice Act 1993 Part V) with respect to publicly quoted companies.
Anyone dealing in securities using information contained in this document, or
in advance copies of a Nature journal’s content, may be guilty of insider trading under the US Securities Exchange Act of 1934.
PICTURES: To obtain artwork from any of the journals, you must first obtain permission from the copyright holder (if named) or author of the research paper in question (if not).
NOTE: Once a paper is published, the digital object identifier (DOI) number can be used to retrieve the abstract and full text from the journal web site (abstracts are available to everyone, full text is available only to subscribers). To do this, add the DOI to the following URL: http://dx.doi.org/ (For example, http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ng730). For more information about DOIs and Advance Online Publication, see http://www.nature.com/ng/aop/.
HYPE: We take great care not to hype the papers mentioned on our press releases, but are sometimes accused of doing so. If you ever consider that a story has been hyped, please do not hesitate to contact us at [email protected], citing the specific example.
PLEASE CITE THE SPECIFIC NATURE JOURNAL AND WEBSITE AS THE SOURCE OF THE FOLLOWING ITEMS. IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO THE APPROPRIATE JOURNAL’S WEBSITE.
[1] Neuroscience: Boosting regeneration in the mouse spinal cord
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2603
The brake which halts the growth of young nerve fibers in adult mammals can be released by genetically inhibiting or abolishing a particular enzyme in the injured nerve cells. The work, online in Nature Neuroscience this week, suggests that targeting these enzymes may be beneficial to treat spinal cord injury.
Zhigang He and his colleagues studied a model of spinal cord injury in mice, and found that the activity of the growth- promoting enzyme mTOR was very low in injured adult neurons in the corticospinal tract. Increasing mTOR activity by genetically blocking its regulator, the enzyme PTEN, increased both the sprouting of the remaining intact nerve fibers and the ability of the injured nerve fibers themselves to re-grow and reconnect with nerve cells below the injury.
The authors did not examine whether the new connections formed by these regenerating nerve fibers translate to functional recovery or improved mobility and it remains to be seen if these findings can be effectively translated to humans. Nonetheless, this work suggests that drugs targeting the regulatory mechanisms that limit mTOR activity in the adult nervous systems may be beneficial to treat spinal cord injury
Author contact:
Zhigang He (Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA)
Tel: +1 617 919 2353
E-mail: [email protected]
[2] Genetics: Variants associated with meningococcal disease
DOI: 10.1038/ng.640
Genetic variants associated with susceptibility to meningococcal disease are reported this week in Nature Genetics. Meningococcal disease, caused by infection with the bacterium Neisseria meningitidis, is more common in younger ages and is associated with a high mortality rate when untreated.
Sonia Davila and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for
meningococcal disease in 475 cases from the UK with replication in two additional populations from Western and Southern Europe. They identify a genomic region
associated with host susceptibility that includes CFH—a regulator of the alternative complement pathway, part of the innate immune response. CFH binds to the bacterium N. meningitidis and is involved with the host’s immune response to infection.
Author contact:
Sonia Davila (Genome Institute of Singapore, Singapore)
Tel: +65 680 88203
E-mail: [email protected]
[3] Genetics: Variants associated with tuberculosis
DOI: 10.1038/ng.639
Genetic variants associated with tuberculosis susceptibility are reported this week in Nature Genetics. This represents one of the few genome-wide association studies in African populations to convincingly identify genetic variants associated with susceptibility to an infectious disease.
Tuberculosis has an estimated global annual incidence of 9 million, and 1.3
million deaths are attributed to active disease. The highest burden of disease
is found in developing countries of Africa and South-EastAsia.
Adrian Hill and colleagues report a genome-wide association for pulmonary tuberculosis, in a combined group of 11,425 individuals from Ghana and The Gambia. They identify a single genomic region associated with progression to disease.
Author contact:
Adrian Hill (Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, Oxford, UK)
Tel: +44 1865 287575
E-mail: [email protected]
[4] Chemical Biology: Metaling in Meiosis
DOI: 10.1038/nchembio.419
Zinc plays an important role in oocyte maturation reports a study published online this week in Nature Chemical Biology. Though these are early stage results, Understanding zinc’s role in oocyte maturation could lead to advances in fertility treatment in future studies.
Zinc, copper, and iron are essential components of most cells and there is
mounting evidence that cells maintain total concentrations of these metals
within a conserved range. However, it has been difficult to determine the
concentration and roles of essential metals for rare cells including mammalian oocytes.
Teresa Woodruff, Thomas O’Halloran, and colleagues found that in mouse
oocytes the zinc acquired during meiotic maturation—the process by which
fertile eggs are formed—is crucial for the late stages of oocyte formation.
The study also found that the oocyte’s total zinc content is an order of
magnitude larger than its iron or copper content, and it rises even higher at a
specific stage of meiotic maturation before decreasing again.
Author contact:
Teresa K. Woodruff (Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA)
Tel: +1 312 503 2503
E-mail: [email protected]
Thomas V. O’Halloran (Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA)
Tel: +1 847 644 9410
E-mail: [email protected]
[5] Nature: Addicted to microRNA?
DOI: 10.1038/nature09284
Overexpression of a small RNA molecule called miR-21 can cause cancer, a mouse study in this week’s Nature suggests. Therapies that successfully inactivate the microRNA (miRNA) may prove useful in many different types of cancer.
Mice with elevated levels of miR-21 rapidly develop lymphoma, Frank Slack and colleagues show. But when the miRNA is ‘switched off’, the tumours regress in just a few days.
The results suggest that miR-21 is a bona fide oncogene, a gene that causes normal cells to become cancerous, and hints that tumour cells may become ‘addicted’ to
these oncomiRs — here, cancerous cells are dependent on miR-21 for their survival. Unusually high levels of miR-21 are found in many different tumour types including colorectal, lung, breast and pancreatic cancer. And although many different genetic mutations are present in each of these tumours, the study suggests that strategies targeting but a single miRNA may have therapeutic value.
Author contact:
Frank Slack (Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA)
Tel: +1 203 432 3492
E-mail: [email protected]
[6] Chemical Biology: Biotin’s mystery solved
DOI: 10.1038/nchembio.420
How biotin—a B-complex vitamin—is biosynthesized is presented in an article published online this week in Nature Chemical Biology. Though biotin was discovered over 70 years ago, the early steps of biotin synthesis have long been an enigma; these results will allow biotin to be produced through bacterial fermentations.
Biotin is an essential nutrient for life as it plays a key role in the metabolism of carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins. Two genes involved in the biosynthesis of biotin had been previously identified: BioC and BioH. However, their functions as anticipated from bioinformatics analysis did not fit with the expected steps necessary for the creation of biotin.
John Cronan and colleagues have discovered that these two genes don’t complete the transformations of biotin; rather they modify a biotin precursor to allow other cellular machinery to complete the steps.
Author contact:
John E. Cronan, (University of Illinois, Urbana, IL, USA)
Tel: +1 217 333 7919
E-mail: [email protected]
[7] And finally…Methods: Making maps of oxygen in the brain
DOI 10.1038/nmeth.1490
A method for noninvasive measurement of oxygen levels in The brain of living rodents is published this week in Nature Methods. This approach will allow for more detailed studies of vascular regulation and metabolic function in the living brain, in health and disease.
The brain maintains high levels of metabolism, which are sustained by the consumption of large amounts of oxygen. Proper oxygenation is critical for brain function, and it is therefore of high interest to study oxygen delivery to different parts of the brain. Existing methods for mapping oxygen levels in the brain are either invasive and can cause damage or suffer from low spatial resolution.
Using a two-photon–excitable phosphorescent probe either introduced into the vasculature or directly injected into the brain, David Boas and colleagues mapped oxygen deep into the tissue of rodent brains. The phosphorescence of this probe is
quenched by oxygen, such that the lifetime of the signal can be used to read out oxygen levels. The authors use this to map oxygen levels in multiple locations
within both blood vessels and tissue of living rodent brains, at microscopic
resolution and at depths of several hundred micrometers. They examine the
effects of transient hypoxia on brain oxygen levels.
Author contact:
David A. Boas (Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA, USA)
Tel: +1 617 724 0130
E-mail: [email protected]
*********************************************************************
Items from other Nature journals to be published online at the same time and
with the same embargo:
Nature
[8] MICU1 encodes a mitochondrial EF hand protein required for Ca21 uptake
DOI: 10.1038/nature09358
NATURE CELL BIOLOGY
[9] Dissecting the molecular architecture of integrin adhesion sites by cryo-electron tomography
DOI: 10.1038/ncb2095
NATURE CHEMISTRY
[10] Kinetic resolution of constitutional isomers controlled by selective protection inside a supramolecular nanocapsule
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.751
[11] Efficient water oxidation at carbon nanotube–polyoxometalate electrocatalytic
interfaces
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.761
[12] Raising the cycling stability of aqueous lithium-ion batteries by eliminating oxygen in the electrolyte
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.763
[13] Charge transfer to solvent identified using dark channel fluorescence-yield L-edge spectroscopy
DOI: 10.1038/nchem.768
NATURE GENETICS
[14] Association of IFIH1 and other autoimmunity risk alleles with selective IgA deficiency
DOI: 10.1038/ng.644
[15] Germline CBL mutations cause developmental abnormalities and predispose to juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia
DOI: 10.1038/ng.641
NATURE GEOSCIENCE
[16] Divergent trends in land and ocean temperature in the Southern Ocean over the past 18,000 years
DOI: 10.1038/ngeo931
NATURE IMMUNOLOGY
[17] The human cytomegalovirus microRNA miR-UL112 acts synergistically with a cellular microRNA to escape immune elimination
DOI: 10.1038/ni.1916
[18] Complement regulator CD46 temporally regulates cytokine production by conventional and unconventional T cells
DOI: 10.1038/ni.1917
NATURE MATERIALS
[19] Designer spoof surface plasmon structures collimate terahertz laser beams
DOI: 10.1038/nmat2822
[20] Low-field magnetoelectric effect at room temperature
DOI: 10.1038/nmat2826
Nature MEDICINE
[21] Transgenic mice with a diverse human T cell antigen receptor repertoire
DOI: 10.1038/nm.2197
NATURE METHODS
[22] CellCognition: time-resolved phenotype annotation in high-throughput live cell imaging
DOI: 10.1038/nmeth.1486
[23] Spontaneous network activity visualized by ultra-sensitive Ca2+ indicators, yellow Cameleon-Nano
DOI: 10.1038/nmeth.1488
[24] Live cell super-resolution imaging with trimethoprim conjugates
DOI: 10.1038/nmeth.1489
NATURE NANOTECHNOLOGY
[25] Nanomechanical mass sensing and stiffness spectrometry based on two-dimensional vibrations of resonant nanowires
DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2010.151
[26] Repeated administrations of carbon nanotubes in male mice cause reversible testis damage without affecting fertility
DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2010.153
[27] Very large magnetoresistance in grapheme nanoribbons
DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2010.154
Nature NEUROSCIENCE
[28] A calcineurin/AKAP complex is required for NMDA receptor-dependent LTD
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2613
[29] GABAergic circuits control stimulus-instructed receptive field development in the optic tectum
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2612
[30] SRF binding to SRE 6.9 in the Arc promoter is essential for the late phase of LTD in cultured cerebellar Purkinje cells
DOI: 10.1038/nn.2611
NATURE PHOTONICS
[31] Time-of-flight measurement with femtosecond light
DOI: 10.1038/nphoton.2010.175
Nature PHYSICS
[32] Real-space mapping of magnetically quantized grapheme states
DOI: 10.1038/nphys1736
[33] Observation of second-harmonic generation induced by pure spin currents
DOI: 10.1038/nphys1742
Nature STRUCTURAL & MOLECULAR BIOLOGY
[34] Double-stranded RNAs containing multiple IU pairs are sufficient to suppress interferon induction and apoptosis
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1864
[35] An overlapping kinase and phosphatase docking site regulates activity of the retinoblastoma protein
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1868
[36] Mycobacterium tuberculosis lipoprotein LprG (Rv1411c) binds triacylated glycolipid agonists of Toll-like receptor
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1869
[37] Structural rearrangements of the ribosome at the tRNA proofreading step
DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.1880
*********************************************************************
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.
AUSTRIA
Graz: 2, 11
Innsbruck: 15
CANADA:
London: 35
Toronto: 15
CHINA
Chengdu: 30
Jinan: 26
Shanghai: 12
CZECH REPUBLIC
Praha: 15
DENMARK
Aarhus: 15
FINLAND
Helsinki: 14
FRANCE
Illkirch: 37
GAMBIA
Banjul: 3
GERMANY
Berlin: 13, 21
Bielefeld: 24
Freiburg: 15
Hamburg: 3, 30
Hannover: 15
Heidelberg: 22, 24
Lubeck: 3
Martinsried: 9, 30
Munich: 15
Stuttgart: 9
Tuebingen: 15
Ulm: 15
Wurzburg: 15, 24
GHANA
Accra:3
Kumasi: 3
ICELAND
Reykjavik: 14
ISRAEL
Beer-Sheva: 9
Jerusalem: 17
Rehovot: 9
ITALY
Bologna: 11
Padova: 11
Rome: 15
Trieste: 11
JAPAN
Hokkaido: 23
Osaka: 20
Saitama: 23
Tokyo: 20, 23
KOREA
Daejeon: 31
MALAWI
Chilumba: 3
NETHERLANDS
Amsterdam: 2
Nijmegen: 2
Rotterdam: 2, 15
NEW ZEALAND
Lincoln: 16
Wellington: 16
SINGAPORE
Singapore: 2, 19
SPAIN
Barcelona: 25
Madrid: 14, 25
Santiago de Compostela: 2
Vigo: 11
SWEDEN
Stockholm: 14
SWITZERLAND
Bern: 28
Lausanne: 13
Zurich: 22
UNITED KINGDOM
Cambridge: 34
Exeter: 16
Leeds: 19
Liverpool: 2
London: 2, 3, 18
Manchester: 21
Oxford: 3, 29
Toulouse: 13
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
California
Irvine: 1
La Jolla: 1, 7
Long Beach: 15
Los Angeles: 27
Palo Alto: 28
San Francisco: 14, 15
Santa Cruz: 35
Colorado
Boulder: 8
Connecticut
New Haven: 5, 25
Georgia
Atlanta: 32
Hawaii
Honolulu: 16
Illinois
Argonne: 4
Evanston: 4
Chicago: 4
Urbana: 6
Kansas
Lawrence: 33
Louisiana
New Orleans: 10
Maryland
Baltimore: 30
Gaithersburg: 32
Massachusetts
Boston: 1, 8, 30, 36
Cambridge: 8, 19
Charlestown: 7
Woods Hole: 22
Missouri
St Louis: 18
New York
Manhasset: 14
New York: 24
Ohio
Cincinnati: 15
Cleveland: 36
Pennsylvania
Philadelphia: 7, 15
Tennessee
Memphis: 26
Texas
College Station: 36
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
Tel: +1 212 726 9288
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Cell Biology (London)
Sowmya Swaminathan
Tel: +44 20 7843 4656
E-mail: [email protected]
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)
Heike Langenberg
Tel: +44 20 7843 4042
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Immunology (New York)
Laurie Dempsey
Tel: +1 212 726 9372
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Materials (London)
Vincent Dusastre
Tel: +44 20 7843 4531
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Medicine (New York)
Juan Carlos Lopez
Tel: +1 212 726 9325
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Methods (New York)
Hugh Ash
Tel: +1 212 726 9627
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Nanotechnology (London)
Peter Rodgers
Tel: +44 20 7014 4019
Email: [email protected]
Nature Neuroscience (New York)
Kalyani Narasimhan
Tel: +1 212 726 9319
E-mail: [email protected]
Nature Photonics (Tokyo)
Oliver Graydon
Tel: +81 3 3267 8776
E-mail: [email protected]
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]
About Nature Publishing Group (NPG):
Nature Publishing Group (NPG) is a publisher of high impact scientific and medical information in print and online. NPG publishes journals, online databases and services across the life, physical, chemical and applied sciences and clinical medicine.
Focusing on the needs of scientists, Nature (founded in 1869) is the leading weekly, international scientific journal. In addition, for this audience, NPG publishes a range of Nature research journals and Nature Reviews journals, plus a range of prestigious academic journals including society-owned publications. Online, nature.com provides over 5 million visitors per month with access to NPG publications and online databases and services, including Nature News and NatureJobs plus access to Nature
Network and Nature Education’s Scitable.com.
Scientific American is at the heart of NPG’s newly-formed consumer media division, meeting the needs of the general public. Founded in 1845, Scientific American is the oldest continuously published magazine in the US and the leading authoritative publication for science in the general media. Together with scientificamerican.com and 15 local language editions around the world it reaches over 3 million consumers and scientists. Other titles include Scientific American Mind and Spektrum der Wissenschaft in Germany.
Throughout all its businesses NPG is dedicated to serving the scientific and medical communities and the wider scientifically interested general public. Part of Macmillan Publishers Limited, NPG is a global company with principal offices in London,
New York and Tokyo, and offices in cities worldwide including Boston, Buenos Aires, Delhi, Hong Kong, Madrid, Barcelona, Munich, Heidelberg, Basingstoke, Melbourne, Paris, San Francisco, Seoul and Washington DC. For more information, please go to www.nature.com.
