This press release contains:
--Summaries of newsworthy papers:
Astrophysics: The Milky Way’s 11.4-billion-year-old halo
Astronomy: Improving the accuracy of exoplanet observations
Outlook: Breast cancer’s clinical trial disconnect
Geoscience: Constraining the onset of plate tectonics
Painting by molecule
And finally... Genomics: Tomato genome bears fruit
--Geographical listing of authors
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[1] Astrophysics: The Milky Way’s 11.4-billion-year-old halo (AOP; N&V)
DOI: 10.1038/nature11062
The age of the Milky Way Galaxy’s inner halo is estimated in Nature this week by using a new precision method of assigning ages to populations of stars. The Milky Way has multiple components, such as the bulge, disk and halo, which are thought to have formed at different times. Determining the assembly history of the Milky Way has been hampered by difficulties in calculating the ages of the stellar populations.
Jason Kalirai develops a technique to estimate the age of newly formed white dwarf stars, using the well-studied globular cluster Messier 4 as a baseline. He applies this technique to a sample of four nearby halo white dwarfs and calculates that they are around 11.4 billion years old. Given that the oldest globular clusters are about 13.5 billion years old, these findings suggest that the halo formed after the globular clusters.
CONTACT
Jason Kalirai (Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, MD, USA)
Tel: +1 410 338 4747; E-mail: [email protected]
Timothy Beers (Michigan State University, Okemos, MI, USA) N&V
Tel: +1 517 884 5616; E-mail: [email protected]
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[2] Astronomy: Improving the accuracy of exoplanet observations (pp 611-614)
An approach to improving the accuracy of astronomical spectrographs ― instruments used to study spectral lines ― is described in Nature this week. Precise observations of an exoplanet are demonstrated following calibration of one of the world’s most stable spectrographs. The calibration method could be used to find new Earth-like exoplanets that couldn’t previously be detected.
Calibration of spectrographs is of utmost importance for continuing astronomical research, as a measurement can only be as accurate as the apparatus used to perform it. Tobias Wilken and colleagues use laser frequency combs to calibrate the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS). The comb, formed of a series of equally spaced spectral lines, acts as a ‘frequency ruler' against which the light emitted from distant stars can be measured. Calibration of HARPS allows precise observations at levels not previously achieved.
The authors use the calibrated spectrograph to monitor the star HD 75289 and calculate the orbit of its companion planet. These findings demonstrate that laser frequency combs will be of value for future astronomical observations.
CONTACT
Tobias Wilken (Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany)
Tel: +49 893 290 5285; E-mail: [email protected]
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Outlook: Breast cancer’s clinical trial disconnect (pp S58-S59)
A new system of testing drugs designed to stop the spread of breast cancer (metastasis) is proposed in an Outlook in Nature this week. In this proposal, the current second phase of clinical trial testing is replaced with a new randomized phase II trial — with the stated aim of preventing metastasis rather than targeting the primary tumour. The author calls on the US Food and Drug Administration to provide input and guidance to support this change of focus immediately.
When it comes to developing new therapeutics for breast cancer, the current clinical-trial system tests the effectiveness of compounds at shrinking established tumours. Drugs designed to prevent metastasis will fail these tests. And because it is metastases, and not the primary tumours, that are responsible for most breast cancer deaths, this oversight is costing lives, argues Patricia Steeg, chief of the Women’s Cancers Section at the National Cancer Institute’s Center for Cancer Research in Bethesda, Maryland. Such a redesign will reach beyond breast cancer treatment, and Steeg urges the oncology community as a whole to commit to doing something different.
CONTACT
Patricia Steeg (National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA)
Please contact via:
The National Cancer Institute press office
Tel: +1 301 496 6641; E-mail: [email protected]
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[3] Geoscience: Constraining the onset of plate tectonics (pp 627-630)
The origins of plate tectonics ― a geological phenomenon that describes large-scale motions of Earth’s crust ― are traced in this week’s Nature. Analysis of ancient rocks in southern West Greenland reveals that modern plate tectonic processes may have begun around 3.2 billion years ago.
Determining the transition of geological processes on Earth between a pre-plate-tectonic regime and a plate-tectonic regime is a matter of considerable debate. Rocks from southern West Greenland provide a useful geological record that contains some of the oldest and best preserved parts of the crust, and cover a critical time period when a modern plate-tectonic regime might have initiated. Tomas Næraa and colleagues report differences in radio-isotope levels in these rocks that reflect changes in crustal formation processes. They infer that a transition took place from an ancient crustal evolutionary regime between 3.9 and 3.2 billion years ago, when juvenile crust generation by plate tectonics was initiated.
CONTACT
Tomas Næraa (Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland, Copenhagen, Denmark)
Tel: +45 3814 2253; E-mail: [email protected]
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[4] Painting by molecule (pp 623-626; N&V)
A simple, modular technique that allows complex, two-dimensional shapes to be ‘painted’ onto a tiny molecular canvas using short synthetic strands of DNA is demonstrated in this week’s Nature.
The programmed self-assembly of strands of nucleic acid has been shown to be effective for creating a range of structures with prescribed shapes. One successful implementation is DNA origami, in which a long scaffold strand is folded by many short auxiliary strands into a complex shape. Modular strategies are, in principle, simpler and more versatile, but creating complex shapes from a large number of uniquely addressable tiles has remained challenging.
To address this problem, Peng Yin and colleagues designed a molecular canvas 64 nanometres by 103 nanometres — a self-assembled rectangle constructed from a series of short synthetic DNA strands, which the authors call single-stranded tiles and which act like pixels. Each tile has 42 bases and is designed to bind to four designated neighbours during self-assembly. A desired shape, drawn on the canvas, is produced by annealing the strands that correspond to pixels covered by the target shape. Using a master strand collection that corresponds to a 310-pixel canvas, the authors constructed 107 distinct and complex two-dimensional shapes, including letters from the Latin alphabet, Chinese characters and emoticons, establishing this method as a simple, modular and robust framework for assembling short synthetic DNA strands into complex DNA nanostructures.
CONTACT
Peng Yin (Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA)
Tel: +1 617 432 7731; E-mail: [email protected]
Paul Rothemund (California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA) N&V author
Tel: +1 626 390 0438; E-mail: [email protected]
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[5] And finally... Genomics: Tomato genome bears fruit (pp 635-641)
The genome sequence of the tomato, a major crop plant and a model system for fruit development, is published in this week’s Nature. Analysis of the sequence provides insights into the evolution of genes that control fruit characteristics, such as colour and fleshiness. Comparing the genomes of wild and domesticated tomatoes also provides a basis for understanding events that have narrowed tomato diversity.
Giovanni Giuliano, Dani Zamir and colleagues from the Tomato Genome Consortium report a high-quality genome sequence for a domesticated tomato breed (Heinz 1706) and a draft sequence for its closest wild relative, Solanum pimpinellifolium. Comparative genomics identify very little difference (0.6%) between the two tomato genomes, at the same time the comparison highlights changes that have occurred since domestication of the wild tomato and the intensive breeding that followed. Further analysis of the tomato sequence reveals over 8% divergence from the recently sequenced potato, a member of the same family (Solanaceae). The authors also find that two consecutive genome triplications experienced by Solanaceae drove changes to the functions of genes controlling fruit characteristics.
CONTACT
Giovanni Giuliano (Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Development, Rome, Italy)
Tel: +39 329 831 3627; E-mail: [email protected]
Dani Zamir (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Rehovot, Israel)
E-mail: [email protected]
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ALSO IN THIS ISSUE…
[6] Inhibitory receptors bind ANGPTLs and support blood stem cells and leukaemia development (pp 656-660)
[7] Ultraviolet-radiation-induced methane emissions from meteorites and the Martian atmosphere
DOI: 10.1038/nature11203
[8] Cis-regulatory control of corticospinal system development and evolution
DOI: 10.1038/nature11094
[9] Dimensionality of consumer search space drives trophic interaction strengths
DOI: 10.1038/nature11131
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GEOGRAPHICAL LISTING OF AUTHORS…
The following list of places refers to the whereabouts of authors on the papers numbered in this release. For example, London: 4 - this means that on paper number four, there will be at least one author affiliated to an institute or company in London. 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
Crawley: 3
Townsville: 3, 8
CHINA
Shanghai: 5
DENMARK
Copenhagen: 3
GERMAN
Bonn: 3
GERMANY
Garching: 2
Köln: 3
Mainz: 6
Martinsried: 2
HUNGARY
Szombathely: 6
JAPAN
Okinawa: 5
NETHERLANDS
Utrecht: 6
SPAIN
La Laguna: 2
Madrid: 2
SWEDEN
Lund: 3
Stockholm: 3
UNITED KINGDOM
Edinburgh: 6
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
California
La Jolla: 5
Los Angeles: 8
Connecticut
New Haven: 7
Maryland
Baltimore: 1
Massachusetts
Boston: 4
New Mexico
Santa Fe: 8
New York
New York: 5
Ohio
Cleveland: 7
Texas
Dallas: 5
PRESS CONTACTS…
From North America and Canada
Neda Afsarmanesh, Nature New York
Tel: +1 212 726 9231; E-mail: [email protected]
From Japan, Korea, China, Singapore and Taiwan
Eiji Matsuda, Nature Tokyo
Tel: +81 3 3267 8751; E-mail: [email protected]
From the UK
Rebecca Walton, Nature London
Tel: +44 20 7843 4502; E-mail: [email protected]
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