Editorials
A Nature journals guide to drawing the structures of molecules should aid expert and casual chemists alike.
doi: 10.1038/d41586-017-05898-6
Adding to PhD students? woes will undermine US research and economy.
doi: 10.1038/d41586-017-05925-6
More international collaboration could build capacity at big physics facilities especially in the south.
doi: 10.1038/d41586-017-05924-7
News
Bizarre tale of theft and suspicious packages casts doubt on claims for early-human occupation in northern Europe.
doi: 10.1038/nature.2017.22984
Effort aims to help scientists understand how generations of inbreeding have altered the genetics of research rodents.
doi: 10.1038/nature.2017.22974
While dealing with their own losses, public-health researchers are regrouping to study the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.
doi: 10.1038/nature.2017.22973
A former pharmaceutical boss will help navigate the UK's exit from the European Union.
doi: 10.1038/nature.2017.22956
Increased coal use in China appears to be driving the first increase in global greenhouse-gas output since 2014.
doi: 10.1038/nature.2017.22995
Beam generator puts country in elite company for doing experiments in materials science and other fields.
doi: 10.1038/nature.2017.22976
News Features
Although abundant in captivity, the salamander has nearly disappeared from its natural habitat, and that's a problem.
doi: 10.1038/d41586-017-05921-w
News & Views
Modelling suggests that Pluto's atmospheric temperature is regulated by haze, unlike the other planetary bodies in the Solar System. The finding has implications for our understanding of exoplanetary atmospheres. See Letter p.352
doi: 10.1038/551302a
Infection with Shigella flexneri bacteria is a major cause of infant death. It emerges that S. flexneri evades intracellular defences by releasing a protein that triggers the destruction of members of a key family of host enzymes. See Letter p.378
doi: 10.1038/nature24157
Microbial activity in the sea results in a loss of bioavailable nitrogen. It emerges that the climate phenomenon called the El Niño–Southern Oscillation has a surprisingly large effect on the size of this loss.
doi: 10.1038/551305a
The treatment of a patient affected by an incurable genetic skin disease demonstrates the efficacy, feasibility and safety of replacing almost the whole skin using genetically corrected stem cells. See Letter p.327
doi: 10.1038/nature24753
The physical nature of two regions called large low-shear-velocity provinces at the base of Earth's mantle is uncertain. A measurement of their density has implications for our understanding of mantle dynamics. See Article p.321
doi: 10.1038/551308a
Statistical analysis of data on threatened species provides a model that can predict how rates of investment in conservation affect biodiversity under changing human population levels and agricultural and economic conditions. See Letter p.364
doi: 10.1038/nature24158
A single antibody uses multiple antiviral mechanisms to block the replication of influenza B viruses in mice and ferrets. The development could inform research into improved flu vaccines.
doi: 10.1038/551310a
Review
A Review of the genetics, biochemistry, ecology and evolution of bacterial quorum sensing.
doi: 10.1038/nature24624
Articles
An estimate of Earth’s deep-mantle buoyancy is derived from GPS-based measurements of body tide deformation and shown to be dominated by dense material possibly related to subducted oceanic plates or primordial rock.
doi: 10.1038/nature24452
Autologous transgenic epidermal stem cell cultures are used to reconstitute almost the entire epidermis of a patient with severe junctional epidermolysis bullosa.
doi: 10.1038/nature24487
Profiling of 53,193 individual epithelial cells from the mouse small intestine identifies previously unknown cell subtypes and corresponding gene markers, providing insight into gut homeostasis and response to pathogens.
doi: 10.1038/nature24489
IgA+ B cells expressing programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) and interleukin 10 accumulate in the inflamed livers of humans and mice with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease where they promote the progression to hepatocellular carcinoma by limiting the local activation of PD-1-expressing CD8+ T cells.
doi: 10.1038/nature24302
Single-molecule fluorescence resonance energy transfer is used to identify the rate-limiting step and new intermediates in the conformational cycle of the Listeria monocytogenes calcium transporter LMCA1.
doi: 10.1038/nature24296
Letters
Modelling results find that the temperature of Pluto’s atmosphere is regulated by haze particles rather than gas molecules, suggesting that Pluto should be brighter than previously thought at mid-infrared wavelengths.
doi: 10.1038/nature24465
Sufficiently strong modulation of the interaction strength in a Bose–Einstein condensate induces inelastic atom–atom scattering and causes collective emission of matter-wave jets from the condensate.
doi: 10.1038/nature24272
The relaxation dynamics of granular materials is more like that of complex fluids than that of thermal glass-forming systems, owing to the absence of the ‘cage effect’.
doi: 10.1038/nature24062
Empirical two-part models describe the relationship between conservation spending, human development pressures and biodiversity loss and can inform sustainable development strategies by predicting the effects of financing decisions on future biodiversity losses.
doi: 10.1038/nature24295
In European Neolithic populations, the arrival of farmers prompted admixture with local hunter-gatherers over many centuries, resulting in distinct signatures in each region due to a complex series of interactions.
doi: 10.1038/nature24476
In the mouse caudal brainstem, functionally distinct neuronal subpopulations, which are distinguishable by neurotransmitter identity, connectivity and location, regulate locomotion parameters.
doi: 10.1038/nature24064
A Shigella flexneri type III secretion system effector targets cellular proteins for degradation via the ubiquitin/proteasome pathway, suggesting that such effectors help to overcome defences against bacterial infection.
doi: 10.1038/nature24467
The branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) pathway and high levels of BCAA transaminase 1 (BCAT1) have recently been associated with aggressiveness in several cancer entities. However, the mechanistic role of BCAT1 in this process remains largely uncertain. Here, by performing high-resolution proteomic analysis of human acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) stem-cell and non-stem-cell populations, we find the BCAA pathway enriched and BCAT1 protein and transcripts overexpressed in leukaemia stem cells. We show that BCAT1, which transfers α-amino groups from BCAAs to α-ketoglutarate (αKG), is a critical regulator of intracellular αKG homeostasis. Further to its role in the tricarboxylic acid cycle, αKG is an essential cofactor for αKG-dependent dioxygenases such as Egl-9 family hypoxia inducible factor 1 (EGLN1) and the ten-eleven translocation (TET) family of DNA demethylases. Knockdown of BCAT1 in leukaemia cells caused accumulation of αKG, leading to EGLN1-mediated HIF1α protein degradation. This resulted in a growth and survival defect and abrogated leukaemia-initiating potential. By contrast, overexpression of BCAT1 in leukaemia cells decreased intracellular αKG levels and caused DNA hypermethylation through altered TET activity. AML with high levels of BCAT1 (BCAT1high) displayed a DNA hypermethylation phenotype similar to cases carrying a mutant isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDHmut), in which TET2 is inhibited by the oncometabolite 2-hydroxyglutarate. High levels of BCAT1 strongly correlate with shorter overall survival in IDHWTTET2WT, but not IDHmut or TET2mut AML. Gene sets characteristic for IDHmut AML were enriched in samples from patients with an IDHWTTET2WTBCAT1high status. BCAT1high AML showed robust enrichment for leukaemia stem-cell signatures, and paired sample analysis showed a significant increase in BCAT1 levels upon disease relapse. In summary, by limiting intracellular αKG, BCAT1 links BCAA catabolism to HIF1α stability and regulation of the epigenomic landscape, mimicking the effects of IDH mutations. Our results suggest the BCAA–BCAT1–αKG pathway as a therapeutic target to compromise leukaemia stem-cell function in patients with IDHWTTET2WT AML.
doi: 10.1038/nature24294
A signalling mechanism in human cells for sensing DNA damage induced by alkylation involves ubiquitin-dependent recruitment of the alkylation repair complex ASCC to the vicinity of the damage and co-localization with transcription and splicing factors.
doi: 10.1038/nature24484
Application of cryo-electron tomography and subtomogram averaging to determine the structure of the Ebola virus nucleocapsid within intact viruses and recombinant nucleocapsid-like assemblies.
doi: 10.1038/nature24490