Nature

Certain cancers are prone to invade the nervous system, which leads to poorer prognosis. A study of leukaemia in mouse models, published in Nature, reveals an unexpectedly direct invasion route from the bone marrow to the central nervous system. This News & Views article discusses the findings.

Editorial: A rogue source of Chlorofluorocarbons has been blamed on Chinese foam manufacturers but investigations continue.

The planet now has 79 known moons, including a tiny oddball on a collision course with its neighbours.

Uncertainty, hostility and irrelevance are now part of daily life for scientists at the US Environmental Protection Agency. Scientists spoke to Nature to reveal all: https://go.nature.com/2mwWG0Q

Editorial: Better statistics on careers for young scientists would show how few of them achieve staff positions.

An electron microscope described in Nature can produce images at higher resolution than conventional approaches, and is suitable for studying fragile materials that can be damaged by electron beams. This News & Views article discusses the findings.

In this week’s Nature podcast: DNA scaffolds, climate-altering microbes, and a robot chemist.

The most important tool for Science is its ability to encourage informed opinion and critical thinking to help make decisions related to everyday life, says biologist Alberto Kornblihtt.

The molecule succinate, which is a product of metabolism, promotes heat production and therefore calorie burning in brown fat in mice. This discovery, reported in Nature, could have implications for combating obesity in humans. This News & Views article discusses the findings.

Hyperglycaemic conditions have an adverse impact on levels of 5-hydroxymethylation (5hmC), a DNA modification that can be perturbed in cancer, according to research in Nature. The findings could help to explain why observations of diabetes can be linked to increased cancer risk.

Artificial intelligence applications can systematically discriminate against specific populations. Computer scientists must identify sources of bias, de-bias training data and develop algorithms that are robust, argue James Zou and Londa Schiebinger.

The black plastic shade balls used to reduce water evaporation from artificial lakes can achieve conservation only if they remain in use for at least 0.2–2.5 years, reports a paper published in Nature Sustainability. This finding casts a shadow on the real sustainability of quick and easy water-management technologies.

The vast majority of experiments probing navigation in the brain have been done in the confines of labs using rodents. Nachum Ulanovsky hopes his bats can help him explore the answer. Read the related Feature here: https://go.nature.com/2KRJEK1

An early-onset, fatal neurodegenerative disease can be prevented in the womb in mouse models by delivering gene therapy vectors into the fetal brain, reports a paper published in Nature Medicine.

Genetic mutations in Pekin ducks, which are associated with their white feathers and large size are identified in an analysis published in Nature Communications. The findings provide insights into the genetic basis of some of the characteristics of Pekin ducks that have been selected for over hundreds of years.

A mosquito species that feeds only on non-vertebrate hosts is reported in Communications Biology. The paper suggests that current methods used for identifying mosquito host species and tracking the transmission of blood-borne pathogens should be updated to include non-vertebrate hosts.

Gene-editing experiments with human embryonic stem cells reveal the imprecision of the CRISPR-Cas9 system; the DNA-cutting enzyme can create large deletions and shuffle genes.