Table Of Contents Page, PNAS Volume 121, Number 23
This Week in PNAS
Science and Culture
QnAs
Commentaries
Perspectives
In the mid-1950s, Arthur Kornberg elucidated the enzymatic synthesis of DNA by DNA
polymerase, for which he was recognized with the 1959 Nobel Prize in Physiology or
Medicine. He then identified many of the proteins that cooperate with DNA polymerase
to ...
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QnAs with Bruce W. Stillman, Roberta S. Fuller, and Jon M. Kaguni
The identification of immunogenic peptides has become essential in an increasing number
of fields in immunology, ranging from tumor immunotherapy to vaccine development.
The nature of the adaptive immune response is shaped by the similarity between ...
Letters
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Brief Reports
Social media’s pivotal role in catalyzing social movements is widely acknowledged
across scientific disciplines. Past research has predominantly explored social media’s
ability to instigate initial mobilization while leaving the question of its capacity
...
The Asian water tower (AWT) serves as the source of 10 major Asian river systems and
supports the lives of ~2 billion people. Obtaining reliable precipitation data over
the AWT is a prerequisite for understanding the water cycle within this pivotal ...
Physical Sciences
Applied Physical Sciences
Stopping power is the rate at which a material absorbs the kinetic energy of a charged
particle passing through it—one of many properties needed over a wide range of thermodynamic
conditions in modeling inertial fusion implosions. First-principles ...
The key of heterostructure is the combinations created by stacking various vdW materials,
which can modify interlayer coupling and electronic properties, providing exciting
opportunities for designer devices. However, this simple stacking does not create
...
In supercooled liquids, dynamical facilitation refers to a phenomenon where microscopic
motion begets further motion nearby, resulting in spatially heterogeneous dynamics.
This is central to the glassy relaxation dynamics of such liquids, which show super-...
A dynamical systems approach to turbulence envisions the flow as a trajectory through
a high-dimensional state space [Hopf, Commun. Appl. Maths 1, 303 (1948)]. The chaotic dynamics are shaped by the unstable simple invariant solutions
populating the ...
We experimentally demonstrate the creation of defects in monolayer WSe2 via nanopillar imprinting and helium ion irradiation. Based on the first method,
we realize atomically thin vertical tunneling light-emitting diodes based on WSe2 monolayers hosting ...
Biophysics and Computational Biology
Living tissues display fluctuations—random spatial and temporal variations of tissue
properties around their reference values—at multiple scales. It is believed that such
fluctuations may enable tissues to sense their state or their size. Recent ...
SARS-CoV-2 employs its spike protein’s receptor binding domain (RBD) to enter host
cells. The RBD is constantly subjected to immune responses, while requiring efficient
binding to host cell receptors for successful infection. However, our understanding
of ...
A key feature of many developmental systems is their ability to self-organize spatial
patterns of functionally distinct cell fates. To ensure proper biological function,
such patterns must be established reproducibly, by controlling and even harnessing
...
Predators and prey benefit from detecting sensory cues of each other’s presence. As
they move through their environment, terrestrial animals accumulate electrostatic
charge. Because electric charges exert forces at a distance, a prey animal could ...
The way goal-oriented birds adjust their travel direction and route in response to
wind significantly affects their travel costs. This is expected to be particularly
pronounced in pelagic seabirds, which utilize a wind-dependent flight style called
...
Chemistry
The renal elimination pathway is increasingly harnessed to reduce nonspecific accumulation
of engineered nanoparticles within the body and expedite their clinical applications.
While the size of nanoparticles is recognized as crucial for their passive ...
The development and performance of two mass spectrometry (MS) workflows for the intraoperative
diagnosis of isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) mutations in glioma is implemented by
independent teams at Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville, and Huashan Hospital, ...
Molecular chirality has long been monitored in the frequency domain in the ultraviolet,
visible, and infrared regimes. Recently developed time-domain approaches can detect
time-dependent chiral dynamics by enhancing intrinsically weak chiral signals. Even-...
Rechargeable sodium-oxygen (Na–O2) battery is deemed as a promising high-energy storage device due to the abundant
sodium resources and high theoretical energy density (1,108 Wh kg–1). A series of quasisolid electrolytes are constantly being designed to ...
While RNA appears as a good candidate for the first autocatalytic systems preceding
the emergence of modern life, the synthesis of RNA oligonucleotides without enzymes
remains challenging. Because the uncatalyzed reaction is extremely slow, experimental
...
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Modeling prebiotic chemistries with quantum accuracy at classical costs
Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
Glacier flow modulates sea level and is governed largely by the viscous deformation
of ice. Multiple molecular-scale mechanisms facilitate viscous deformation, but it
remains unclear how each contributes to glacier-scale deformation. Here, we present
a ...
Magnetotactic bacteria produce chains of nanoscopic iron minerals used for navigation,
which can be preserved over geological timescales in the form of magnetofossils. Micrometer-sized
magnetite crystals with unusual shapes suggesting a biologically ...
Magmatic iron-meteorite parent bodies are the earliest planetesimals in the Solar
System, and they preserve information about conditions and planet-forming processes
in the solar nebula. In this study, we include comprehensive elemental compositions
and ...
Engineering
Lithium is an emerging strategic resource for modern energy transformation toward
electrification and decarbonization. However, current mainstream direct lithium extraction
technology via adsorption suffers from sluggish kinetics and intensive water usage,...
Environmental Sciences
Peracetic acid (PAA) is emerging as a versatile agent for generating long-lived and
selectively oxidative organic radicals (R–O•). Currently, the conventional transition metal–based activation strategies still
suffer from metal ion leaching, undesirable ...
Single-atom catalysts (SACs) with atomic dispersion active sites have exhibited huge
potentials in peroxymonosulfate (PMS)-based Fenton-like chemistry in water purification.
However, four-N coordination metal (MN4) moieties often suffer from such problems ...
Water is a limited resource in Arctic watersheds with continuous permafrost because
freezing conditions in winter and the impermeability of permafrost limit storage and
connectivity between surface water and deep groundwater. However, groundwater can
...
Mathematics
We introduce a function of the density of states for periodic Jacobi matrices on trees
and prove a useful formula for it in terms of entries of the resolvent of the matrix
and its “half-tree” restrictions. This formula is closely related to the one-...
Physics
Frustrated rare-earth-based intermetallics provide a promising platform for emergent
magnetotransport properties through exchange coupling between conduction electrons
and localized rare-earth magnetic moments. Metamagnetism, the abrupt change of ...
Understanding the interplay between charge, nematic, and structural ordering tendencies
in cuprate superconductors is critical to unraveling their complex phase diagram.
Using pump–probe time-resolved resonant X-ray scattering on the (0 0 1) Bragg peak
at ...
Rapid progress in algal biotechnology has triggered a growing interest in hydrogel-encapsulated
microalgal cultivation, especially for the engineering of functional photosynthetic
materials and biomass production. An overlooked characteristic of gel-...
Statistics
In this article, we develop CausalEGM, a deep learning framework for nonlinear dimension
reduction and generative modeling of the dependency among covariate features affecting
treatment and response. CausalEGM can be used for estimating causal effects in ...
Social Sciences
Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
Neural oscillations reflect fluctuations in excitability, which biases the percept
of ambiguous sensory input. Why this bias occurs is still not fully understood. We
hypothesized that neural populations representing likely events are more sensitive,
and ...
Theories of language development—informed largely by studies of Western, middleclass
infants—have highlighted the language that caregivers direct to children as a key
driver of language learning. However, some have argued that language development unfolds
...
Sustainability Science
Improving urban air quality is a pressing challenge in the Global South. A key source
of air pollution is the informal burning of household waste. Reducing informal burning
requires governments to develop formal systems for waste disposal and for ...
Biological Sciences
Applied Biological Sciences
The renal elimination pathway is increasingly harnessed to reduce nonspecific accumulation
of engineered nanoparticles within the body and expedite their clinical applications.
While the size of nanoparticles is recognized as crucial for their passive ...
Biochemistry
Rearranged during transfection (RET) rearrangement oncoprotein-mediated Ras/MAPK signaling
cascade is constitutively activated in cancers. Here, we demonstrate a unique signal
niche. The niche is a ternary complex based on the chimeric RET liquid–liquid ...
Our ability to fight pathogens relies on major histocompatibility complex class I
(MHC-I) molecules presenting diverse antigens on the surface of diseased cells. The
transporter associated with antigen processing (TAP) transports nearly the entire
...
Repressor element-1 silencing transcription factor (REST) is required for the formation
of mature neurons. REST dysregulation underlies a key mechanism of neurodegeneration
associated with neurological disorders. However, the mechanisms leading to ...
Biophysics and Computational Biology
The dimeric nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) transcription factors (TFs) regulate gene
expression by binding to a variety of κB DNA elements with conserved G:C-rich flanking
sequences enclosing a degenerate central region. Toward defining mechanistic ...
Patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus who are dependent on an external supply of
insulin develop insulin-derived amyloidosis at the sites of insulin injection. A major
component of these plaques is identified as full-length insulin consisting of the
two ...
Cell Biology
The RNA tailing machinery adds nucleotides to the 3′-end of RNA molecules that are
implicated in various biochemical functions, including protein synthesis and RNA stability.
Here, we report a role for the RNA tailing machinery as enzymatic modifiers of ...
Myogenesis is a multistep process that requires a spatiotemporal regulation of cell
events resulting finally in myoblast fusion into multinucleated myotubes. Most major
insights into the mechanisms underlying fusion seem to be conserved from insects to
...
In mammals, CLOCK and BMAL1 proteins form a heterodimer that binds to E-box sequences
and activates transcription of target genes, including Period (Per). Translated PER proteins then bind to the CLOCK–BMAL1 complex to inhibit its transcriptional
...
Many animals exhibit remarkable colors that are produced by the constructive interference
of light reflected from arrays of intracellular guanine crystals. These animals can
fine-tune their crystal-based structural colors to communicate with each other, ...
Developmental Biology
Living tissues display fluctuations—random spatial and temporal variations of tissue
properties around their reference values—at multiple scales. It is believed that such
fluctuations may enable tissues to sense their state or their size. Recent ...
Ecology
Predators and prey benefit from detecting sensory cues of each other’s presence. As
they move through their environment, terrestrial animals accumulate electrostatic
charge. Because electric charges exert forces at a distance, a prey animal could ...
The way goal-oriented birds adjust their travel direction and route in response to
wind significantly affects their travel costs. This is expected to be particularly
pronounced in pelagic seabirds, which utilize a wind-dependent flight style called
...
Climate change will likely shift plant and microbial distributions, creating geographic
mismatches between plant hosts and essential microbial symbionts (e.g., ectomycorrhizal
fungi, EMF). The loss of historical interactions, or the gain of novel ...
Assessing within-species variation in response to drought is crucial for predicting
species’ responses to climate change and informing restoration and conservation efforts,
yet experimental data are lacking for the vast majority of tropical tree species.
...
Environmental Sciences
The year 2021 marked a decade of holopelagic sargassum (morphotypes Sargassum natans I and VIII, and Sargassum fluitans III) stranding on the Caribbean and West African coasts. Beaching of millions of
tons of sargassum negatively impacts coastal ...
Evolution
SARS-CoV-2 employs its spike protein’s receptor binding domain (RBD) to enter host
cells. The RBD is constantly subjected to immune responses, while requiring efficient
binding to host cell receptors for successful infection. However, our understanding
of ...
Genetics
In many mammals, recombination events are concentrated in hotspots directed by a sequence-specific
DNA-binding protein named PRDM9. Intriguingly, PRDM9 has been lost several times in
vertebrates, and notably among mammals, it has been pseudogenized in the ...
Immunology and Inflammation
Regulatory T cells (Tregs) are central in controlling immune responses, and dysregulation
of their function can lead to autoimmune disorders or cancer. Despite extensive studies
on Tregs, the basis of epigenetic regulation of human Treg development and ...
Essential for reactive oxygen species (EROS) protein is a recently identified molecular
chaperone of NOX2 (gp91phox), the catalytic subunit of phagocyte NADPH oxidase. Deficiency in EROS is a recently
identified cause for chronic granulomatous disease, a ...
Medical Sciences
The development and performance of two mass spectrometry (MS) workflows for the intraoperative
diagnosis of isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH) mutations in glioma is implemented by
independent teams at Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville, and Huashan Hospital, ...
Microbiology
Olfactory receptors (Olfr) are G protein–coupled receptors that are normally expressed
on olfactory sensory neurons to detect volatile chemicals or odorants. Interestingly,
many Olfrs are also expressed in diverse tissues and function in cell–cell ...
The accessory protease transmembrane protease serine 2 (TMPRSS2) enhances severe acute
respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) uptake into ACE2-expressing cells,
although how increased entry impacts downstream viral and host processes remains ...
The phylum Preplasmiviricota (kingdom Bamfordvirae, realm Varidnaviria) is a broad assemblage of diverse viruses with comparatively short double-stranded
DNA genomes (<50 kbp) that produce icosahedral capsids built from double jelly-roll
major capsid ...
Neuroscience
Neural oscillations reflect fluctuations in excitability, which biases the percept
of ambiguous sensory input. Why this bias occurs is still not fully understood. We
hypothesized that neural populations representing likely events are more sensitive,
and ...
The anterolateral system (ALS) is a major ascending pathway from the spinal cord that
projects to multiple brain areas and underlies the perception of pain, itch, and skin
temperature. Despite its importance, our understanding of this system has been ...
Epilepsies have numerous specific mechanisms. The understanding of neural dynamics
leading to seizures is important for disclosing pathological mechanisms and developing
therapeutic approaches. We investigated electrographic activities and neural dynamics
...
Pharmacology
The transformation of lung adenocarcinoma to small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is a recognized
resistance mechanism and a hindrance to therapies using epidermal growth factor receptor
tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs). The paucity of pretranslational/...
Plant Biology
Rapid progress in algal biotechnology has triggered a growing interest in hydrogel-encapsulated
microalgal cultivation, especially for the engineering of functional photosynthetic
materials and biomass production. An overlooked characteristic of gel-...
Haplotype-resolved genome assemblies were produced for Chasselas and Ugni Blanc, two
heterozygous Vitis vinifera cultivars by combining high-fidelity long-read sequencing and high‐throughput chromosome
conformation capture (Hi-C). The telomere-to-telomere ...
Plants and animals detect biomolecules termed microbe-associated molecular patterns
(MAMPs) and induce immunity. Agricultural production is severely impacted by pathogens
which can be controlled by transferring immune receptors. However, most studies use
...
Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
A balanced excitation-inhibition ratio (E/I ratio) is critical for healthy brain function.
Normative development of cortex-wide E/I ratio remains unknown. Here, we noninvasively
estimate a putative marker of whole-cortex E/I ratio by fitting a large-scale ...
Systems Biology
Rosettes are self-organizing, circular multicellular communities that initiate developmental
processes, like organogenesis and embryogenesis, in complex organisms. Their formation
results from the active repositioning of adhered sister cells and is ...
Cover image: Pictured are wandering albatrosses (Diomedea exulans) on Possession Island in the Indian Ocean. Yusuke Goto et al. compared the navigation strategies employed by wandering albatrosses and sailboat racers based on analysis of high-resolution tracking data from 28 yachts and 149 foraging trips made by wandering albatrosses. Both sailboat racers and wandering albatrosses alternated between traveling in beelines and zig zags to account for local wind conditions relative to their goal direction. The results show how human movement strategies can provide insight into the movements of wildlife. See the article by Goto et al. e2312851121. Image credit: Yusuke Goto.
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