TechCrooks™

Sir David King Sir David King is the United Kingdom Foreign Secretary's Special Representative for Climate Change. E-mail: david.king{at}fco.gov.uk The importance of the agreement reached at the Paris climate Conference of Parties (COP21) last month cannot be overstated. It is a major step toward preventing some of the worst risks that climate change presents to the global economy and security. Now is the time to seize the opportunity that this moment represents. We must transform world economies away from fossil fuels toward a more sustainable low-carbon future.

In science news around the world, Australian scientists slam the environmental impact assessment process behind projects such the expansion of the Abbot Point coal terminal near the Great Barrier Reef, and Iran offers a new science prize in the effort to become known as a research powerhouse. Also, new superheavy elements claim their places on the periodic table, researchers discover a way to predict side effects of the flu vaccine, and a unique orchid imitates human body odor to attract pollinating mosquitoes. And archaeologist Nicole Boivin talks to Science about the philosophy behind the new Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena, Germany.

Brazil is facing a disturbing spike in a severe birth defect called microcephaly. Babies are born with heads that are far too small, a sign that the brain failed to fully develop. Doctors there have reported nearly 3000 cases since July 2015—more than 20 times the usual rate. Scientists are scrambling to understand what is going on. The leading theory so far is that the condition is caused by a little known mosquito-borne virus called Zika that surfaced in Brazil in March and is quickly spreading through Latin America. The news has prompted the government to declare a public health emergency; some doctors are recommending women not get pregnant until more is known. Researchers are trying to develop better diagnostic tests for the virus so they can track whether mothers of affected babies were infected during their pregnancies, and other groups are hoping to use stem cell models of the developing human brain to understand how the virus might affect fetal growth. Meanwhile, the virus ...

Iraq, already struggling with war, poverty, and sectarian strife, faces a new threat. The loss of water in the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which begin in Turkey and flow into the Persian Gulf, endangers farmers, city dwellers, and the famous Mesopotamian marshes that are home to a rich ecosystem. Turkish dams, a long drought, and water mismanagement mean that little freshwater reaches southern Iraq. As a result, the saltwater of the gulf is slowly working its way inland, with important ramifications for Iraq's future. University of Basra researchers are sounding the alarm.

In a world looking for better, cheaper alternative energy, the solar cell materials called perovskites are a bright hope. Their efficiency at converting sunlight into electricity is climbing faster than that of any solar technology before them. They're cheap and easy to make, can be manufactured roll-to-roll like newsprint, and can even be layered atop conventional silicon solar cells to boost their output. But they are fragile stars: Moisture, air, heat, or even prolonged sunlight makes them fall apart. Now, these materials are toughening up. Over the past few months, three separate teams have reported that adding a dash of cesium to their perovskite recipes produces efficient solar cells that are far more stable when exposed to the elements. Meanwhile, other researchers report that their latest cells are as efficient as standard silicon cells and may soon rival costly gallium arsenide cells.

Since 2007, the Cambridge Conservation Initiative (CCI) has helped support collaborations among the largest concentration of conservation scientists in the world, in Cambridge, U.K. Several years ago, CCI saw an opportunity to deepen such alliances after two university departments left a 1960s-era Brutalist concrete office building in the heart of the university. As part of a £58 million overhaul, architects designed spaces to foster collaborations. Planners say the relationships will be mutually beneficial: Up to 150 academics will find new opportunities to apply their research, while an estimated 350 conservation practitioners will bring new problems. Participants believe that by harnessing "the Cambridge brand" for conservation research, the hub will become a go-to resource for government, business, and philanthropy leaders.

Science: Current Issue Some publishers add new journal titles more often than I buy new shoes. The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the publisher of Science, certainly cannot be accused of that, having grown to only four journal titles in 136 years. Yet many members of the scientific community have encouraged AAAS to expand its repertoire, arguing that the Science family of journals is high quality, well curated and edited, and worth supporting because they enable the mission of a nonprofit scientific society that is governed by scientists working to further the best interests of the scientific community. It is thus with some pride that I describe the launch in 2016 of two new journals: Science Robotics and Science Immunology. Author: Marcia McNutt Read More...

Science: Current Issue At the end of 2015, Science looked back at some of the biggest science stories of the year. Now we're looking forward, pondering which research trends and ideas are poised to create buzz in 2016—making them the scientific equivalent of the recent Star Wars movie—and which ones are losing some steam. From the rise of reusable rockets to sequencing entire ancient genomes to the rapidly spreading Zika virus to the hunt for a sidekick to the Higgs boson, we offer our best guesses—in no particular order—of the new themes that we think will take hold in 2016, shoving aside some once-sizzling topics. Read More...

Science: Current Issue Advocates for U.S. science succeeded in winning more dollars for most federal research agencies in the final 2016 spending bill signed into law last month. Just as importantly, however, they also dissuaded Congress from imposing policies that they believe would have harmed the scientific enterprise. At the National Institutes of Health (NIH), backers of biomedical research achieved their ambitious goal of winning a $2 billion increase for the king of the research hill; the 6.6% boost over its 2015 budget was the largest NIH has received since 2003. Science at NASA and the Department of Energy did much better than expected, with hikes of 6.6% and 5.5%, respectively. The National Science Foundation ended up with a more modest bump of 1.6% that nevertheless exceeded the amounts approved earlier in the budget process by congressional spending panels. Research funded by grant competitions will expand at the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Oceanic and ...

Science: Current Issue As the Ebola epidemic exploded in the summer of 2014, a frenzied effort began to test vaccines and drugs in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea. But so far, results from just one clinical trial have appeared in a peer-reviewed journal; it showed Merck's Ebola to be remarkably successful. A dozen other trials have yet to be published. Many didn't deliver a clear answer because they failed to enroll the planned number of participants. Others did recruit enough patients but didn't use a randomized controlled trial design, which weakened results. Still others were halted early. One last hope for an uplifting result remains: an ongoing study of ZMapp, a promising antibody cocktail. Authors: Jon Cohen, Martin Enserink Read More...

Science: Current Issue "Impossible" is how biologists once described so-called epigenetic inheritance, in which something other than a DNA sequence passes a trait between generations. In recent years, however, researchers have found many examples of this phenomenon. A male mouse's diet and stress level, for instance, can tweak offspring metabolism. Researchers are still trying to determine how offspring inherit a father's metabolic attributes and physiological condition. Some evidence implicates chemical modification of DNA. Other work by neuroscientist Tracy Bale of the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia and colleagues has found that mammalian sperm pack gene-regulating molecules called microRNAs. Now, two new studies highlight a different class of RNAs, transfer RNAs, carried by sperm. Author: Mitch Leslie Read More...

Science: Current Issue Several widely used biology databases supported by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) are facing unsettling change. Over the next 4 years, NHGRI expects to bow out as sole funder for these resources, ranging from protein databases to the world's most authoritative catalog of human disease-related genes, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man. Who will pick up the tab is not yet clear. Other databases could face a similar threat as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) takes stock of all its data resources. NHGRI Director Eric Green says that nothing has been decided. But he and other NIH leaders are searching for ways to cut costs, and they are urging the databases' overseers to consider charging for use. Author: Jocelyn Kaiser Read More...

Science: Current Issue The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) is at a key juncture. Over the past decade, it has spent a large portion of its $3 billion budget nurturing fledgling disease therapies, including 23 that have reached clinical trials. But many of its projects won't be ready to test in humans by the time its state funding runs out. Last month, CIRM's governing board approved an ambitious 5-year plan to award the last of its funds in the next 5 years—and to attract pharmaceutical companies and investors that could carry these projects forward in its absence. But the agency's leadership is also eying new sources of funding to keep it afloat after 2020. Author: Kelly Servick Read More...

Science: Current Issue Vaccines that appear scientifically feasible often move through development slowly because they have little commercial potential and thus have trouble attracting serious investments. Just such a situation held back R&D on Ebola vaccines, one of which quickly proved its worth in a real-world trial held in Guinea last year. In the wake of that success, a growing number of researchers and public health advocates are lobbying to find new money and strategies to develop vaccines that could thwart both outbreak diseases like chikungunya and Marburg to endemic afflictions like paratyphoid fever and schistosomiasis. In response to a survey designed by Science, 50 vaccine experts ranked 10 vaccine-vulnerable diseases in order of development priority based on needs and the likelihood that they would work. Author: Jon Cohen Read More...

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Science: Current Issue The mesolimbic dopamine (DA) system is part of the brain's reward circuitry (see the figure). It controls an individual's responses to rewards such as food, social interactions, and money, and is therefore an important determinant of motivation. Midbrain DA neurons projecting to the striatum are causally involved in reward-like processes. Less clear is how another apparent target of midbrain DA neurons, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), may contribute to the reward system. On page 41 of this issue, Ferenczi et al. (1) report using a unique combination of optogenetic tools and functional magnetic resonance brain imaging (fMRI) in conscious rats to investigate the underlying mechanisms of the competitive relationships of these two brain regions over striatal function and reward-like behavior. The findings have implications for understanding and treating affective symptoms in disorders such as depression, schizophrenia, and addiction. Author: Trev...

Science: Current Issue Cells must sense their environment to determine whether conditions are suitable for growth. Despite the physiological importance of a multiprotein complex called mammalian/mechanistic target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) in this process, a detailed molecular understanding of its assemblage and regulation of its serine-threonine kinase function have proven difficult to elucidate. On page 48 of this issue, Aylett et al. (1) help uncover the molecular underpinnings of mTORC1, while on pages 43 and 53, Wolfson et al. (2) and Saxton et al. (3), respectively, make strides in determining how mTORC1 is regulated by the amino acid leucine. Authors: Gwen R. Buel, John Blenis Read More...

Science: Current Issue Organoboron compounds are among the most widely used reagents in organic synthesis and underpin many of the most frequently practiced and important reactions in synthetic organic chemistry (1). These reactions are based on specific mechanistic events that are distinctive to the reaction class. Catalytic processes are usually driven by transmetallation to transition metal complexes (passing a ligand from boron to the metal), whereas stoichiometric processes are based on metallate rearrangement mechanisms—ligands undergoing redistribution around a boron center—initiated by an incoming nucleophile. On page 70 of this issue, Zhang et al. (2) report an alternative transmetallation process that harmoniously merges these usually independent mechanisms, and they demonstrate its application within a multicomponent catalytic reaction that generates specific chiral products. Authors: James W. B. Fyfe, Allan J. B. Watson Read More...

Science: Current Issue Political attempts to denigrate and dilute the teaching of evolution in science classrooms have been a feature of the U.S. educational scene for 90 years (1). These may be classified into three major waves (2). Bans on teaching evolution were enacted in the 1920s (and unsuccessfully challenged in the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial) and persisted until ruled unconstitutional in 1968. When bans were rescinded, creationists (3) began to lobby for “balanced treatment” for creationism whenever evolution was taught, first trying biblical creationism, then “creation science,” and finally “intelligent design” (ID). Each strategy was ruled unconstitutional (table S1), in part due to court attention to creationist origins. Creationists did not give up with the defeat of ID in Kitzmiller v. Dover, decided in U.S. District Court on 20 December 2005, but instead shifted political efforts to the third wave of antievolutionism, “stealth creationism” (2): legislation that avoids ment...

Science: Current Issue Closely coupled, ubiquitous, and complex, accretion and outflow are the yin and yang of astrophysics (1). The processes occur on all length and time scales, from the formation of the first galaxies in the early universe to the formation of stars in our Milky Way. Compact objects such as white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes provide some of the most spectacular examples of these entangled phenomena. Quasars, for instance, are supermassive black holes with masses as large as 10 billion times that of the Sun that lurk in the centers of galaxies and are extraordinarily efficient accretors as revealed through luminous x-ray emission as well as producers of narrowly collimated relativistic jets that can extend millions of light years away from the black hole (see the figure). On page 62 of this issue, van Velzen et al. (2) report the discovery of a transient relativistic jet flowing from a supermassive black hole system that captured and destroyed a passing sta...