‘Neural tourniquet’ could stem bleeding by stimulating nerves

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Single-cell data sets, a type of genetic database, could be exploited to reveal the identities and private health information of donors. The databases are often freely accessible and can contain cellular genetic information from thousands of people. The data are supposed to be anonymized, but researchers have shown that it can be used to predict a person’s genome. “Our genomes are very identifying,” says bioinformatician and co-author Gamze Gürsoy. “You can change your credit-card number if it leaks, but you cannot change your genome.”

Nature | 5 min read

Reference: Cell paper

Electrical stimulation near the ear that targets the vagus nerves might help to reduce bleeding during surgery or childbirth. The ‘neural tourniquet’ seems to stimulate the spleen, which stores about one-third of the body’s clot-forming platelets, according to preliminary results presented at the 2024 Society for Neuroscience conference. Tests in injured pigs and mice with the blood-clotting condition haemophilia showed that the animals bled less, and for less time, than untreated ones. The time scale could be a real-world limitation for emergency treatment: platelets were most highly activated 2 hours after stimulation.

Nature | 4 min read

The planet’s natural carbon sinks — such as the oceans, forests, soil — absorb about half of the emissions people create. But in 2023, these natural systems hardly absorbed any CO₂, finds a preprint analysis. The hottest year since records began, exacerbated by deforestation, led to situations such as abnormal carbon loss in the drought-plagued Amazon and emissions from wildfires across huge swathes of Canada. The speed and extent of the effect has some scientists worried that predictive climate models are too optimistic.

The Guardian | 8 min read

Reference: arXiv preprint (not peer reviewed)

NASA’s Europa Clipper yesterday began its voyage to investigate a vast ocean buried under the icy crust of Jupiter’s moon Europa. If Europa is found to have the ingredients for life, that discovery would drastically expand the chances of finding life on icy worlds in other solar systems. The spacecraft will make crucial manoeuvres in space, such as deploying radar antennas, to prepare for its arrival in 2030. “We’re watching through our fingers with excitement,” says planetary scientist Kathleen Craft. “Everything needs to go right.”

Nature | 6 min read

Features & opinion

Neurologist Francisco Lopera, who has died aged 73, changed the course of research on Alzheimer’s disease by forming deep connections with communities in his native Colombia. In the 1980s, Lopera and his colleague, psychologist Lucia Madrigal, gathered a vast family tree of people who seemed to carry a mutated gene that raised their risk of early-onset dementia — and, in a few family members, rare protective genes that can delay the symptoms by decades. Lopera created an exceptional level of doctor-patient trust that paved the way for a first-of-its-kind clinical trial, writes neuroscientist Kenneth Kosik, who was a long-time collaborator. “His philosophy [was]: ‘They don’t come to us; we go to them.’ It produced good science and goodwill.”

Nature | 5 min read

Artificial intelligence (AI) tools that dream up new kinds of proteins are being put to the test in a raft of new competitions. The contests are similar to the one that first helped launch the protein-structure-prediction tool AlphaFold – which was recognized in this year’s Chemistry Nobel – into the headlines. Judges are already trying to sift the functional from the fantastical in pursuit of more-effective drugs, industrial enzymes and laboratory reagents. But “these competitions can do damage” to a field if they are not executed properly, says computational biologist Burkhard Rost.

Nature | 8 min read

The price of scientific equipment has shot up in the last two years. Factors such as inflation due to energy shortages triggered by war in Ukraine and global scarcities of raw materials have left lab managers and researchers across the world feeling the squeeze. Buying refurbished equipment is both budget-friendly and reduces waste, while co-working labs offer access to specialist equipment without the need to purchase it, say researchers who offered their cost-cutting tips to Nature.

Nature | 8 min read

Where I work

Astrobiologist Rebeca Gonçalves poses with “the best of presents”: one hundred kilograms of material designed to simulate Mars regolith, the dense, soil-like deposits present on the planet’s surface. “We found that tomatoes, peas and carrots all took to the soil and grew well,” she says — though plants would need intensive protection to actually survive on the red planet. “Research to understand how to help food grow in harsh conditions won’t be wasted if it doesn’t get to Mars,” says Gonçalves. “That’s because restoring infertile, degraded soil that’s been damaged by climate change, or events such as flash flooding and droughts, will become more and more important in the future.” (Nature | 3 min read)

Today I’m giggling at the 40 finalists in the Nikon Comedy Wildlife Award. I’ve got a few favourites, but I don’t want to sway your votes for the People’s Choice Award.

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Thanks for reading,

Flora Graham, senior editor, Nature Briefing

With contributions by Jacob Smith

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