Nature Take Stock: Top 10 Life Sciences Cover Articles for 2020

Towards the end of 2020, Mays Medical has reviewed ten life science cover articles published in the journal Nature in 2020, including p53 missing neurons that drive the reprogramming and efficient decomposition of plastics in head and neck cancer. Breakthroughs and studies such as PET degease, programming to restore young metagenetic information and vision, accelerating the release of carbon dioxide from tropical forest soils by warming, the process of COVID-19 research, and spectral blueprints for intestinal organ regeneration.
to take a look at it - 1 map of stunting in children in low- and middle-income countries doi: 10.1038/s41586-019-1878-8 Child stunting (CGF) refers to children under five years of age who show stunting, wasting, low body weight, characterized by height or weight is not enough.
stunting in children is associated with high global morbidity and mortality.
children who suffer from malnutrition are more likely to develop metabolic developmental disorders and are more likely to have cognitive, physical and psychological problems, leading to problems such as lack of intelligence, declining academic performance and poor economic capacity as adults and susceptible to cardiovascular disease.
In the same country, estimates of CGF vary widely between provinces or states due to geographical differences, prompting further calls for assessments that match the distribution of CGFs and the development of corresponding public health programmes.
in this issue of Nature, researchers detail the developmental disabilities and educational attouration of children in about 100 low- and middle-income countries, from Africa to the Middle East, Asia and South America, from 2000 to 2017.
found that while both low- and middle-income countries had made significant progress, there were still serious regional inequalities in many countries.
children's potential is everywhere, the opportunities they have are not.
the study, researchers mapped the latest high spatial resolution estimates of stunting in children under 5 years of age in 105 low- and middle-income countries (LIMCs) between 2000 and 2017, with 99 percent of stunted children living in those countries.
study found that the overall rate of child stunting in low- and middle-income countries decreased from 36.9 per cent to 26.6 per cent between 2000 and 2017, but many low- and middle-income countries are still far from meeting the World Health Organization's global nutrition target of reducing stunting to less than 40 per cent by 2025.
there are significant differences in the rate and progress of stunting between and within countries.
such as 60.6 per cent in The State of Jigava, Nigeria's first administrative-level unit, 60.0 per cent in Karuzi Province, Burundi, 49.0 per cent in Uttar Pradesh, India, 58.3 per cent in Huapan, Laos, 47.0 per cent in Guatemala and 47.0 per cent in Niger The rate of stunting is 47.5 per cent, the rate of stunting in Burundi is 54.2 per cent, the rate of stunting in Madagascar is 49.8 per cent, the rate of stunting in Timor-Leste is 49.8 per cent and the rate of stunting in Yemen is 45.4 per cent In 105 low- and middle-income countries, the number of stunting among children under five years of age is severely unevenly distributed.
176.1 million stunted children in 2017, about 85.1% of stunted children live in Africa or Asia, and 50.1% of stunted children live in four countries: India, Pakistan, Nigeria and China.
India (51.5 million children, 28.6 per cent of the world's population), Pakistan (10.7 million, or 6.8 per cent of the world's population), Nigeria (11.8 million, or 6.6 per cent of the world's population), and China (16.2 million; 9.0 per cent).
In 2017, China's national rate of stunting was 10.8 percent, India's 39.3 percent, Pakistan's 44.0 percent and Nigeria's 38.2 percent, providing accurate data on public health tools for the first comprehensive estimate of CGF in low- and middle-income countries on a nuanced geospatial scale.
these geospatial estimates can support policy makers in planning interventions corresponding to them according to different regions in order to adapt to local conditions and effectively use resources to reduce CGF and its impact.
2.p53 deficiency drives neurons in head and neck cancer to reprogram, thereby promoting tumor growth doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-1996-3 Numerous studies have shown that patients with many neurons in tumors have higher recurrence rates and shorter lifetimes.
the source of neurons and neurons in these tumors is a neglected cancer feature.
cover article, researchers reveal for the first time the mechanisms by which neurons are involved in tumor production, a new feature of cancer.
researchers found that the loss of P53 could cause miR-34a to be missing from the vesicles secreted by tumor cells in head and neck cancer, allowing cancer-related sensational neurons to be reprogrammed as epinephrine-energy neurons to promote tumor growth.
also found drugs that might block the process, such as those commonly used to treat blood pressure and arrhythmics.
the absence of p53 can drive neurons in head and neck cancer to reprogram what types of neurons are in tumors? The researchers found that neurons that invade tumors are adrenaline-energy nerves involved in stress responses.
and guess they are pre-existing nerve extensions.
, however, when they cut off the adrenal energy nerve before the tumor was induced in mice, the adrenal energy nerve still appeared in the tumor.
later discovered that head and neck cancer cells secrete follicles containing small molecules of RNA (microRNA), which are then ingested by nearby sensory nerve cells.
If the head and neck cancer cells have a complete p53, the secreted vesicles contain certain types of miRNAs that keep neurons stationary, and when p53 mutates, the miRNAs in the exosome change and are then connected to existing sensory nerves and convert the sensory nerves into epinephrine nerves.
, these new epinephrine nerves invade the tumor, which promotes its growth.
neurotransmitters secreted by the adrenaline-energy nerves are epinephrine and epinephrine, two neurotransmitters that are sensitive to drugs for α and β blockers.
have long been used to treat high blood pressure and arrhythmics.
Refore, in this study, the researchers treated oral cancer mice with adrenergic blocker adrenegic blocker carvedilol, and found that tumor growth and cancer cell proliferation decreased significantly in oral cancer mice.
and researchers say they are working on clinical trials of epinephrine-blockers, most likely in the same way as other drugs.
study, researchers found that tumor-related neurons were reprogrammed as epinephrine neurons because of the p53 mutation, which stimulates tumor growth.
neuron's involvement in tumor production could be a potential target for cancer treatment.
3. An artificially modified PET decomposition enzyme that breaks down and recycles plastic DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2149-4 In everyday life, plastic products are everywhere, takeaway bags, shopping bags, milk tea and beverage bottles, etc., and we consume a lot of plastic products every day.
is an important environmental problem, with about 200 million tons of waste plastic clustered in landfills or in the natural environment each year.
is a major factor in this problem, and it is one of the world's most commonly used plastic varieties, producing nearly 70 million tons of PET per year for textiles and packaging bottles worldwide.
PET bottles can be recycled, there are problems with the current recycling methods, making them recycled at only about 30%.
the use of clycers causes serious clycer contamination.
according to the United Nations Environment Programme, by 2018, more than 300 million tons of plastic waste had been generated worldwide each year, of which more than 8 million tons would enter the ocean.
And it is estimated that more than 8 billion tons of plastic have been produced worldwide since the 1950s, about 60% of which end up in ecological or landfills, many of which take decades or even hundreds of years to break down naturally.
And as mentioned in our earlier articles, a lot of plastic that can't be broken down is finally back in our bodies, and each of us consumes the same amount of microplastics a year as a credit card (see for details, eat plastic, do you (nei)?). )。
the cover of this issue of Nature, Alain Marty and colleagues report on an engineered enzyme that effectively degrades PET to its monolithic parts.
10 hours, the PET hydrolyzed enzyme can achieve at least 90% PET dissophation.
and decomposed to produce new PETs that are as robust as conventional plastics.
in particular, the degraded monosome has almost the same characteristics as the newly produced monosome using petrochemical raw materials, so it can be reused to make plastic bottles - taking us one step closer to achieving a PET-based circular economy.
in the PET de-ionation experiment, the performance of various hydrolyzed enzymes may be compared, we can expect that the PET de-ionase can bring a large number of plastic waste pollution in China a technical solution path.
4. The transformation of astrological glial cells into dopamine neurons restored part of the motor function of the Parkinson's mouse model doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-2583-3 Parkinson's disease (Parkinson's disease, PD) is a primary central nervous system degenerative disease, the cause of which is not clear.
clinical symptoms, multiple cases are hidden and slow, memory and motor functions are deteriorating, and irreversible.
China accounts for half of the world's nearly 3 million PD patients and adds more than 100,000 cases each year.
pathological changes in PD are the degenerative death of neurons in the central brain, dopamine (DA), resulting in a significant reduction in the synth dopamine content and disease.
when patients showed clinical symptoms of PD, the patient's black dopamine neurons died at least 50% and the synth DA content decreased by more than 80%.
PD patients showed more static tremors, slow movement, muscle strength and posture gait disorders, accompanied by non-motor symptoms such as depression, constipation, and sleep disorders.
PD has a serious impact on the quality of life of patients.
there is still no effective treatment for the disease, and existing treatments can only alleviate symptoms.
it is urgent to find a strategy to cure PD at its root, and it is of great clinical significance and value.
in a June cover article in Nature, Professor Fu's team used adeno-related virus shRNA or antisumatic oligonucleotide drugs to reduce the level of RNA binding protein PTB in glial cells in the mesoblastamine region of the brain, successfully transforming glial cells into dopamine neurons in mouse models of Parkinson's disease.
neurons can reverse the loss of dopamine and restore some of the motor function of the Parkinson's mouse model.
technology is also suitable for in-body human cells, suggesting it could lead to treatments for neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's disease.
the study, the researchers first found that in-body isolated mice or human-origin astrological glial cells were able to efficiently differentiate into mature functional neurons after knocking down PTBs.
Knocking down the PTB, the astrological glial cells were transformed into neurons and then the researchers went on to conduct in vivo experiments, the researchers constructed adeno-related virus vectors, injected the vector into the central brain of Parkinson's disease mice, and found that the astrological glial cells in the brain were converted into dopamine neurons, which secreted dopamine, thus restoring some of the motor function of the Parkinson's mouse model.
In addition, the researchers then tried injecting parkinson's mice with antonym oligonucleotides that inhibited PTB, and found that it also converted astrological glial cells into dopamine-energy neurons and effectively reversed the symptoms of movement defects in mice.
In this study, researchers used adeno-related virus shRNA or antonymical oligonucleotide drugs to convert shaped cells into functional dopamine neurons, restoring some of the motor function of the Parkinson's mouse model, and this study provided promising new ideas for the treatment of Parkinson's disease, with very exciting conversion potential.
5. Uncovering the super immunity of bats, scientists for the first time published a high-quality genome map of six bats doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-2486-3 Bats are the only mammals that can really fly, have a strong flight ability, and are natural hosts of multiple zoonotic viruses, capable of carrying dozens of viruses, but it is unusually immune to viral infections.
addition to the new coronavirus and the close relationship with bats, SARS virus, MERS virus, Ebola virus, etc. have also been confirmed to originate in bats.
why do bats have extraordinary immunity to viruses? In this nature cover, Emma Teeling and Sonja Vernes and others show the high-quality genomes of six bats sequenced by the "Bat1K" research complex.
explains bats' extraordinary adaptability and high immunity on a genetic basis.
researchers have provided evidence of molecular mechanisms that may have prompted bats to form their particular immune systems.
these reference genomes will be important tools for studying how bats are resistant to coronavirus infections, or will enhance human resilience to diseases such as COVID-19.
in the study, researchers used genome-wide screening to find that some of bats' immune-related genes evolved positively, suggesting that the bat's common ancestor began to evolve immune regulatory mechanisms that were different from those of other mammals.
also, in the bat genome, genes with immune stimuli, such as regulating NF