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Sun Jan 24 11:50:45 EST 2010
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Essentiality of FASII pathway for Staphylococcus aureus - Arising from: S. Brinster et al.Nature458, 83–86 (2009); Brinster et al.replyRecently, Brinster et al. suggested that type II fatty-acid biosynthesis (FASII) is not a suitable antibacterial target for Gram-positive pathogens because they use fatty acids directly from host serum rather than de novo synthesis. Their findings, if confirmed, are relevant for further scientific and financial investments in the development of new drugs targeting FASII. We present here in vitro and in vivo data demonstrating that their observations do not hold for Staphylococcus aureus, a major Gram-positive pathogen causing several human infections. The observed differences among Gram-positive pathogens in FASII reflects heterogeneity either in fatty-acid synthesis or in the capacity for fatty-acid uptake from the environment.

Brinster et al. reply - Replying to: W. Balemans et al.Nature462, 10.1038/nature08667 (2009)Our studies led us to conclude that growth of major Gram-positive pathogens, including Staphylococcus aureus, is not inhibited by FASII-targeted antibiotics in septicaemic infection, owing to compensation by serum fatty acids. The comments of Balemans et al. challenge the generality of our results, mainly on the basis of their own work, which is aimed at developing FabI inhibitors for treatment of S. aureus infections. Their allusion to the documented use of FASII inhibitors to treat mycobacterial infections is misleading. Mycobacteria were not considered in our study, because (1) their main route of pathogenesis is not sepsis, and (2) they require mycolic acids for normal growth, which are lacking in serum. The results we present here further reinforce the conclusions of our article.

Making the paper: Ernst Fehr - Testosterone's 'bad guy' image is rooted in folklore, not fact.

Abstractions - First authorHumans, plants and animals are vulnerable to the harmful effects of ozone when exposed to high levels of the air pollutant. Since the 1970s, scientists have been monitoring ozone levels in the atmospheric boundary and free troposphere over western North America. Previous studies

From the blogosphere - If you've ever wondered what it's like to do science on Earth's southernmost land mass, you can follow an Antarctic field trip at the In the Field blog (http://go.nature.com/4Bk1kn).Student journalist Chaz Firestone of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, is travelling across

Climate of suspicion - With climate-change sceptics waiting to pounce on any scientific uncertainties, researchers need a sophisticated strategy for communication.

Ten years of synergy - Contributions to and from basic science are the part of synthetic biology that most deserves celebration.

Self-inflicted damage - The autocratic actions of an institute's founder could destroy a centre of excellence for brain research.

Microbiology: Life in the lost city -

Geophysics: Synthetic sky light -

Chemistry: Chase acid, solve maze -

Astrophysics: Dusty galaxy - Astrophys. J.709, 210–217 (2010) 10.1088/0004-637X/709/1/210Astronomers have discovered the glow of a dusty galaxy about 7.3 billion parsecs away that existed when the Universe was just 1.5 billion years old. Kirsten Knudsen of the Argelander Institute for Astronomy

Evolutionary biology: How girls go solo -

Biochemistry: Designer label -

Ecology: Asocial invaders -

Geoscience: Blowin' in the wind - Geology38, 19–22 (2010) 10.1130/G25287.1The composition of dust blowing into the Mediterranean Sea from North Africa varies according to season and, new work suggests, is also influenced by broader oceanic and atmospheric cycles. As a result, dust may

Evolutionary biology: Sperm signals -

Neuropharmacology: Beating depression - Neuron65, 40–52 (2010) 10.1016/j.neuron.2009.12.003Many antidepressants increase levels of the neurotransmitter serotonin in the brain. But the drugs don't work in all patients. It has been suggested that a particular gene variant of the human serotonin receptor 5-HT

Journal club - A neuroscientist learns about algorithms for motor learning.Under what conditions do people learn most effectively? This question is pertinent to several fields and to many neuropsychiatric disorders involving aberrant learning and memory. In motor neurobiology, understanding how people learn new movements may yield insight

Advocacy for carbon capture and storage could arouse distrust - In addition to industry voices such as Gert Jan Kramer and Martin Haigh (Nature462, 568–569; 2009), many academic experts are promoting CO2 capture and storage (CCS). But advocacy by academics could be ill-advised.The technology has

Activists should be consulted in animal testing decisions - You argue, in an Editorial discussing a university's decision to cancel a primate-research project (

Conservation work is incomplete without cryptic biodiversity - You focus attention on biological diversity, nature conservation and the effects of climate warming in your special issue on biodiversity (19 November 2009). 'Cryptic' biodiversity is also crucial, because it helps natural ecosystems to continue functioning and habitats to bounce back in response to environmental

Geothermal energy stuck between a rock and a hot place - In his Opinion article, Domenico Giardini (Nature462, 848–849; 2009) calls for a better understanding of earthquake risk in pursuing deep geothermal energy using an enhanced geothermal system (EGS). However, earthquakes are only part of the problem in trying

Correction - While J. P. Albars' Correspondence 'Spanish cuts could do lasting damage to biomedical research' (

A route to more tractable expert advice - There are mathematically advanced ways to weigh and pool scientific advice. They should be used more to quantify uncertainty and improve decision-making, says Willy Aspinall.

Fixing the communications failure - People's grasp of scientific debates can improve if communicators build on the fact that cultural values influence what and whom we believe, says Dan Kahan.

Vision of a personal genomics future - The director of the US National Institutes of Health, Francis Collins, calls for a revolution in personalized medicine. Such advances should be shared beyond the developed world, says Abdallah S. Daar.

The bootleggers' legacy - As Deborah Blum describes vividly in The Poisoner's Handbook, the catalyst for the birth of forensic medicine in the United States was Prohibition. Most people think of the nationwide banning of the consumption of alcohol in the 1920s as merely a failed attempt at

Turin's criminology museum - These days Cesare Lombroso is often considered a figure of fun, a flamboyant crazy who insisted that a criminal — or, indeed, a genius — could be recognized by the cut of his jaw or the slope of his forehead.The self-styled anthropological criminologist might

Culture dish: Doom-laden Sundance - The Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, sets the agenda for independent cinema. At this year's festival, which runs until 31 January, science-related films are most concerned with disaster scenarios, both real and imagined.A handful of documentaries chart the spread of man-made catastrophes.

Synthetic biology: Synchronized bacterial clocks - By synchronizing clocks, humans make more efficient use of their time and orchestrate their activities in different places. Bacteria have now been engineered that similarly coordinate their molecular timepieces.

Materials science: Membrane magic - The use of magnetic fields to assemble particles into membranes provides a powerful tool for exploring the physics of self-assembly and a practical method for synthesizing functional materials.

Genetics: Decoding a national treasure - The giant-panda genome is the first reported de novo assembly of a large mammalian genome achieved using next-generation sequencing methods. The feat reflects a trend towards ever-decreasing genome-sequencing costs.

Asteroids: Stripped on passing by Earth - Asteroids are weakly bound piles of rubble, and if one comes close to Earth, tides can cause the object to undergo landslides and structural rearrangement. The outcome of this encounter is a body with meteorite-like colours.

Evolutionary biology: New take on the Red Queen - Biologists have assumed that natural selection shapes larger patterns of evolution through interactions such as competition and predation. These patterns may instead be determined by rare, stochastic speciation.

Atmospheric chemistry: More ozone over North America - Springtime ozone levels in the lower atmosphere over western North America are rising. The source of this pollution may be Asia, a finding that reaffirms the need for international air-quality control.

Cell biology: How cilia beat - Physics provides new approaches to difficult biological problems: a plausible mathematical model of how cilia and flagella beat has been formulated, but it needs to be subjected to rigorous experimental tests.

Correction - In the obituary of Vitaly Ginzburg by Malcolm Longair (

The sequence and de novo assembly of the giant panda genome -

The transcriptional network for mesenchymal transformation of brain tumours -

A synchronized quorum of genetic clocks -

Earth encounters as the origin of fresh surfaces on near-Earth asteroids -

Strong crystal size effect on deformation twinning -

High-water-content mouldable hydrogels by mixing clay and a dendritic molecular binder -

Increasing springtime ozone mixing ratios in the free troposphere over western North America -

Phylogenies reveal new interpretation of speciation and the Red Queen -

Mutational robustness can facilitate adaptation -

Prejudice and truth about the effect of testosterone on human bargaining behaviour -

Systematic sequencing of renal carcinoma reveals inactivation of histone modifying genes -

HnRNP proteins controlled by c-Myc deregulate pyruvate kinase mRNA splicing in cancer -

FOXO-dependent regulation of innate immune homeostasis -

Transcriptional role of cyclin D1 in development revealed by a genetic–proteomic screen -

Mechanism of folding chamber closure in a group II chaperonin -

Direct inhibition of the NOTCH transcription factor complex - Nature462, 182–188 (2009)In the print issue of this Article, text from the last line of the Figure 4 legend, defining the scale bar lengths, is inadvertently missing. This sentence should read “Scale bars, 50 μm”.

Cyclical DNA methylation of a transcriptionally active promoter - Nature452, 45–50 (2008)Errors and inappropriate manipulations were made in the assembly and processing of images in this Article. This affected Figure 2b, d, and some of the Supplementary Figures. These errors have been rectified using original data,

Thickness and Clapeyron slope of the post-perovskite boundary - Nature462, 782–785 (2009)In this Letter, the accepted date was incorrectly listed as 19 August 2009. The correct accepted date is 21 October 2009. Also, in the Acknowledgements, APS was defined incorrectly. The correct definition is the Advanced

FGF signalling during embryo development regulates cilia length in diverse epithelia - Nature458, 651–654 (2009)In Figure 4 of this Letter, panel b (fgfr1 MO, sox17in situ) was inadvertently duplicated in panel a (WT uninj., sox17 in situ) during figure revision and assembly.

Strange machine - A fair exchange?