There is concern that the time taken to publish academic papers in microbiological science has significantly increased in recent years. While the data do not specifically support this, evidence suggests that editors are having to invite more and more reviewers to identify those willing to perform peer review.

Subduction related to the ancient supercontinent cycle is poorly constrained by mantle samples. Sublithospheric diamond crystallization records the release of melts from subducting oceanic lithosphere at 300-700 km depths(1,2) and is especially suited to tracking the timing and effects of deep mantle processes on supercontinents. Here we show that four isotope systems (Rb-Sr, Sm-Nd, U-Pb and Re-Os) applied to Fe-sulfide and CaSiO3 inclusions within 13 sublithospheric diamonds from Juina (Brazil) and Kankan (Guinea) give broadly overlapping crystallization ages from around 450 to 650 million years ago. The intracratonic location of the diamond deposits on Gondwana and the ages, initial isotopic ratios, and trace element content of the inclusions indicate formation from a peri-Gondwanan subduction system. Preservation of these Neoproterozoic-Palaeozoic sublithospheric diamonds beneath Gondwana until its Cretaceous breakup, coupled with majorite geobarometry(3,4,) suggests that they accreted to and were retained in the lithospheric keel for more than 300 Myr during supercontinent migration. We propose that this process of lithosphere growth-with diamonds attached to the supercontinent keel by the diapiric uprise of depleted buoyant material and pieces of slab crust-could have enhanced supercontinent stability.

Animal regeneration requires coordinated responses of many cell types throughout the animal body. In animals carrying endosymbionts, cells from the other species may also participate in regeneration, but how cellular responses are integrated across species is yet to be unraveled. Here, we study the acoel Convolutriloba longifissura, which hosts symbiotic Tetraselmis green algae and can regenerate entire bodies from small tissue fragments. We show that animal injury leads to a decline in the photosynthetic efficiency of the symbiotic algae and concurrently induces upregulation of a cohort of photosynthesis-related genes. A deeply conserved animal transcription factor, runt, is induced after injury and required for the acoel regeneration. Knockdown of runt also dampens algal transcriptional responses to the host injury, particularly in photosynthesis related pathways, and results in further reduction of photosynthetic efficiency post-injury. Our results suggest that the runt-dependent animal regeneration program coordinates wound responses across the symbiotic partners and regulates photosynthetic carbon assimilation in this metaorganism.

Dissecting plant responses to the environment is key to understanding if and how plants adapt to anthropogenic climate change. Stomata, plants' pores for gas exchange, are expected to decrease in density following increased CO2 concentrations, a trend already observed in multiple plant species. However, it is unclear if such responses are based on genetic changes and evolutionary adaptation. Here we make use of extensive knowledge of 43 genes in the stomatal development pathway and newly generated genome information of 191 A. thaliana historical herbarium specimens collected over the last 193 years to directly link genetic variation with climate change. While we find that the essential transcription factors SPCH, MUTE and FAMA, central to stomatal development, are under strong evolutionary constraints, several regulators of stomatal development show signs of local adaptation in contemporary samples from different geographic regions. We then develop a polygenic score based on known effects of gene knock-out on stomatal development that recovers a classic pattern of stomatal density decrease over the last centuries without requiring direct phenotype observation of historical samples. This approach combining historical genomics with functional experimental knowledge could allow further investigations of how different, even in historical samples unmeasurable, cellular plant phenotypes have already responded to climate change through adaptive evolution.

Aerosols can affect photosynthesis through radiative perturbations such as scattering and absorbing solar radiation. This biophysical impact has been widely studied using field measurements, but the sign and magnitude at continental scales remain uncertain. Solar-induced fluorescence (SIF), emitted by chlorophyll, strongly correlates with photosynthesis. With recent advancements in Earth observation satellites, we leverage SIF observations from the Tropospheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) with unprecedented spatial resolution and near-daily global coverage, to investigate the impact of aerosols on photosynthesis. Our analysis reveals that on weekends when there is more plant-available sunlight due to less particulate pollution, 64% of regions across Europe show increased SIF, indicating more photosynthesis. Moreover, we find a widespread negative relationship between SIF and aerosol loading across Europe. This suggests the possible reduction in photosynthesis as aerosol levels increase, particularly in ecosystems limited by light availability. By considering two plausible scenarios of improved air quality-reducing aerosol levels to the weekly minimum 3-d values and levels observed during the COVID-19 period-we estimate a potential of 41 to 50 Mt net additional annual CO2 uptake by terrestrial ecosystems in Europe. This work assesses human impacts on photosynthesis via aerosol pollution at continental scales using satellite observations. Our results highlight i) the use of spatiotemporal variations in satellite SIF to estimate the human impacts on photosynthesis and ii) the potential of reducing particulate pollution to enhance ecosystem productivity.

The use of biomethane, produced through anaerobic digestion of organic waste, holds promise as an energy source for mitigating climate change. This study quantifies the technical potential of biomethane, considering neither socio-economic nor political constraints, and then compares it to worldwide natural gas use and imports. Furthermore, it calculates the potential emission reduction achieved by substituting natural gas with biomethane. We find that biomethane can offset 29% of natural gas use and two-thirds of natural gas net-imports worldwide. Considering the European energy crisis arising from the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, we analyze the potential for each European country to generate enough biomethane to decrease their reliance on imported Russian natural gas. Our estimates indicate that almost one-third of European countries, including the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Ireland, Slovenia, Romania, Greece, Sweden, and Portugal, have the potential to completely replace their natural gas imports from Russia by utilizing domestic biomethane production. Our study also evaluates how biomethane can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by substituting fossil natural gas, while considering methane leaks in both biomethane and natural gas supply chains and carbon emissions from fossil natural gas combustion. Our results indicate that replacing fossil natural gas with biomethane will decrease emissions from natural gas systems by 11%, equivalent to 1.1 Gt CO2-eq per year. These findings illustrate the potential of biomethane in reducing our dependence on fossil natural gas and mitigating its emissions.

The extent and ecological significance of intraspecific functional diversity within marine microbial populations is still poorly understood, and it remains unclear if such strain-level microdiversity will affect fitness and persistence in a rapidly changing ocean environment. In this study, we cultured 11 sympatric strains of the ubiquitous marine picocyanobacterium Synechococcus isolated from a Narragansett Bay (RI) phytoplankton community thermal selection experiment. Thermal performance curves revealed selection at cool and warm temperatures had subdivided the initial population into thermotypes with pronounced differences in maximum growth temperatures. Curiously, the genomes of all 11 isolates were almost identical (average nucleotide identities of >99.99%, with >99% of the genome aligning) and no differences in gene content or single nucleotide variants were associated with either cool or warm temperature phenotypes. Despite a very high level of genomic similarity, sequenced epigenomes for two strains showed differences in methylation on genes associated with photosynthesis. These corresponded to measured differences in photophysiology, suggesting a potential pathway for future mechanistic research into thermal microdiversity. Our study demonstrates that present-day marine microbial populations can harbor cryptic but environmentally relevant thermotypes which may increase their resilience to future rising temperatures.

We present extensive ultraviolet (UV) and optical photometric and optical spectroscopic follow-up of supernova (SN) 2021gno by the 'Precision Observations of Infant Supernova Explosions' (POISE) project, starting less than 2 d after the explosion. Given its intermediate luminosity, fast photometric evolution, and quick transition to the nebular phase with spectra dominated by [Ca II ] lines, SN 2021gno belongs to the small family of Calcium-rich transients. Moreo v er, it shows double-peaked light curves, a phenomenon shared with only four other Calcium-rich events. The projected distance from the centre of the host galaxy is not as large as other objects in this family. The initial optical light-curve peaks coincide with a very quick decline of the UV flux, indicating a fast initial cooling phase. Through hydrodynamical modelling of the bolometric light curve and line velocity evolution, we found that the observations are compatible with the explosion of a highly stripped massive star with an ejecta mass of 0.8 M-circle dot and a Ni-56 mass of 0.024 M-circle dot. The initial cooling phase (first light-curve peak) is explained by the presence of an extended circumstellar material comprising similar to 10 (-2) M-circle dot with an extension of 1100 R-circle dot. We discuss if hydrogen features are present in both maximum-light and nebular spectra, and their implications in terms of the proposed progenitor scenarios for Calcium-rich transients.

We model the stellar abundances and ages of two disrupted dwarf galaxies in the Milky Way stellar halo: Gaia-Sausage Enceladus (GSE) and Wukong/LMS-1. Using a statistically robust likelihood function, we fit one-zone models of galactic chemical evolution with exponential infall histories to both systems, deriving e-folding time-scales of tau in = 1.01 +/- 0.13 Gyr for GSE and tau(in) = 3 . 08 (+ 3 . 19) (-1. 16) Gyr for Wukong/LMS-1. GSE formed stars for tau(tot) = 5 . 40 (+ 0 . 32) (-0. 31) Gyr, sustaining star formation for similar to 1.5-2 Gyr after its first infall into the Milky Way similar to 10 Gyr ago. Our fit suggests that star formation lasted for tau(tot) = 3 . 36 (+ 0 . 55) (-0. 47) Gyr in Wukong/LMS-1, though our sample does not contain any age measurements. The differences in evolutionary parameters between the two are qualitatively consistent with trends with stellar mass M-* predicted by simulations and semi-analytic models of galaxy formation. Our inferred values of the outflow mass-loading factor reasonably match eta alpha M-* (-1/ 3) as predicted by galactic wind models. Our fitting method is based only on Poisson sampling from an evolutionary track and requires no binning of the data. We demonstrate its accuracy by testing against mock data, showing that it accurately recovers the input model across a broad range of sample sizes (20 <= N <= 2000) and measurement uncertainties (0.01 <=sigma([alpha/Fe]), sigma([Fe/H]) <= 0.5; 0 . 02 < sigma(log10( age )) <= 1). Due to the generic nature of our derivation, this likelihood function should be applicable to one-zone models of any parametrization and easily extensible to other astrophysical models which predict tracks in some observed space.