Pioneering nuclear-fusion reactor shuts down after 40 years

What matters in science | 

View this email in your browser Tuesday 23 January 2024

Hello Nature readers, Today, we bid farewell to pioneering nuclear-fusion reactor JET, learn about China's enormous dark matter lab and follow the debate over megalodon's body shape.

Fusion reactors use tritium, an isotope of hydrogen that can leave components radioactive for decades. (CEA-IRFM/EUROfusion/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock)

How to disassemble a fusion reactor Scientists have started to decommission the United Kingdom's Joint European Torus (JET) — one of the world's foremost nuclear-fusion reactors — 40 years after it began operations. The process will take 17 years and will prioritize reusing and recycling parts — and use the knowledge to make sure future fusion power plants are safe and financially viable. JET taught scientists about how to build and fuel ITER, the ambitious US$22-billion fusion reactor in France, which scientists aim to have up and running in the 2030s. Nature | 5 min read

Biggest and deepest dark matter lab More than 2,000 metres below the Jinping Mountains in southwest China, the world's deepest and largest underground laboratory has just opened. Experiments that fill the 330,000-cubic-metre space will help to hunt down dark matter — the hypothetical substance that is thought to make up more than 80% of the mass in the Universe. The mountain will shield sensitive detectors from noise that could interfere with the signal from potential dark matter particles, which are almost impossible to detect. It's "like trying to hear the tiny voice of a child inside a stadium where everybody's shouting", says physicist Marco Selvi. Nature | 5 min read

Megalodon: stocky or slim? A reconstruction of the ancient extinct shark Otodus megalodon as long and slender has reignited the debate over what the giant predator really looked like. Sharks' cartilage skeleton doesn't fossilize well and no complete megalodon fossil has ever been found. A 2022 study on megalodon vertebrae concluded that it was short and stocky, like a great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias), but much larger. Researchers who have now reanalysed the same vertebrae suggest that megalodon's length was underestimated. Smithsonian Magazine | 5 min read Reference: Palaeontologia Electronica paper

Features & opinion

The race to cure autoimmune diseases Scientists are closing in on therapies to treat conditions in which people's immune systems attack their own bodies, such as type 1 diabetes, lupus and multiple sclerosis. Instead of suppressing the entire immune response, researchers try to selectively wipe out disease-causing cells or deprogram them by administering the very antigens that they attack. In one study, engineered immune cells put 15 people's autoimmune conditions into remission. "The results are mind blowing, boggling, outstanding," says neuroimmunologist Lawrence Steinman. But he cautions against undue optimism. "Every time these are taken to the clinic, including some of my own efforts, they fall short of getting a drug approval." Nature | 11 min read

ACCESS NATURE AND 54 OTHER NATURE JOURNALS Nature+ is our most affordable 30-day subscription, giving you online access to a wide range of specialist Nature Portfolio journals, including Nature. Nature+ is for personal use and is suitable for students. Learn more about Nature+ in the Americas, in the UK and internationally.

We need building codes for climate survival Building regulations that focus on energy efficiency can help people to survive extreme heat or cold, even without power, argues Earth scientist Meredydd Evans. Insulation and built-in window shades can help to maintain liveable conditions for longer. The cost is worth it, says Evans. "Constructing buildings to code is much less expensive than retrofitting them later or paying for the effects of extreme heat on human lives and health." Nature | 5 min read

Why we get Zoom fatigue, and how to fight it Videoconference fatigue is real. We aren't able to clearly read each other's body language or make the usual amount of eye contact during online meetings, explains neural engineering researcher Gernot Müller-Putz. Here are his tips to reduce Zoom exhaustion: Take a short break every 30—45 minutes Turn off your camera after greeting others to focus on the conversation and avoid feeling self-conscious Keep meetings short by encouraging everyone to do them standing up. NPR podcast | 11 min listen Reference: Scientific Reports paper

Where I work

Engineer Mahmoud Tavakoli leads a multidisciplinary team that develops wearable electronic devices that are less invasive than standard equipment — like the stretchable circuit pictured here. "The e-patches we make that use the same technology and can monitor heart rate, respiration rate, brain activity, body temperature and blood oxygen levels," says Tavakoli. "We aim to give patients in hospital more autonomy and help them to go home sooner." (Nature | 3 min read) (Ana Paganini for Nature)

Quote of the day "Physics is a process of getting stuck. Blackboards are the best tool for getting unstuck." Writing out problems on a blackboard often helps to solve them, says physicist Thomas Fink. And collaborating with colleagues on a blackboard — or a digital equivalent — creates a record of confirmations and contradictions. (Nautilus | 6 min read)

Today, I'm delving into chemist and science writer Ash Jogalekar's list of academic papers that "transcend disciplines and stand as timeless testaments to both great thinking and great writing". Theoretical physicist Philip Anderson's 1972 paper More is different for example is very useful to explain why chemistry can't be reduced to physics, Jogalekar says. Please send your favourite scientific bedtime reading — alongside any feedback on this newsletter — to briefing@nature.com. Thanks for reading, Katrina Krämer, associate editor, Nature Briefing With contributions by Flora Graham, Gemma Conroy and Sarah Tomlin

Want more? Update your preferences to sign up to our other free Nature Briefing newsletters: Nature Briefing: Anthropocene — climate change, biodiversity, sustainability and geoengineering Nature Briefing: AI & Robotics — 100% written by humans, of course Nature Briefing: Cancer — a weekly newsletter written with cancer researchers in mind Nature Briefing: Translational Research covers biotechnology, drug discovery and pharma Please visit your preferences page to choose which Nature Briefing newsletters to receive (or to unsubscribe).

Join our community

You received this newsletter because you subscribed with the email address: manojdole1.Lens@blogger.com Please add briefing@nature.com to your address book. Enjoying this newsletter? You can use this form to recommend it to a friend or colleague — thank you! Had enough? To unsubscribe from this Briefing, but keep receiving your other Nature Briefing newsletters, please update your subscription preferences. To stop all Nature Briefing emails forever, click here to remove your personal data from our system. Fancy a bit of a read? View our privacy policy. Forwarded by a friend? Get the Briefing straight to your inbox: subscribe for free. Want to master time management, protect your mental health and brush up on your skills? Sign up for our free short e-mail series for working scientists, Back to the lab. Get more from Nature: Register for free on nature.com to sign up for other newsletters specific to your field and email alerts from Nature Research journals. Would you like to read the Briefing in other languages? Sign up for the weekly round-up e-mail in Arabic, curated and translated by the editors of Nature Arabic Edition. هل تود أن تقرأ هذا الموجز باللغة العربية؟ سَجِّل الآن لتصلك نشرة العلوم الموجزة أسبوعيًّا، التي يختار محتواها ويترجمه فريق محرري "نيتشر الطبعة العربية". Follow Nature Portfolio on WeChat for a weekly round-up post in Chinese, curated and translated by our team in China. 关注Nature Portfolio官方微信订阅号，每周二为您推送Nature Briefing精选中文内容——自然每周简报。 Nature | The Springer Nature Campus, 4 Crinan Street, London, N1 9XW, United Kingdom Nature Research, part of Springer Nature. © 2024 Springer Nature Limited. All rights reserved.