News at a glance

SCI COMMUN### Climate change The United States submitted its new goals to the Paris climate agreement last week, pledging to cut its planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions 50% to 52% below 2005 levels by 2030. The nonbinding pledge, made on Earth Day at an online climate summit convened by President Joe Biden, is one of the most aggressive targets of any wealthy country. The cuts are also higher than the 26% to 28% reduction by 2025 pledged by former President Barack Obama when the United States first joined the agreement in 2015. In the past month, Canada, Japan, and the United Kingdom have also committed to cuts steeper than their earlier pledges; other large polluters, such as China, India, and Russia, have yet to increase their goals ahead of a critical U.N. climate meeting this winter in Glasgow, U.K. The U.S. pledge has a long road to reality. It will require immediate increases in renewable energy, widespread adoption of electric vehicles, and other steps, many of which will require laws that could be difficult to pass, such as Biden's climate-focused infrastructure bill. > “It is our policy … not to employ anyone who has taken the experimental COVID-19 injection.” > > Miami-based private school Centner Academy in a letter to parents this week, citing discredited claims that vaccinated people can transmit harmful substances to others. ### Biomedicine ![Figure][1] CREDITS: (GRAPHIC) J. BRAINARD/ SCIENCE ; (DATA) ASGCT/INFORMA The number of new clinical trials for gene, cell, and RNA therapies has almost tripled in the past 4 years, the American Society of Gene & Cell Therapy said this month in its first ever quarterly trends report. As of 31 March, nearly 3500 of these experimental treatments were in development, most of which (53%) consist of altered genes or genetically modified (GM) cells, such as cancer-fighting T cells with modified receptors. Cancer is the target for the largest number (1200) of therapies under development. Among RNA therapies, many were vaccines (35) or COVID-19 treatments (30). The United States has more clinical trials underway in each of the three types of therapies than any other country: 1400 overall. Globally, 16 gene therapies (including GM cells), 53 non-GM cell therapies, and 15 RNA therapies have been approved for use so far. ### Vaccination The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) last week killed a rule that would have made it much more difficult for people who sustain shoulder injuries during vaccination to win compensation from a $4.1 billion government fund. The rule had been finalized on 19 January, the last day of former President Donald Trump's administration. But President Joe Biden's administration froze its implementation on 20 January. The new administration said the previous one had been “irregular in its haste” when it moved to remove shoulder injuries from a list of injuries in which the petitioner does not have to prove a vaccine caused the injury, making it easier to win a government payout ( Science , 10 April 2020, p. [121][2]). Shoulder injuries accounted for nearly 55% of more than 2400 claims filed with the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program in the past 2 years, most of them after flu shots. COVID-19 vaccines fall under a different HHS program, but if they win formal approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, they could in principle be added to the national compensation program. ### Publishing Sixteen journals, including BMJ Open Science and Royal Society Open Science , say they will accept articles reviewed by the nonprofit Peer Community In Registered Reports (PCI RR). The organization, launched last week, will review one type of article: “registered reports,” describing studies for which detailed experimental plans are peer reviewed before research begins. Once the research is complete, PCI RR will do a second round of peer review including results and analysis. Papers it recommends can then be published in any of the 16 journals without further review as long as they meet a journal's normal criteria. The organization, funded by donations, will provide peer review free to authors and journals in any discipline. ### COVID-19 The National Institutes of Health (NIH) last week announced it would launch a large study repurposing existing drugs for patients with mild COVID-19 symptoms who don't need hospitalization. The $155 million trial, which aims to recruit 13,500 participants, will open in a few weeks at several research centers. It will test up to seven medications already approved for other conditions, but NIH hasn't yet named them. A recent, similar trial at the University of Oxford that has so far enrolled about 4800 patients has found that the asthma drug budesonide lessens symptoms and speeds recovery in certain COVID-19 patients. ### Medicine A large study has firmed up earlier evidence that SARS-CoV-2 increases the rate of complications for pregnant women and their babies. The study followed 706 pregnant women with COVID-19 and 1424 uninfected pregnant women at hospitals in 18 countries. Infected women had a 76% higher risk of developing problems caused by pregnancy-associated high blood pressure and a 59% higher risk of preterm birth. They were also five times more likely to be admitted to intensive care than uninfected women. Eleven women with COVID-19 died, compared with one uninfected woman, researchers report in JAMA Pediatrics . Infected women with fever and shortness of breath had babies with a fivefold increased risk of complications such as immature lungs, eye disorders, and brain damage. The coronavirus may affect pregnancy via changes in a woman's heart, lungs, and immune system. The results show pregnant women should be among priority groups for COVID-19 vaccines, the authors say. A separate study last week found no obvious safety problems in more than 800 U.S. women who gave birth after receiving messenger RNA vaccines. ### Community The American Humanist Association has decided to withdraw Richard Dawkins's 1996 Humanist of the Year award as a result of his “history of making statements that use the guise of scientific discourse to demean marginalized groups.” The decision came soon after the evolutionary biologist and former University of Oxford professor wrote a tweet comparing transgender people to Rachel Dolezal, a civil rights activist who for years posed as Black. The association said the tweet “implies that the identities of transgender individuals are fraudulent, while also simultaneously attacking Black identity as one that can be assumed when convenient.” In 2015, Dawkins argued that trans women are not women based on their chromosomes, but said he would use the pronoun “she” out of courtesy. ### Seismology The first large-scale, phone-based earthquake early warning system will be deployed in Greece and New Zealand, Google announced this week. Since last year, the company has been testing the use of data compiled from its more than 2 billion active Android phones to pinpoint the location and strength of earthquakes. The measurement comes from the built-in Android phones' accelerometers, which sense movement just like seismometers. When the phones detect earthquakelike signals, they alert a server that combines information from many phones. If enough phones corroborate the result, an alert goes out. The cellphone results compared well to those from seismometer-based warning systems in Japan and the United States. Google chose New Zealand and Greece, both countries with high earthquake hazards and many Android phones, to premier the system because they lack operational warning systems of their own. Eventually, phone-based alerts could be available worldwide. ### Biotechnology Genetically modified mosquitoes designed to prevent the spread of viruses such as Zika and dengue are set to be released in the United States for the first time. Starting this week, the company Oxitec will free fewer than 12,000 transgenic Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, all of them nonbiting males, in the Florida Keys as part of a pilot study, the company announced on 23 April. They are engineered to carry a gene that kills their female offspring, reducing the population of mosquitoes capable of transmitting diseases. Field tests outside the United States have shown dramatic population drops, though the company has not published definitive evidence that the strategy reduces disease in humans. The project, which has long faced public opposition in Florida, won approval in May 2020 from the Environmental Protection Agency, which predicted no adverse effects on people or local wildlife. ### Science policy President Joe Biden last week picked two veterans of government service and a newcomer to fill top science positions. He named soil scientist Asmeret Asefaw Berhe of the University of California, Merced, to lead the Department of Energy's Office of Science. Berhe, born in Eritrea, has little government experience but has won accolades for her research and efforts to promote diversity in science. She would become the first Black woman to lead the science office if confirmed by the Senate. Oceanographer Rick Spinrad of Oregon State University, Corvallis, who has held numerous posts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, is Biden's choice to lead that agency. To run the State Department's science bureau, he chose Monica Medina, an ocean policy expert and attorney at Georgetown University. Confirmation hearings for the three nominees could come as early as next month. ### Regulation In one of the broadest attempts to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) to date, the European Commission on 21 April proposed new rules for algorithms that power everything from medical device and credit scoring software to chatbots and facial recognition systems. The rules divide AI technologies into risk categories, and put outright bans on some, such as systems that would score individuals' “social credit.” Other “high-risk” systems, including those that collect biometric data, would require a strict vetting process. However, there are exceptions for national security, and it could take years before the rules become law: They must first pass the European Council and the European Parliament and be adopted by member countries. ### Community An effort to increase gender, racial, and geographic diversity in the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) has begun to bear fruit. Nearly half of the 120-member 2021 class announced last week are women, compared with one-quarter in 2011. The new cohort includes nine Black scientists; NAS officials say previous classes never had more than three and often had none. “We need to do better, but I'm amazed at how far we've come,” says plant geneticist Susan Wessler, NAS home secretary. The academy's governing council has begun to give more slots to disciplinary units that present candidate slates less skewed toward older white men. To reduce its geographic imbalance, NAS is also prohibiting members from nominating someone from their own institution. Today, 18 U.S. states have two or fewer members, whereas a handful of elite academic institutions each have more than 100. [1]: pending:yes [2]: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/368/6487/121