Seven days: 9 15 august 2013food safety concern Additives that help to colour, flavour and preserve food are deemed often officially safe by experts with financial ties to the manufacturers, according to data published on 7  August (T.  G.  Neltner et  al. JAMA Intern. Med. http://doi. org/nd5; 2013). ) The study, led by researchers at the Pew Charitable trusts in WASHINGTON DC, found that employees or hired consultants of food companies made 35%of the 451  determinations classifying food additives as safe in the United states between 1997 and 2012. The authors have called on the US Food and Drug Administration to bar the practice. See go. nature. com/jqccur and page 253 for more. Space fence down Citing the US federal budget cuts known as sequestration, the US Air force Space Command announced on 12  August that it will shut down a key component of a network that monitors orbital debris and space objects. The Air force Space Surveillance system dubbed the space fence, will close by 1  October. Two of the system s nine radar stations were deactivated in April. Losing the rest will make it harder to track break ups of space junk, which can endanger satellites, says Brian  Weeden, technical adviser at the Secure World Foundation in Washington  DC. S. Wiessinger/NASA Goddard Space Flight Centerastronomers image pink exoplanet A magenta exoplanet 17.5 parsecs from Earth is the lowest-mass planet that has ever been imaged directly orbiting a Sun-like star outside the Solar system, NASA announced last week. The Subaru Telescope on Mauna kea Hawaii, took pictures of the exoplanet GJ 504b at near-infrared wavelengths with the help of adaptive optics. GJ 504b is four times more massive than Jupiter and, with a surface temperature of 237 °C, still glows pink from its fiery birth 160  million years ago. The rosy planet (pictured in an artist s impression) orbits the star GJ  504, which can be seen with the naked eye, in the constellation Virgo. With an orbiting radius 43.5  times Earth s distance from the Sun, GJ  504b challenges current theories of how far away from stars large planets form. The findings will be published in The Astrophysical Journal. Coronavirus clues Scientists have an early lead in the search for animal sources of the Middle east respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-Cov), which has killed 46  people since last September. The virus is thought to have originated in bats, but could have spread to humans through one or more intermediate hosts. Researchers reported on 9  August that of 50  Omani camels sampled, all showed evidence of previous infection with MERS-Cov or a closely related virus (C.  B.  E.  M.  Reusken et  al. Lancet Infect. Dis. http://doi. org/nfb; 2013). ) Further work is needed to verify whether camels could be a source of human infections. Stormy Atlantic The current Atlantic hurricane season, which began on 1  June, could be said unusually active the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric administration in an updated forecast on 8  August. There have been named four storms so far this year. The agency calculates a 70%chance that a total of 13-19  named storms, including 3-5  major hurricanes, will develop before the Atlantic season ends on 30  November. These projections would exceed the 30-year seasonal average of 12 named storms including 3 major hurricanes. GM rice row Protesters uprooted a field of genetically modified (GM) golden rice at a Philippines Department of agriculture compound in Camarines Sur on 8  August, citing concerns over future marketing and potential health effects. The crop is engineered to contain à Â-carotene and helps to mitigate vitamin  A deficiency which causes malnutrition and affects 1. 7 million children in the Philippines. The nonprofit International Rice Research Institute, which was helping to conduct safety trials on the rice, vowed to continue its experiments. Landsat woes The future of Landsat the world s longest-running series of Earth-observing satellites, is in jeopardy, according to a report released on 8  August by the US National Research Council. Current methods of management and funding cannot sustain the land-imaging programme over the long term, the report warns. NASA launched the US$855-million Landsat  8 probe in February (see Nature 494,13-14; 2013), but the space agency has outlined not yet clear mission objectives or secured sufficient funding for a successor. Landsat satellites have monitored Earth s surface continuously since 1972. H7n9 virus persists China reported on 11 august its first new case of the H7n9 avian influenza virus in three weeks: a 51-year-old woman from Huizhou in Guangdong province, who fell ill on 27  July. Since the start of June, only three cases have been confirmed in China; 132  cases were confirmed from March to May. There have been 44  deaths, but no evidence of sustained human-to-human transmission, says the World health organization. Paul E. Alers/NASANASA deputy out NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver (pictured) is resigning after four years, the agency announced on 6  August. As second in command to NASA chief Charles Bolden, Garver had a major role in developing initiatives such as commercial space transportation and a mission to capture an asteroid. She has advised also US President Barack Obama on space policy during his campaign and presidency. Garver will become general manager at the Air line Pilots Association based in WASHINGTON DC. Misconduct finding A dermatology researcher at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, has been sanctioned for misconduct by the US Office of Research Integrity (ORI). Pratima Karnik admitted submitting a grant application to the US National institutes of health that contained text plagiarized from a grant application she had reviewed, as well as from eight research articles and a patent application. The ORI, in Rockville, Maryland, noted on 6  August that Karnik has agreed to have supervised her research, and to exclude herself from any peer-reviewing or advising for US public-health services for two years. Brain-implant trial A deep-brain stimulation (DBS) device that not only delivers electrical pulses, but also records brain activity simultaneously, has been implanted in a person for the first time. Until now there has been a lack of data on how the brain responds to DBS, which is used to treat motor disorders such as Parkinson s disease, and is being tested for some psychiatric conditions. On 7  August, the device maker Medtronic in Minneapolis, Minnesota announced the start of clinical trials for the system, with the first implantation in a person with Parkinson s in Germany. Genetics lawsuit Ambry Genetics in Aliso Viejo, California, has countersued its competitor Myriad Genetics. Myriad, a medical diagnostics company in Salt lake city, Utah, sued Ambry in July for infringing patents that Myriad holds on tests for cancer-associated mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. Last week Ambry replied that Myriad s patent claims were invalid in light of a June ruling by the US Supreme court that human genes cannot be patented (see Nature 498,281-282; 2013), and countersued Myriad for suppressing competition to maintain a monopoly on the tests. Source: NOAAINCREASED emissions of carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane drove atmospheric greenhouse gases to their highest recorded levels in 2012, according to the US  National Oceanic and Atmospheric administration (NOAA. CO2 now accounts for about 80%of the increase in global-warming potential since 1990, the agency says. In May, atmospheric concentrations of the gas surpassed 400  parts per million at NOAA s Mauna loa Observatory in Hawaii (see Nature 497,13-14; 2013). ) 20 august A US presidential bioethics commission discusses the ethical implications of neuroscience and its applications at a public meeting in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (see page  261). go. nature. com/zrthim22 August US federal agencies reach the deadline to file their proposals for increasing public access to federally funded research, set by the Office of Science and Technology Policy in WASHINGTON DC (see Nature 494,414-415;
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