Stubble-burning activities in north-western India in 2021: Contribution to air pollution in Delhi.

Stubble-burning in northern India is an important source of atmospheric particulate matter (PM) and trace gases, which significantly impact local and regional climate, in addition to causing severe health risks. Scientific research on assessing the impact of these burnings on the air quality over Delhi is still relatively sparse. The present study analyzes the satellite-retrieved stubble-burning activities in the year 2021, using the MODIS active fire count data for Punjab and Haryana, and assesses the contribution of CO and PM2.5 from such biomass-burning activities to the pollution load in Delhi. The analysis suggests that the satellite-retrieved fire counts in Punjab and Haryana were the highest among the last five years (2016-2021). Further, we note that the stubble-burning fires in the year 2021 are delayed by ∼1 week compared to that in the year 2016. To quantify the contribution of the fires to the air pollution in Delhi, we use tagged tracers for CO and PM2.5 emissions from fire emissions in the regional air quality forecasting system. The modeling framework suggests a maximum daily mean contribution of the stubble-burning fires to the air pollution in Delhi in the months of October-November 2021 to be around 30-35%. We find that the contribution from stubble burning activities to the air quality in Delhi is maximum (minimum) during the turbulent hours of late morning to afternoon (calmer hours of evening to early morning). The quantification of this contribution is critical from the crop-residue and air-quality management perspective for policymakers in the source and the receptors regions, respectively.

Transcriptional programs of neoantigen-specific TIL in anti-PD-1-treated lung cancers.

PD-1 blockade unleashes CD8 T cells1, including those specific for mutation-associated neoantigens (MANA), but factors in the tumour microenvironment can inhibit these T cell responses. Single-cell transcriptomics have revealed global T cell dysfunction programs in tumour-infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL). However, the majority of TIL do not recognize tumour antigens2, and little is known about transcriptional programs of MANA-specific TIL. Here, we identify MANA-specific T cell clones using the MANA functional expansion of specific T cells assay3 in neoadjuvant anti-PD-1-treated non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLC). We use their T cell receptors as a 'barcode' to track and analyse their transcriptional programs in the tumour microenvironment using coupled single-cell RNA sequencing and T cell receptor sequencing. We find both MANA- and virus-specific clones in TIL, regardless of response, and MANA-, influenza- and Epstein-Barr virus-specific TIL each have unique transcriptional programs. Despite exposure to cognate antigen, MANA-specific TIL express an incompletely activated cytolytic program. MANA-specific CD8 T cells have hallmark transcriptional programs of tissue-resident memory (TRM) cells, but low levels of interleukin-7 receptor (IL-7R) and are functionally less responsive to interleukin-7 (IL-7) compared with influenza-specific TRM cells. Compared with those from responding tumours, MANA-specific clones from non-responding tumours express T cell receptors with markedly lower ligand-dependent signalling, are largely confined to HOBIThigh TRM subsets, and coordinately upregulate checkpoints, killer inhibitory receptors and inhibitors of T cell activation. These findings provide important insights for overcoming resistance to PD-1 blockade.

Two distinct head-tail interfaces cooperate to suppress activation of vinculin by talin.

Vinculin is autoinhibited by an intramolecular interaction that masks binding sites for talin and F-actin. Although a recent structural model explains autoinhibition solely in terms of the interaction between vinculin tail (Vt) and residues 1-258 (D1), we find an absolute requirement for an interface involving the D4 domain of head (Vh residues 710-836) and Vt. Charge-to-alanine mutations in Vt revealed a class of mutants, T12 and T19, distal to the V-(1-258) binding site, which showed increases in their Kd values for head binding of 100- and 42-fold, respectively. Reciprocal mutation of residues in the D4 domain that contact Vt yielded a head-tail interaction mutant of comparable magnitude to T19. These findings account for the approximately 120-fold difference in Kd values between Vt binding to V-(1-258), as opposed to full-length Vh-(1-851). The significance of a bipartite autoinhibitory site is evidenced by its effects on talin binding to Vh. Whereas Vt fails to compete with the talin rod domain for binding to V-(1-258), competition occurs readily with full-length Vh, and this requires the D4 interface. Moreover in intact vinculin, mutations in the D4-Vt interface stabilize association of vinculin and talin rod. In cells, these head-tail interaction mutants induce hypertrophy and elongation of focal adhesions. Definition of a second autoinhibitory site, the D4-Vt interface, supports the competing model of vinculin activation that invokes cooperative action of ligands at two sites. Together the D1-Vt and D4-Vt interfaces provide the high affinity (approximately 10(-9)) autoinhibition observed in full-length vinculin.