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SCIENCE sciencemag.org
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RetractionThe authors of the Report “Secondary
siRNAs result from unprimed RNA syn-
thesis and form a distinct class” (1) have
been made aware of duplications in Fig.
2D and supplementary figures S1C and
S3C. We attempted to find the original
data from 2007, but all authors have left
the Hubrecht Institute, where the work
was performed, and the data could not
be located. Although other data in the
paper were consistent with the conclu-
sions supported by Fig. 2D and figs.
S1C and S3C, all data were taken into
account in the review of the paper, and
the loss of these figures weakens the con-
clusions. Therefore, in the spirit of full
transparency, we have decided to retract
the paper.
Titia Sijen1, Florian A. Steiner2, Karen L. Thijssen3,
Ronald H. A. Plasterk4*1Netherlands Forensic Institute, 2497GB The Hague, Netherlands. 2University of Geneva, 1211 Geneva, Switzerland. 3Rotterdam, Netherlands. 4Frame Cancer Therapeutics, 1098XG Amsterdam, Netherlands. *Corresponding author. Email: ronald.plasterk@frametherapeutics.com
REFERENCES AND NOTES
1. T. Sijen, F. A. Steiner, K. L. Thijssen, R. H. A. Plasterk, Science 315, 244 (2007).
10.1126/science.abf4837
Ducipsap erspelit ut faccat as nobit vitiunt et
magniam volorro rercili quost, sandit is quasint
Eroded protections threaten U.S. forests Despite record-breaking mega-fires in 2020
(1), the U.S. Department of Agriculture
(USDA) recently removed the 2001
Roadless Rule protection for 9.37 million
acres of Tongass National Forest in Alaska
(2). The intact and fire-resistant Tongass
temperate rainforest is home to valuable
biodiversity and functions as an important
carbon sink, making it vital in combatting
both global extinction risk and climate
change (3, 4). In light of catastrophic fires
and rapid climate change, the government
needs to rigorously and transparently
evaluate costs and benefits before repeal-
ing any environmental protections.
Ending the rule prohibiting roads in
the Tongass exposes 165,000 acres of
old-growth rainforest to logging (2) and
leaves the remaining rainforest vulnerable
to degradation from road-building and
potential mining and fossil fuel extraction
(5, 6). Industrial expansion has ecological
repercussions through increased emissions,
diminished carbon sequestration, and
reduced fire resistance (6) as well as poten-
tial downstream socio-economic effects for
local fishery and tourism industries (7).
The Roadless Rule repeal was opposed by
several local tribes and 96% of the quarter
million letters submitted by the public (2, 7).
The repeal will also enable an economically
unviable timber program that has cost U.S.
taxpayers more than half a billion dollars in
losses since 1980 (8).
The government’s decision to erode
protection of Tongass National Park sets a
precedent to roll back protections for other
remaining intact forests (9) that provide
critical carbon storage, protection against
species extinction, and refuge against the
effects of climate and fire-season intensifi-
cation (2, 3, 10). Instead of forcing taxpayers
to subsidize an ecologically and financially
shortsighted initiative, activities such as
native reforestation should be implemented.
Strategic reforesting, particularly after fires,
can provide short- and long-term benefits
for the environment, society, and economy
by increasing carbon storage (11), reducing
erosion, providing habitat for displaced
wildlife, and supporting the long-term
sustainability of industries like tourism and
carbon farming (12). In the face of global
climate change and intensifying fire sea-
sons, the U.S. government should be seeking
to fortify rather than repeal evidence-based
protections in a way that supports ecologi-
cal, social, and economic objectives.
Katharina-Victoria Pérez-Hämmerle1,2*, Katie
Moon3,4, Hugh P. Possingham,2,5, Maria Jose
Martinez-Harms6, James E. M. Watson1,2,71School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, The University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Brisbane, QLD 4067, Australia. 2Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, The
LETTERS
The repeal of a rule prohibiting
roads within Alaska’s Tongass
National Forest has put the
temperate rainforest at risk.
Edited by Jennifer Sills
20 NOVEMBER 2020 • VOL 370 ISSUE 6519 921
Published by AAAS
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University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia. 3Public Service Research Group, School of Business, University of New South Wales, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia. 4Centre for Ecosystem Science, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia. 5School of Biological Sciences, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia. 6Center for Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile. 7Wildlife Conservation Society, Global Conservation Program, Bronx, NY 10460, USA.*Corresponding author. Email: k.perezhammerle@uq.edu.au
REFERENCES AND NOTES
1. P. E. Higuera, J. T. Abatzoglou, Glob. Change Biol. 10.1111/gcb.15388 (2020).
2. USDA, Forest Service, “Special Areas; Roadless Area Conservation; National Forest System Lands in Alaska,” Federal Register (2020).
3. S. L. Maxwell et al., Sci. Adv. 5, eaax2546 (2019). 4. J. W. Coulston et al., in “Moving from status to trends:
Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) symposium 2012,” R. S. Morin, G. C. Liknes, Eds. (Gen. Tech. Rep. NRS-P-105. Newtown Square, PA: USDA, Forest Service, Northern Research Station [CD-ROM]), pp. 170–176.
5. W. F. Laurance, M. Goosem, S. G. Laurance, Trends Ecol. Evol. 24, 659 (2009).
6. P. Potapov et al., Sci. Adv. 3, e1600821 (2017). 7. USDA, Forest States, “Alaska Roadless Rule: Draft
Environmental Impact Statement, Public Comment Report” (2020).
8. Taxpayers for Common Sense, “Cutting our losses after 40 years of money-losing timber sales in the Tongass” (2020).
9. M. B. Mascia, S. Pailler, Conserv. Lett. 4, 9 (2011). 10. J. E. M. Watson et al., Nat. Ecol. Evol. 2, 599 (2018). 11. G. M. Domke et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 117,
24649 (2020). 12. R. Chazdon, P. Brancalion, Science 365, 24 (2019).
10.1126/science.abf5654
Space debris puts exploration at riskHumans have now lived aboard the
International Space Station (ISS) for 20
years (1). As we look toward the next 20
years, we must address the dangers that
space debris poses to both manned missions
and crucial satellites. National policy-makers
and international organizations must
develop actionable rules and regulations
that preserve our ability to explore space.
With tens of millions of pieces of space
junk rocketing around our planet at
thousands of kilometers an hour, debris
is a substantial threat to our expanding
networks of satellites and even the ISS itself
(2–4). The European Space Agency (ESA)
puts much of the blame on the failure to
properly dispose of expiring satellites (2).
The recently signed Artemis Accords simi-
larly point to the value of “end-of-mission
planning and implementation [and…]
post-mission disposal” in reducing debris
(5). With the rapid expansion of the satellite
orbital population—many of which are rela-
tively cheaply produced with comparatively
high failure rates (6)—this problem will
likely get much worse before it gets better.
Unfortunately, Cold War cooperation
led to rules designed primarily for nation
states, not for the corporations that are
now launching literally thousands of new
satellites. Meanwhile, the nation states
have mostly neglected to implement the
necessary local space regulations that
would promote the long-term sustain-
ability of equitable space exploration. This
tragedy of the commons will damage the
space environment and eventually impair
commercial space endeavors. Space debris
threatens efforts ranging from the emerg-
ing mini-satellite mega-constellations that
aim to democratize internet access to space
tourism. In a worst case scenario, orbital
debris could start a self-sustaining cascade
of destruction that would litter the Low
Earth Orbit with enough debris to make it
effectively unusable (7).
To maintain a sustainable space envi-
ronment, all states and their nationals
must take responsibility for reducing the
creation of new space debris. Both nations
and private corporations should design
more reliable satellites that are less likely to
malfunction, deorbit satellites before they
become inoperable and hazardous, and
promote the emerging private-sector indus-
tries that are collecting defunct satellites
and repairing and refueling older satellites.
Developing public-private collaborations can
enhance the tracking of even small man-
made particles zooming around in orbit.
The United Nations’ Committee on the
Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) may
be the most appropriate forum to accom-
plish these goals. COPUOS can provide
both the desperately needed development
of norms, the required regulatory support,
and the necessary scientific and technical
expertise to direct these efforts. During the
past 20 years, astronauts on the ISS have
conducted space-based research represent-
ing the work of scientists from more than
100 countries (1), and science diplomacy has
often prefaced cross-boundary collaboration
on Earth. We must preserve the amazing
opportunities space exploration provides
by developing better sustainable practices
before it is too late.
Dov Greenbaum Zvi Meitar Institute for Legal Implications of Emerging Technologies, IDC Herzliya, Herzliya, Israel; Harry Radzyner Law School, IDC Herzliya, Herzliya, Israel, and Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06510, USA. Email: dov.greenbaum@aya.yale.edu
REFERENCES AND NOTES
1. National Aeronautics and Space Administration,
“International Space Station facts and figures” (2020);
www.nasa.gov/feature/facts-and-figures.
2. ESA, “The current state of space debris” (2020);
www.esa.int/Safety_Security/Space_Debris/
The_current_state_of_space_debris.
sciencemag.org SCIENCE922 20 NOVEMBER 2020 • VOL 370 ISSUE 6519
INS IGHTS | LETTERS
3. ESA, “Space Debris by the numbers” (2020);
www.esa.int/Safety_Security/Space_Debris/
Space_debris_by_the_numbers.
4. R. Khatchadourian, “The elusive peril of space junk,”
The New Yorker (2020).
5. “The Artemis Accords: Principles for cooperation in the
civil exploration and use of the Moon, Mars, Comets,
and Asteroids for peaceful purposes” (2020), pp. 6–7;
www.nasa.gov/specials/artemis-accords/img/
Artemis-Accords-signed-13Oct2020.pdf.
6. S. A Jacklin, “Small-satellite mission failure rates,” NASA
Technical Memorandum (2019); https://ntrs.nasa.gov/
citations/20190002705.
7. D. J. Kessler, J. Spacecraft Rockets 18, 357 (1981).
10.1126/science.abf2682
TECHNICAL COMMENT ABSTRACTS
Comment on “Ancient origins of allosteric activation
in a Ser-Thr kinase”
Yeonwoo Park, Jaeda E. J. Patton, Georg K. A.
Hochberg, Joseph W. Thornton
Hadzipasic et al. (Reports, 21 February 2020,
p. 912) used ancestral sequence recon-
struction to identify historical sequence
substitutions that putatively caused Aurora
kinases to evolve allosteric regulation. We
show that their results arise from using an
implausible phylogeny and sparse sequence
sampling. Addressing either problem
reverses their inferences: Allostery and the
amino acids that confer it were not gained
during the diversification of eukaryotes but
were lost in a subgroup of Fungi.
Full text: dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.abc8301
Response to Comment on “Ancient origins
of allosteric activation in a Ser-Thr kinase”
Christopher Wilson and Dorothee Kern
Park et al. question one out of seven
findings from Hadzipasic et al.: whether
TPX2 allosterically regulates the oldest
Aurora. We had already addressed the
two concerns raised—sparse sequence
sampling and not forcing the gene to the
species tree—before publication. Moreover,
we believe their ancestral sequence
reconstruction would be consistent with
a nonallosteric common ancestor, and we
show large sequence differences caused by
species tree–enforced gene trees.
Full text: dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.abd0364
ERRATA
Erratum for the Report “Activation of methane:
A selective industrial route to methanesulfonic
acid” (previously titled “Activation of methane
to CH3+: A selective industrial route to methanesul-
fonic acid”) by C. Díaz-Urrutia and T. Ott, Science
369, eabe0416 (2020). Published online 7 August
2020; 10.1126/science.abe0416
Erratum for the Report “Global distribution
of earthworm diversity” by H. R. P. Phillips et al.,
Science 369, eabd9834 (2020). Published online
31 July 2020; 10.1126/science.abd9834
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RetractionTitia Sijen, Florian A. Steiner, Karen L. Thijssen and Ronald H. A. Plasterk
DOI: 10.1126/science.abf4837 (6519), 921.370Science
ARTICLE TOOLS http://science.sciencemag.org/content/370/6519/921.1
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