Biophysics

Identify potent SARS-CoV-2 main protease inhibitors via accelerated free energy perturbation-based virtual screening of existing drugs

1. Zhe Li
2. Xin Li
3. Yi-You Huang
4. Yaoxing Wu
5. Runduo Liu
6. Lingli Zhou
7. Yuxi Lin
8. Deyan Wu
9. Lei Zhang
10. Hao Liu
11. Ximing Xu
12. Kunqian Yu
13. Yuxia Zhang
14. Jun Cui
15. Chang-Guo Zhan
16. Xin Wang
17. Hai-Bin Luo

Reviewed by ScreenIT

A Multiscale and Comparative Model for Receptor Binding of 2019 Novel Coronavirus and the Implication of its Life Cycle in Host Cells

1. Zhaoqian Su
2. Yinghao Wu

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Structure of the SARS-CoV-2 spike receptor-binding domain bound to the ACE2 receptor

1. Jun Lan
2. Jiwan Ge
3. Jinfang Yu
4. Sisi Shan
5. Huan Zhou
6. Shilong Fan
7. Qi Zhang
8. Xuanling Shi
9. Qisheng Wang
10. Linqi Zhang
11. Xinquan Wang

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Structure and Immune Recognition of the Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus Spike Protein

1. Robert Kirchdoerfer

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Spontaneous body wall contractions stabilize the fluid microenvironment that shapes host–microbe associations

1. Janna C Nawroth
2. Christoph Giez
3. Alexander Klimovich
4. Eva Kanso
5. Thomas CG Bosch

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This important work studies the spontaneous contractions (SC) of the Hydra body wall and presents a mathematical model of nutrient transport to hypothesize the role of SC on maintaining the microbiota. The solid evidence presented yields insights on the functional implications of the SC and the increased nutrient update obtained from mixing the local fluid environment through body wall contractions. The main result represents an important observation about the role of hydrodynamics on organism behavior and its relation to diffusive chemical transport processes.

Reviewed by eLife

Agonist efficiency links binding and gating in a nicotinic receptor

1. Dinesh C Indurthi
2. Anthony Auerbach

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This valuable work investigates the fundamental concept of how the energy of agonist binding is converted into the energy of the conformational change that opens the pore of a ligand-gated ion channel. The conclusions are based on analysis of solid data in terms of a mechanistic model, but adequate statistical analysis is lacking and the uniqueness of the proposed model is not discussed. The findings will be interesting to biophysicists working on ligand-gated ion channels and, more generally, to enzymologists focused on allosteric enzyme regulation.

Reviewed by eLife

EMT induces cell-cycle-dependent changes of Rho GTPases and downstream effectors

1. Kamran Hosseini
2. Annika Frenzel
3. Elisabeth Fischer-Friedrich

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

Canalisation and plasticity on the developmental manifold of Caenorhabditis elegans

1. David J Jordan
2. Eric A Miska

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

Determinants of sugar-induced influx in the mammalian fructose transporter GLUT5

1. Sarah E McComas
2. Tom Reichenbach
3. Darko Mitrovic
4. Claudia Alleva
5. Marta Bonaccorsi
6. Lucie Delemotte
7. David Drew

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  The current manuscript investigates the energy landscape of the mammalian sugar porter GLUT5 using enhanced molecular dynamics simulations and biochemical assays. The approach generates important insights into the mechanism of GLUT5 conformational change, and into mechanistic diversity among the GLUT sugar porters more generally. The overall strategy is solid, but without an additional error analysis, the computational components remain incomplete. These findings will be of interest to the transporter and membrane biology communities.

Reviewed by eLife

Interplay between VSD, pore, and membrane lipids in electromechanical coupling in HCN channels

1. Ahmad Elbahnsi
2. John Cowgill
3. Verena Burtscher
4. Linda Wedemann
5. Luise Zeckey
6. Baron Chanda
7. Lucie Delemotte

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  Hyperpolarised-activated and Cyclic Nucleotide-gated (HCN) channels are the only mammalian channels to open under hyperpolarisation, being important for their roles in cardiac and neuronal cells. The authors of this study use atomistic simulations to enforce changing interaction distances that have been identified from a cryoEM structure and a homology model based on the hERG channel. The simulations suggest state-dependent interactions involving pore and voltage sensor helices, as well as with lipids, leading the authors to propose a domino-like mechanism of activation. These findings will be of considerable interest to the ion channel community.

Reviewed by eLife