Biophysics

Structural insights into the recruitment of viral Type 2 IRES to ribosomal preinitiation complex for protein synthesis

1. Deepakash Das
2. Tanweer Hussain

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This manuscript offers valuable structural and mechanistic insights into the structure and assembly of the Type II internal ribosome entry site (IRES) from encephalomyocarditis virus (EMCV) and the translation initiation complex, revealing a direct interaction between the IRES and the 40S ribosomal subunit. While a solid cryo-EM method was used, enhancing the overall resolution or adding complementary biochemical data would further improve the clarity and impact of this study. This manuscript will attract researchers in cap-independent translation, host-pathogen interactions, and virology.

Reviewed by eLife

Balancing stability and flexibility when reshaping archaeal membranes

1. Miguel Amaral
2. Felix Frey
3. Xiuyun Jiang
4. Buzz Baum
5. Anđela Šarić

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This fundamental study characterizes the mechanics and stability of bolalipids from archaeal membranes using a minimalist, physics-based computational model. The authors present a robust mesoscale model of bolalipids-containing membranes, systematically evaluating it across diverse membrane configurations. The results are compelling, demonstrating that the incorporation of bolalipids and regular bilayer lipids in archaeal membranes significantly enhances membrane fluidity and structural stability.

Reviewed by eLife, Arcadia Science

Tension-Induced Stiffening of Cytoskeletal Components Regulates Cardiomyocyte Contractility

1. Mohammad Jafari
2. Sisir Datla
3. Elliot L. Elson
4. Brian E. Carlson
5. Tetsuro Wakatsuki
6. Farid Alisafaei

Reviewed by PREreview

Quantifying the shape of cells, from Minkowski tensors to p-atic orders

1. Lea Happel
2. Griseldis Oberschelp
3. Valeriia Grudtsyna
4. Harish P Jain
5. Rastko Sknepnek
6. Amin Doostmohammadi
7. Axel Voigt

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This important work describes a set of parameters that give a robust description of shape features of cells in tissues. The evidence for the usefulness of these parameters is solid. The work should be of interest for anybody analyzing epithelial dynamics, but more details about the analysis of experimental images are necessary and some streamlining of the text would increase the accessibility of the material for non-specialists.

Reviewed by eLife

Phase-Space Dynamics Reveal Structured and Chaotic Motility in Human Sperm via DTW Clustering

1. Athanasia Sergounioti
2. Efstathios Alonaris
3. Dimitrios Rigas

Reviewed by PREreview

Molecular Drivers of RNA Phase Separation

1. V Ramachandran
2. DA Potoyan

Reviewed by PREreview

Genome-wide modeling of DNA replication in space and time confirms the emergence of replication specific patterns in vivo in eukaryotes

1. Dario D’Asaro
2. Jean-Michel Arbona
3. Vinciane Piveteau
4. Aurèle Piazza
5. Cédric Vaillant
6. Daniel Jost

Reviewed by Review Commons

Dimerization and dynamics of human angiotensin-I converting enzyme revealed by cryo-EM and MD simulations

1. Jordan M Mancl
2. Xiaoyang Wu
3. Minglei Zhao
4. Wei-Jen Tang

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study shows, for the first time, the structure and snapshots of the dynamics of the full-length soluble Angiotensin-I converting enzyme dimer. The combination of structural and computational analyses provides compelling evidence that reveals the conformational dynamics of the complex and key regions mediating the conformational change. This fundamental work illustrates how conformational heterogeneity can be used to gain insights into protein function.

Reviewed by eLife

Emergence of specific binding and catalysis from a designed generalist binding protein

1. Yuda Chen
2. Sagar Bhattacharya
3. Lena Bergmann
4. Galen J. Correy
5. Sophia K. Tan
6. Kaipeng Hou
7. Justin Biel
8. Lei Lu
9. Ian Bakanas
10. Alexander N. Volkov
11. Ivan V. Korendovych
12. Nicholas F. Polizzi
13. James S. Fraser
14. William F. DeGrado

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

Expanding automated multiconformer ligand modeling to macrocycles and fragments

1. Jessica Flowers
2. Nathaniel Echols
3. Galen J Correy
4. Priyadarshini Jaishankar
5. Takaya Togo
6. Adam R Renslo
7. Henry van den Bedem
8. James S Fraser
9. Stephanie A Wankowicz

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  The work presents a valuable extension of qFit-ligand, a computational method for modeling conformational heterogeneity of ligands in X-ray crystallography and cryo-EM density maps. The authors provide solid evidence of improved capabilities through careful validation against the previous version, particularly in expanding ligand sampling within conformational space. Such improvements suggest practical utility for challenging applications, including macrocyclic compound modeling and crystallographic drug fragment screening.

Reviewed by Arcadia Science, eLife