Developmental Biology

Extracellular adenosine deamination primes tip organizer development in Dictyostelium

1. Pavani Hathi
2. Ramamurthy Baskar

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  During the development of the unicellular eukaryote Dictyostelium discoideum, cells aggregate into mounds, which then form protrusions called tips, and the tips then become the front of migrating slugs and the top of fruiting bodies. This valuable study identifies a protein called adenosine deaminase-related growth factor (ADGF) as a key regulator of tip formation, and the authors convincingly show that ADGF catalyses the formation of ammonia from adenosine, allowing ammonia to initiate tip formation, and they then elucidate pathways upstream and downstream from ADGF. The authors discuss the intriguing possibility that mammalian ADGF may also regulate development in a similar manner.

Reviewed by eLife

The oocyte zinc transporter Slc39a10/Zip10 is a regulator of zinc sparks during fertilization in mice

1. Atsuko Kageyama
2. Narumi Ogonuki
3. Takuya Wakai
4. Takafumi Namiki
5. Yui Kawata
6. Manabu Ozawa
7. Yasuhiro Yamada
8. Toshiyuki Fukada
9. Atsuo Ogura
10. Rafael A Fissore
11. Naomi Kashiwazaki
12. Junya Ito

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study presents significant and novel insights into the roles of zinc in mammalian meiosis/fertilization events. These findings are useful to our understanding of these processes. The evidence presented is solid, with experiments being well-designed, carefully described, and interpreted with appropriate rigor. The main limitation of lack of mechanistic insight needs to be acknowledged.

Reviewed by eLife

Neural crest induction requires SALL4-mediated BAF recruitment to lineage specific enhancers

1. Martina Demurtas
2. Samantha M. Barnada
3. Emma van Domselaar
4. Zoe H. Mitchell
5. Laura Deelen
6. Marco Trizzino

Reviewed by Review Commons

A cell atlas of the developing human outflow tract of the heart and its adult derivatives

1. Rotem Leshem
2. Syed Murtuza Baker
3. Joshua Mallen
4. Lu Wang
5. John Dark
6. Andrew D Sharrocks
7. Karen Piper Hanley
8. Neil A Hanley
9. Magnus Rattray
10. Simon D Bamforth
11. Nicoletta Bobola

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study provides valuable insights into human valve development by integrating snRNA-seq and spatial transcriptomics to characterize cell populations and regulatory programs in the embryonic and fetal outflow tract. The methods, data, and analyses are solid overall, but with some weaknesses that can be strengthened. The findings will be of interest to those who work in the field of heart development and congenital heart disease.

Reviewed by eLife

Sp Transcription Factors Establish the Signaling Environment in the Neuromesodermal Progenitor Niche During Axial Elongation

1. Ravindra B Chalamalasetty
2. Haley Tran
3. Ryan Kelly
4. Samuel Kuo
5. Mark W Kennedy
6. Moonsup Lee
7. Sara Thomas
8. Nikolaos Mandalos
9. Vishal Koparde
10. Francisco Pereira Lobo
11. Terry P Yamaguchi

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This fundamental work advances our understanding of how SP5 and SP8 promote neuromesodermal competent progenitors in murine embryos. Generally the evidence is compelling, with strong developmental genetics, transcriptomic, and genomic transcription binding surveys contributing to the strength of the data. Some of the language could be softened to avoid overinterpretation of the data, and figures and diagrams could be improved.

Reviewed by eLife

Sulfation affects apical extracellular matrix organization during development of the Drosophila embryonic salivary gland tube

1. J Luke Woodward
2. Jeffrey Matthew
3. Rutuparna Joshi
4. Vishakha Vishwakarma
5. Ying Xiao
6. SeYeon Chung

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This paper is important in demonstrating a requirement for sulfation in organizing apical extracellular matrix (aECM) during tubulogenesis in Drosophila melanogaster. The authors identify and characterize the organization of some of the first known components of the non-chitinous aECM in the Drosophila salivary gland tube, and these findings are supported by convincing data. This study would be of interest to developmental and cell biologists.

  [Editors' note: this paper was reviewed by Review Commons.]

Reviewed by eLife, Review Commons

Characterisation of cell-scale signalling by the core planar polarity pathway during Drosophila wing development

1. Alexandre Carayon
2. Helen Strutt
3. David Strutt

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This useful paper examined the mechanism of planar cell polarity (PCP) using Drosophila pupal wing, investigating how 'cellular level', 'molecular level' and 'tissue level' mechanisms intersect to establish PCP. This represents a progress for the field, and the conclusions are mostly backed up by solid data. Whereas the manuscript is sound overall, the reviewers found remaining concerns, which can mostly be addressed by textual clarification of the concepts used in the manuscript.

  [Editors' note: this paper was reviewed by Review Commons.]

Reviewed by eLife

Shifts in embryonic oxygen levels cue heterochrony in limb initiation

1. Meng Zhu
2. ChangHee Lee
3. Rinaldo Catta-Preta
4. Clifford J. Tabin

Reviewed by Life Science Editors Foundation

Spatial and longitudinal tracking of enhancer-AAV vectors that target transgene expression to injured mouse myocardium

1. David W Wolfson
2. Joshua A Hull
3. Yongwu Li
4. Trevor J Gonzalez
5. Mourya D Jayaram
6. Garth W Devlin
7. Valentina Cigliola
8. Kelsey A Oonk
9. Alan Rosales
10. Nenad Bursac
11. Aravind Asokan
12. Kenneth D Poss

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study identifies novel approaches to improving transgene expression in the injured mammalian myocardium through a combination of a tissue regeneration enhancer element and engineered AAVs - specifically, a liver-detargeting capsid, AAV.cc84, and an in vivo library screen-selected AAV-IR41. The evidence is convincing, and the AAV vectors are of fundamental value to the field of cardiac gene therapy. Future research exploring how to combine the features of AAV.cc84 and AAV-IR41 could yield an even more promising vector for therapeutic use.

Reviewed by eLife

Arrayed single-gene perturbations identify drivers of human anterior neural tube closure

1. Roya E Huang
2. Giridhar M Anand
3. Heitor C Megale
4. Jason Chen
5. Chudi Abraham-Igwe
6. Sharad Ramanathan

• Curated by eLife

  eLife Assessment

  This study is a fundamental advance in the field of developmental biology and transcriptional regulation that demonstrates the use of hPSC-derived organoids to generate reproducible organoids to study the mechanisms that drive neural tube closure. The work is exceptional in its development of tools to use CRISPR interference to screen for genes that regulate morphogenesis in human PSC organoids. The additional characterization of the role of specific transcription factors in neural tube formation is solid. The work provides both technical advances and new knowledge on human development through embryo models.

Reviewed by eLife