Evolutionary Biology

Coevolution with toxic prey produces functional trade-offs in sodium channels of predatory snakes

1. Robert E. del Carlo
2. Jessica S. Reimche
3. Haley A. Moniz
4. Michael T.J. Hague
5. Shailesh R. Agarwal
6. Edmund D. Brodie
7. Edmund D. Brodie
8. Normand Leblanc
9. Chris R. Feldman

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This valuable study describes an investigation of the properties of two heterologously-expressed Nav1.4 channels, with mutations close to the selectivity filter found in tetrodotoxin(TTX)-resistant snakes. The authors studied these mutants by electrophysiological methods, assessed the muscle properties of two types of snakes bearing these mutations, and built homology models of the channels to hypothesize a molecular explanation of the altered channel properties. The methods employed and the results are generally solid, although some aspects would benefit from additional experiments and a more nuanced discussion.

Reviewed by eLife

Can mechanistic constraints on recombination reestablishment explain the long-term maintenance of degenerate sex chromosomes?

1. Thomas Lenormand
2. Denis Roze

Reviewed by Peer Community in Evolutionary Biology

Evolution of novel sensory organs in fish with legs

1. Corey A.H. Allard
2. Amy L. Herbert
3. Stephanie P. Krueger
4. Qiaoyi Liang
5. Brittany L. Walsh
6. Andrew L. Rhyne
7. Allex N. Gourlay
8. Agnese Seminara
9. Maude W. Baldwin
10. David M. Kingsley
11. Nicholas W. Bellono

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

Community structure of heritable viruses in a Drosophila-parasitoids complex

1. Julien Varaldi
2. David Lepetit
3. Nelly Burlet
4. Camille Faber
5. Bérénice Baretje
6. Roland Allemand

Reviewed by Peer Community in Evolutionary Biology

Phylogenomics reveals coincident divergence between giant host sea anemones and the clownfish adaptive radiation

1. Aurelien De Jode
2. Andrea M. Quattrini
3. Tommaso Chiodo
4. Marymegan Daly
5. Catherine S. McFadden
6. Michael L. Berumen
7. Christopher P. Meyer
8. Suzanne Mills
9. Ricardo Beldade
10. Aaron Bartholomew
11. Anna Scott
12. James D Reimer
13. Kensuke Yanagi
14. Takuma Fuji
15. Estefanía Rodríguez
16. Benjamin M. Titus

Reviewed by Arcadia Science

Positive selection and relaxed purifying selection contribute to rapid evolution of male-biased genes in a dioecious flowering plant

1. Lei Zhao
2. Wei Zhou
3. Jun He
4. De-Zhu Li
5. Hong-Tao Li

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This valuable paper examines gene expression differences between male and female individuals over the course of flower development in the dioecious angiosperm Trichosantes pilosa. Male-biased genes evolve faster than female-biased and unbiased genes, which is frequently observed in animals, but this is the first report of such a pattern in plants. In spite of the limited sample size, the evidence is mostly solid and the methods appropriate for a non-model organism. The resources produced will be used by researchers working in the Cucurbitaceae, and the results obtained advance our understanding of the mechanisms of plant sexual reproduction and its evolutionary implications: as such they will broadly appeal to evolutionary biologists and plant biologists.

Reviewed by eLife

Analyses of allele age and fitness impact reveal human beneficial alleles to be older than neutral controls

1. Alyssa M. Pivirotto
2. Alexander Platt
3. Ravi Patel
4. Sudhir Kumar
5. Jody Hey

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  Drawing on a human population genomic data set, this valuable study seeks to show that potentially advantageous alleles are on average older than neutral alleles, invoking the action of balancing selection as the underlying explanation. Currently it is unfortunately unclear how robust the estimates of allele ages are, and the evidence for the authors' proposal is therefore at this stage incomplete. If confirmed, the conclusions would be of interest to population genomicists, especially those studying humans.

Reviewed by eLife

Sperm production and allocation in response to risk of sperm competition in the black soldier fly Hermetia illucens

1. Frédéric Manas
2. Carole Labrousse
3. Christophe Bressac

Reviewed by Peer Community in Evolutionary Biology

Natural variation in the Caenorhabditis elegans egg-laying circuit modulates an intergenerational fitness trade-off

1. Laure Mignerot
2. Clotilde Gimond
3. Lucie Bolelli
4. Charlotte Bouleau
5. Asma Sandjak
6. Thomas Boulin
7. Christian Braendle

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  This important work provides a thorough and detailed analysis of natural variation in C. elegans egg-laying behavior. The authors present convincing evidence to support their hypothesis that variations in egg-laying behavior are influenced by trade-offs between maternal and offspring fitness. This study establishes a framework for elucidating the molecular mechanisms underlying this paradigm of behavioral evolution.

Reviewed by eLife

Antigenic strain diversity predicts different biogeographic patterns of maintenance and decline of antimalarial drug resistance

1. Qixin He
2. John K Chaillet
3. Frédéric Labbé

• Curated by eLife

  eLife assessment

  The study is an important advancement to the consideration of antimalarial drug resistance: the authors make use of both modelling results and supporting empirical evidence to demonstrate the role of malaria strain diversity in explaining biogeographic patterns of drug resistance. The theoretical methods and the corresponding results are compelling, with the novel model presented moving beyond existing models to incorporate malaria strain diversity and antigen-specific immunity. This work is likely to be interesting to malaria researchers and others working with antigenically diverse infectious diseases.

Reviewed by eLife