Evolutionary Biology

An epi‐evolutionary model for predicting the adaptation of spore‐producing pathogens to quantitative resistance in heterogeneous environments

1. Frédéric Fabre
2. Jean‐Baptiste Burie
3. Arnaud Ducrot
4. Sébastien Lion
5. Quentin Richard
6. Ramsès Djidjou‐Demasse

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Antigenic evolution of human influenza H3N2 neuraminidase is constrained by charge balancing

1. Yiquan Wang
2. Ruipeng Lei
3. Armita Nourmohammad
4. Nicholas C Wu

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This paper performs a systematic analysis of the fitness landscape of the influenza virus protein neuraminidase (NA). The paper analyzes 864 different combinations of mutations, over six genetic backgrounds. The main findings are that the fitness landscape correlates well across genetic backgrounds, and that natural evolution of neuraminidase seems to select for neutrally charged variants.

  (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1, Reviewer #2 and Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Signatures of adaptive evolution during human to mink SARS CoV2 cross-species transmission inform estimates of the COVID19 pandemic timing

1. Jui-Hung Tai
2. Shu-Miaw Chaw
3. Hsiao-Yu Sun
4. Yi-Cheng Tseng
5. Guanghao Li
6. Sui-Yuan Chang
7. Shiou-Hwei Yeh
8. Pei-Jer Chen
9. Hurng-Yi Wang

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Biomarkers in a socially exchanged fluid reflect colony maturity, behavior, and distributed metabolism

1. Sanja M Hakala
2. Marie-Pierre Meurville
3. Michael Stumpe
4. Adria C LeBoeuf

Reviewed by Review Commons

Adaptive convergent evolution of genome proofreading in SARS-CoV2: insights into the Eigen’s paradox

1. Keerthic Aswin
2. Srinivasan Ramachandran
3. Vivek T Natarajan

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Rapid and parallel adaptive mutations in spike S1 drive clade success in SARS-CoV-2

1. Kathryn E. Kistler
2. John Huddleston
3. Trevor Bedford

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Rhythmicity is linked to expression cost at the protein level but to expression precision at the mRNA level

1. David Laloum
2. Marc Robinson-Rechavi

Reviewed by Review Commons

Gene age shapes the transcriptional landscape of sexual morphogenesis in mushroom-forming fungi (Agaricomycetes)

1. Zsolt Merényi
2. Máté Virágh
3. Emile Gluck-Thaler
4. Jason C Slot
5. Brigitta Kiss
6. Torda Varga
7. András Geösel
8. Botond Hegedüs
9. Balázs Bálint
10. László G Nagy

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  This manuscript provides a deep characterization of transcriptional regulation and conservation across key stages of complex multicellular development during mushroom formation. The authors present evidence for extensive allele-specific expression that includes many developmentally regulated genes that appear to have evolved recently. These findings help underscore how the tuning of gene expression and gains of new genes, the function of which will need to be unraveled in future, are likely the basis for the evolution of complex morphologies in fungi. This work should be of broad interest to evolutionary biologists, and especially to those studying the evolution of gene regulation.

  (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 and Reviewer #4 agreed to share their names with the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife

Variation in synonymous nucleotide composition among genomes of sarbecoviruses and consequences for the origin of COVID-19

1. Alexandre Hassanin

Reviewed by ScreenIT

Evolution of brilliant iridescent feather nanostructures

1. Klara Katarina Nordén
2. Chad M Eliason
3. Mary Caswell Stoddard

• Curated by eLife

  Evaluation Summary:

  Nordén et al. examine feather iridescent color diversity across bird species. Their findings show how key modifications in feather melanosomes, pivotal nanophotonic structures, underlie the brilliant colors of iridescent feathers, broadening feather color range approximately twofold. In a next step, the authors evaluate the function of feather melanosomes by performing optical modelling of nanostructure diversity, evaluating up to 4500 distinct nanostructure combinations, which are then contrasted with the observed (color) spectral data from 120 plumage regions across 80 (diverse) bird species. This meticulous integration of diverse methods across a comprehensive dataset will not only inform biologists studying structural color biodiversity, but it may also inspire engineers designing nanophotonic systems.

  (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. The reviewers remained anonymous to the authors.)

Reviewed by eLife