eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Congenital aphantasia reveals frontotemporal and cingulate structural alterations underlying conscious access to imagery

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Yusaku Takamura
   2. Romain Delsanti
   3. Laurent Cohen
   4. Paolo Bartolomeo
   5. Jianghao Liu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study provides novel evidence that congenital aphantasia is associated with structural differences in frontotemporal and cingulate systems, with relative sparing of early visual regions and major visual pathways. The multimodal structural imaging approach is carefully implemented and will be of interest to researchers studying mental imagery and aphantasia. However, the strength of evidence is incomplete because the data cannot adjudicate between alternative cognitive interpretations, and the multiple discovery streams make the findings better viewed as key exploratory evidence, rather than as establishing a definitive structural phenotype of aphantasia.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Cooperative antibiotic response in coupled biofilm and planktonic E. faecalis communities

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Gabriela Fernandes Martins
   2. Keanu Alexander Guardiola-Flores
   3. Luis Zaman
   4. Jordan M Horowitz
   5. Kelsey M Hallinen
   6. Kevin Wood

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This useful study combines experiments and mathematical modeling to show that antibiotic protection provided by resistant cells can extend across both surface-associated and freely growing bacterial populations. Notably, they show that treatment efficacy depends on population composition and density. The evidence supporting the main conclusions is incomplete, primarily because the biofilm context is not adequately characterized and demonstrated, raising the concern that it might represent only an aggregate of cells on the surface (rather than a biofilm) under the studied experimental conditions.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Astrocytic Nonsense-mediated mRNA decay regulates calcium signaling to support synapse function and restrain anxiety

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Pablo J Lituma
   2. Aykut Deveci
   3. Estibaliz Barrio-Alonso
   4. Kun Tan
   5. Miles F Wilkinson
   6. Pablo E Castillo
   7. Dilek Colak

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study provides the first in vivo evidence that nonsense-mediated mRNA decay (NMD) in mature astrocytes regulates astrocyte function, synaptic plasticity, and anxiety-related behavior. Using a broad range of approaches, the authors show that conditional deletion of Upf2 alters astrocyte morphology and calcium signaling while impairing synaptic transmission and plasticity, providing solid support for the central conclusion that astrocytic NMD influences neural circuit function. Some key mechanistic claims remain incompletely supported, including whether phenotypes reflect astrocyte remodeling versus loss, the interpretation of synaptic engulfment data, the link between NMD targets and calcium signaling, and the extent to which calcium dysregulation explains the observed synaptic and behavioral effects.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. CHOP promotes the transition to chronic integrated stress response signaling with suppression of hepatocyte identity

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Theo F. Velarde
   2. Kaihua Liu
   3. Zewei Zhang
   4. Reed C. Adajar
   5. Chaoxian Zhao
   6. Huojun Cao
   7. D. Thomas Rutkowski

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This fundamental manuscript describes a key role for the integrated stress response-regulated transcription factor CHOP in regulating liver biology in response to endoplasmic reticulum stress through both the downregulation of transcription factors involved in regulating hepatic identity and altering the capacity for integrated stress response and unfolded protein response signaling to induce protective signaling. The data supporting this model is convincing, but including some additional discussion on the mechanism and importance of the work in the context of the published literature would be helpful to better define the complex importance of CHOP signaling. This work will be of interest to a wide range of biologists interested in liver biology, stress-responsive signaling, and ER stress.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Nanoscale organization of betaII-spectrin within segments of the membrane-associated periodic skeleton in mouse sciatic nerve axons

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Nahir Guadalupe Gazal
   2. Gonzalo Escalante
   3. Lucía F Lopez
   4. Laurence Goutebroze
   5. Mariano Bisbal
   6. E Axel Gorostiza
   7. Alan M Szalai
   8. Fernando D Stefani
   9. Nicolás Unsain

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This is a valuable paper looking at nanoscale organization of the membrane associated periodic cytoskeleton in mouse sciatic nerve axons. Despite previous studies, the precise organisation of the structure remains unclear, especially in vivo, and this manuscript significantly adds to this knowledge with solid data. An unexpected observation is the presence of discrete nanoscale clusters, regularly distributed around sections of axons. However, the paper misses a description of these clusters along the longitudinal axis of the axons.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Fourfold lifespan extension in C. elegans daf-2 mutant males

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Mike Russell
   2. Michelle Lin
   3. Alexander Tate Lasher
   4. Steven N Austad
   5. Liou Y Sun

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This useful study reports on lifespan extension in C. elegans males that carry a mutation in a gene for an insulin receptor; while the observations are striking, the strength of evidence is currently incomplete. The central claim of male-specificity is undermined by the absence of direct hermaphrodite healthspan comparisons, and the reliance on a single mutant allele leaves open the possibility that background mutations, rather than daf-2 loss-of-function, drive the phenotype. Methodological details critical for reproducibility are also lacking, particularly regarding male housing density, censoring of plate-leaving animals, and the adequacy of replication for the key epistasis experiment. The work could be substantially strengthened by a targeted set of additional experiments and fuller engagement with the existing literature on sex-specific aging in C. elegans.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. PCNA-Polκ-Polδ/USP18 axes stabilize replication fork and restart to reduce cisplatin cytotoxicity

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Ipsita Subhadarsini
   2. Jugal Kishor Sahu
   3. Shweta Thakur
   4. Rupesh Dash
   5. Narottam Acharya

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     Building on earlier studies, this manuscript reports a role for pol kappa in cisplatin resistance in the very specific scenarios of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, providing evidence that the PIP box of Pol kappa is critical for cisplatin resistance in these cells. The findings are of a highly focused relevance and will be useful in the field, but the conclusions are limited to very specific cancer cells. Conclusions cannot be generalized to all cisplatin resistance mechanisms and cell types and are based on incomplete evidence that presents uncertainties and discrepancies that need to be resolved.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Primate Hippocampus Reveals Distinct Rules for Associative Synaptic Plasticity

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Anoop Manakkadan
   2. Krishna Kumar
   3. Yee Song Chong
   4. Wong Lik-Wei
   5. Sheeja Navakkode
   6. Yuk Peng Wong
   7. Soong Tuck Wah
   8. Camilo Libedinsky
   9. Sreedharan Sajikumar

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This is a potentially important study comparing LTP mechanisms between primates and rodents. The experimental methods have some possible confounds, and the power (replicates) and design of the statistical methods could be strengthened, hence the support for the central claims of species differences is currently incomplete.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Estimating the replicability of Brazilian biomedical science

   This article has 1 author:

   1. The Brazilian Reproducibility Initiative

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study assessed the replicability of a selection of lab-based biomedical experiments in papers published by authors based in Brazil. The study adds a unique perspective to the literature on replication, and provides rich data on the approach taken, the outcomes, and the challenges involved in conducting large-scale crowd-sourced research. The evidence supporting the claims is convincing, but there is scope for clarifying the presentation of the results and extending the discussion section.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Yoda molecules agonize PIEZO2

    This article has 5 authors:

    1. Tharaka D Wijerathne
    2. Aneesh Chandrasekharan
    3. Aashish Bhatt
    4. Yun L Luo
    5. Jérôme J Lacroix

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife Assessment

      This study presents an important finding regarding the effect of Yoda molecules on PIEZO2 function, challenging the assumption that they selectively activate PIEZO1. The evidence supporting this claim is solid, but several methodological and conceptual issues need to be addressed. Overall, this work will be of broad interest to researchers working with PIEZO channels across various biological scales.

    Reviewed by eLife