eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Association between continuous glucose monitoring-derived metrics and coronary plaque vulnerability: A retrospective exploratory analysis

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Hikaru Sugimoto
   2. Ken-ichi Hironaka
   3. Tomoko Yamada
   4. Natsu Otowa-Suematsu
   5. Yushi Hirota
   6. Hiromasa Otake
   7. Ken-Ichi Hirata
   8. Kazuhiko Sakaguchi
   9. Wataru Ogawa
   10. Shinya Kuroda

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable retrospective analysis identified three independent components of glucose dynamics - "value," "variability," and "autocorrelation" - which may be used in predicting coronary plaque vulnerability. The study is solid and of interest to a wide range of investigators in the medical field who are interested in the role of glycemia on cardiometabolic health. The manuscript has been substantially strengthened by clarifying methods, improving transparency, and validating key findings, resulting in a coherent and persuasive case for autocorrelation as a meaningful third dimension of glucose dynamics despite remaining design-related limitations.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Pyruvate and related energetic metabolites modulate resilience against high genetic risk for glaucoma

   This article has 20 authors:

   1. Keva Li
   2. Nicholas Tolman
   3. Ayellet V Segrè
   4. Kelsey V Stuart
   5. Oana A Zeleznik
   6. Neeru A Vallabh
   7. Kuang Hu
   8. Nazlee Zebardast
   9. Akiko Hanyuda
   10. Yoshihiko Raita
   11. Christa Montgomery
   12. Chi Zhang
   13. Pirro G Hysi
   14. Ron Do
   15. Anthony P Khawaja
   16. Janey L Wiggs
   17. Jae H Kang
   18. Simon WM John
   19. Louis R Pasquale
   20. UK Biobank Eye and Vision Consortium

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study presents a valuable finding on the importance of the plasma metabolome in glaucoma risk prediction. The evidence supporting the claims of the authors is solid and the work offers insights for the design of protective therapeutic strategies for glaucoma. The authors have addressed the concerns of the reviewers and reported on the limitations of the study.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Notch signaling maintains a progenitor-like subclass of hepatocellular carcinoma

   This article has 20 authors:

   1. Kerstin Seidel
   2. Robert Piskol
   3. Thi Thu Thao Nguyen
   4. Amy Shelton
   5. Charisa Cottonham
   6. Cecile C de la Cruz
   7. Joseph Castillo
   8. Jesse Garcia
   9. Udi Segal
   10. Mark Merchant
   11. Yeqing Angela Yang
   12. Jasmine Chen
   13. Musa Ahmed
   14. Alexis Scherl
   15. Rajesh Vij
   16. Lluc Mosteiro
   17. Yan Wu
   18. Zora Modrusan
   19. Ciara Metcalfe
   20. Chris Siebel

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     In this valuable study, Seidel et al. identify and characterize a novel subset of hepatocellular carcinoma patient-derived xenograft models defined by active Jagged 1-Notch2 signaling and a distinctive progenitor-like gene expression profile. Within the limitations of the PDX system they used, their methods are state-of-the-art, their data are strong and believable, and their conclusions are convincing. However, the ability to identify HCC patients that might respond is limited, and the mechanistic assessment downstream of JAG1/NOTCH2 is relatively descriptive. Some additional clarifications and experiments would strengthen the paper.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Mitochondrial adenine base editing of mouse somatic tissues via adeno-associated viral delivery

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Christian D Mutti
   2. Lindsey Van Haute
   3. Lucia Luengo-Gutierrez
   4. Keira Turner
   5. Pedro Silva-Pinheiro
   6. Michal Minczuk

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The authors have demonstrated the use of adenine base editors delivered via adeno-associated viruses to introduce edits in the mitochondrial genome. The manuscript describes the methodology well, and the conclusions are convincingly supported by the results. The valuable results highlight the potential of these base editors to model mtDNA variations in somatic tissues in animal models.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Opposing regulation of TNF responses by IFN-γ and a PGE2-cAMP axis that is apparent in rheumatoid and immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced arthritis human IL-1β+ macrophages

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Upneet K Sokhi
   2. Ruoxi Yuan
   3. Bikash Mishra
   4. Yurii Chinenov
   5. Anvita Singaraju
   6. Karmela K Chan
   7. Anne Bass
   8. Richard D Bell
   9. Laura Donlin
   10. Lionel B Ivashkiv

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The manuscript contains important findings regarding inflammatory macrophage subsets that have theoretical and/or practical applications beyond the field of rheumatology. The authors demonstrate with compelling evidence the effects of PGE2 on TNF signaling. This work will be of broad interest to immunologists and cell biologists.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Variation of malaria dynamics and its relationship to climate in western Kenya during 2008-2019: a wavelet approach

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Alexis Martin-Makowka
   2. Bryan O Nyawanda
   3. Anton Beloconi
   4. Godfrey Bigogo
   5. Sammy Khagayi
   6. Stephen Munga
   7. Patrick K Munywoki
   8. Ina Danquah
   9. Jürg Utzinger
   10. Penelope Vounatsou

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The manuscript presents a useful analysis of the relationship between climate variables and malaria incidence, for local temperature and rainfall and the global climate driver of ENSO from 2008 to 2019 in a lowland region of East Africa, with wavelet analyses and linear regressions after time series decomposition. The paper is convincing albeit not novel in its application of wavelets to the analysis of this type of time series data for a vector-borne infection. It is less persuasive on what is learned about the role of climate variability (non-seasonal climate effects), and it is also unclear how the analysis informs climate change and malaria, and this motivation for the work is not warranted as it pertains to longer time scales than those considered. The work should be better placed in the context of what is known for malaria in East Africa and in different transmission settings.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Polyphosphate discriminates protein conformational ensembles more efficiently than DNA promoting diverse assembly and maturation behaviors

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Saloni Goyal
   2. Divya Rajendran
   3. Anup Kumar Mani
   4. Athi N Naganathan

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This manuscript offers important insights into how polyphosphate (polyP) influences protein phase separation differently from DNA. The authors present compelling evidence that polyP distinguishes among protein conformational ensembles, leading to divergent condensate maturation behaviors that include unfolding and polyproline II formation. In response to reviewer feedback, the authors addressed key concerns by incorporating charge-equivalent DNA controls and extending structural analysis to FruR variants, further reinforcing the polymer-specific effects of polyP. While some discrepancies between protein systems remain unresolved, the study enhances our understanding of how biopolymers influence protein assembly and conformational transitions.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. A dual ribosomal system in the zebrafish soma and germline

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Arish N Shah
   2. Friederike Leesch
   3. Laura Lorenzo-Orts
   4. Lorenz Grundmann
   5. Maria Novatchkova
   6. David Haselbach
   7. Eliezer Calo
   8. Andrea Pauli

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     Shah and colleagues take advantage of the presence of maternal and somatic ribosomes in zebrafish and confirm their differential expression during development. The authors convincingly show that ribosomes previously found expressed during oogenesis are also expressed in primordial germ cells and that hybrid maternal and somatic ribosomes are formed during development. The question of ribosome heterogeneity, the expression and function of maternal versus somatically provided ribosomes are of broad interest and this fundamental work sets new directions for future functional studies of this interesting phenomenon.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Efficient coding explains neural response homeostasis and stimulus-specific adaptation

   This article has 2 authors:

   1. Edward James Young
   2. Yashar Ahmadian

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This work derives a valuable general theory unifying theories of efficient information transmission in the brain with population homeostasis. The general theory provides an explanation for firing rate homeostasis at the level of neural clusters with firing rate heterogeneity within clusters. Applying this theory to the primary visual cortex, the authors present solid evidence that accounts for stimulus-specific and neuron-specific adaptation. Reviewers have provided additional suggestions for improving the readability of the manuscript, as well as discussing previous results on adapting coding as well as those aspects of experimental data that are not fully explained by the present theory.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Psilocin fosters neuroplasticity in iPSC-derived human cortical neurons

    This article has 10 authors:

    1. Malin Schmidt
    2. Anne Hoffrichter
    3. Mahnaz Davoudi
    4. Sandra Horschitz
    5. Thorsten Lau
    6. Marcus W Meinhardt
    7. Rainer Spanagel
    8. Julia Ladewig
    9. Georg Köhr
    10. Philipp Koch

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife Assessment

      This fundamental study reports the effects of the psychedelic drug psilocin on iPSC-derived human cortical neurons, analyzing different aspects of structural and functional neuronal plasticity. The evidence is convincing, integrating a comprehensive characterization of 5-HT2A expression and its subcellular distribution upon treatment with psilocin at different time points. The study supports the value of using iPSC-derived human cortical neurons for testing the potentially translational effects of psilocin and other psychedelic-related compounds.

    Reviewed by eLife