eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Heterogeneous responses to embryonic critical period perturbations within the Drosophila larval locomotor circuit

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Niklas Krick
   2. Jacob Davies
   3. Bramwell Coulson
   4. Daniel Sobrido-Cameán
   5. Michael Miller
   6. Matthew CW Oswald
   7. Aref A Zarin
   8. Richard Baines
   9. Matthias Landgraf

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This is an important study of critical period plasticity, focused on temperature manipulations, and how different parts of the Drosophila larval motor circuit adapt or maladapt. The work convincingly demonstrates that components of the motor network respond in distinct ways to the heat shock, and the combination of functional, structural, and electrophysiological approaches makes the study of significant interest. The work points to central interneurons as primary drivers of maladaptive changes, while motoneurons and neuromuscular junctions show compensatory or homeostatic adjustments. The study is methodologically rigorous, contributing significant insights into critical period biology using a tractable invertebrate model.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Anti-resonance in developmental signaling regulates cell fate decisions

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Samuel J Rosen
   2. Olivier Witteveen
   3. Naomi Baxter
   4. Ryan S Lach
   5. Erik Hopkins
   6. Marianne Bauer
   7. Maxwell Z Wilson

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important work combines theoretical analysis with precise experimental perturbation to demonstrate a previously unappreciated quantitative characteristic of the Wnt signaling pathway, which is anti-resonance, or a suppression of pathway output at intermediate activation frequencies. This effect is demonstrated experimentally with compelling evidence from optogenetic stimulation in multiple cell types, alongside modeling results that corroborate the phenomenon. While the demonstration of this phenomenon has yet to be extended to fully physiological situations, its clear existence within optogenetically stimulated systems shows that it is likely a significant factor that contributes to the behavior of this central signaling pathway.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Functional Muscle Networks as Biomarkers of Post-Stroke Motor Impairment and Therapeutic Responsiveness

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. David O’Reilly
   2. Giorgia Pregnolato
   3. Andrea Turolla
   4. Pawel Kiper
   5. Ioannis Delis
   6. Giacomo Severini

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important work employed a recent, functional muscle network analysis for evaluating rehabilitation outcomes in post-stroke patients. While the research direction is relevant and suggests the need for further investigation, the strength of evidence supporting the claims is incomplete. Muscle interactions can serve as biomarkers, but improvements in function are not directly demonstrated, and the method's robustness is not benchmarked against existing approaches.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Spatiotemporal WNT and BMP gradients orchestrate regional enteroendocrine cell diversity along the Drosophila midgut

   This article has 3 authors:

   1. Jiaying Lv
   2. Xingting Guo
   3. Rongwen Xi

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study is a comprehensive investigation into the regulatory mechanisms and regional distribution of enteroendocrine cell subtypes in the Drosophila midgut, significantly advancing the understanding of how WNT and BMP gradients contribute to EE diversity. The methodological foundation and robust genetic evidence are solid in supporting the key roles of compartment boundary signals, particularly WNT and BMP, in specifying EE subtypes and division modes. However, there is a lack of full mechanistic insight regarding Notch pathway involvement, incomplete quantification of phenotype data, and insufficient global pattern analysis, which detracts from fully supporting some proposed models. Overall, the study provides a platform for future work but would benefit from stronger data integration and expanded mechanistic exploration.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Aggressive trait selection influences life-history trade-offs, favoring survival over reproductive success in Drosophila melanogaster males

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Anthony Defert
   2. Romane Gout
   3. Gaelle Pennot
   4. Fanny Jamme
   5. Amandine Castex
   6. Anissa Handjar
   7. Thomas Guilleman
   8. Jean-Christophe Billeter
   9. Séverine Trannoy

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study addresses the effects of selection on aggression on fitness and life-history trade-offs in Drosophila melanogaster. However, the evidence presented is incomplete and does not support the claims proposed in the study of increased survival of highly aggressive males at the expense of reproductive success and shorter mating duration. The main limitation of the study is the choice to use males from only one aggressive Drosophila line in combination with CantonS females, that do not allow disambiguation between nonaggression-related factors, such as hybrid vigor and aggression-related factors influencing mating and lifespan.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Kinematics and morphological correlates of descent strategies in arboreal mammals suggest early upright postures in euprimates

   This article has 3 authors:

   1. Séverine LD Toussaint
   2. Dionisios Youlatos
   3. John A Nyakatura

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study examines how mammals descend effectively and securely along vertical substrates. The conclusions from comparative analyses based on behavioral data and morphological measurements collected from 21 species across a wide range of taxa are convincing, making the work of interest to all biologists studying animal locomotion.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Abundant Parent-of-origin Effect eQTL: The Framingham Heart Study

   This article has 3 authors:

   1. Yongtao Guan
   2. Tianxiao Huan
   3. Daniel Levy

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study provides a systematic investigation of parent-of-origin (POE) effects on gene expression using large trio-based data from the Framingham Heart Study, uncovering thousands of potentially novel associations. While the findings are potentially significant, the statistical support for classifying POE eQTLs and some downstream analyses is incomplete, and more stringent re-analysis is needed. With such revisions, the work would serve as a foundation for advancing understanding of POEs and their role in gene regulation.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Adapting Clinical Chemistry Plasma as a Source for Liquid Biopsies

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Spencer C Ding
   2. Jingru Yu
   3. Tiepeng Liao
   4. Lauren S Ahmann
   5. Yvette Y Yao
   6. Chandler Ho
   7. Linlin Wang
   8. Benjamin A Pinsky
   9. Wei Gu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important work provides a new method to extract cfDNA from residual plasma from heparin separators for molecular testing. The evidence supporting the authors' claims is convincing, although some further metrics should also be evaluated. This finding will be interesting to people working in epigenomics and infectious disease diagnostics.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Mediator Subunit MED16 Collaborates with UBP1-TFCP2 to Control Transcriptional Activation or Repression via Promoter Positional Specificity

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Yuanming Zheng
   2. Xiaying Zhao
   3. Ming Yang
   4. Xinyi Yang
   5. Huanzhang Zhu
   6. Xiaofei Yu
   7. Qiang Zhou
   8. Gang Wang

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The characterization of a dissociable Mediator subunit implicated in cellular pathways, particularly lung alveolar function and HIV latency, would be conceptually interesting. The authors have preliminary evidence for a stable Med16 subcomplex that may regulate specific genes. This work is useful in that it points to interactions between Med16 and UBP1, but the evidence is preliminary and incomplete.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. The genetic control of rapid genome content divergence in Arabidopsis thaliana

    This article has 2 authors:

    1. Christopher J Fiscus
    2. Daniel Koenig

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife Assessment

      This important study systematically investigates repeat expansion in the plant Arabidopsis thaliana using a new k-mer-based method, expanding on smaller studies to more comprehensively identify cis- and trans-acting loci associated with repeat dynamics. The approach is methodologically sound and broadly applicable to large-scale short-read datasets for assessing copy number variation and genomic repeat content. While convincing in its scope and novelty, the findings would be further strengthened with exploratory analyses of datasets from other species with more or fewer repeats in their genomes.

    Reviewed by eLife