eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Reactivation-coupled brain stimulation enables complete learning generalization

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Yibo Xie
   2. Minmin Wang
   3. Yuan Gao
   4. Baoyu Wu
   5. Shaomin Zhang
   6. Mengyuan Gong
   7. Zoe Kourtzi
   8. Ke Jia

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study shows that combining reactivation-based training with anodal tDCS yields an unusually broad generalization of visual perceptual learning, while preserving robust learning gains and markedly reducing total training time. Although the empirical evidence is solid, the proposed mechanistic account, i.e., the GABA modulation, disrupted offline consolidation and reduced perceptual overfitting, remains insufficiently substantiated, as these assumptions lack direct neurochemical support, and several alternative behavioral explanations and necessary control comparisons have not been fully addressed. The work will be of broad interest to researchers investigating brain plasticity, perceptual learning, and rehabilitation training.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. The structural context of mutations in proteins predicts their effect on antibiotic resistance

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Anna G Green
   2. Mahbuba Tasmin
   3. Roger Vargas
   4. Maha R Farhat

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study leverages a large global dataset of tens of thousands of tuberculosis samples to place recurrent protein-coding mutations into their three-dimensional structural context, offering an expanded view of how antibiotic resistance emerges compared to traditional genetic analyses alone. The strength of evidence is convincing, supported by the scale and breadth of the dataset and the systematic structural analysis, although some of the assumptions made in the the modeling approach are only partially supported. Overall, the work will be of broad interest to researchers studying microbial evolution, antibiotic resistance, and structure-function relationships in pathogens.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Verbal Episodic Processing in Newborns

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Emma Visibelli
   2. Ana Fló
   3. Eugenio Baraldi
   4. Silvia Benavides-Varela

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This fundamental study reports solid evidence for early verbal episodic memory formation. The findings demonstrate that speaker identity is a crucial feature, enabling episodic-like memories from birth, and will be of interest to cognitive neuroscientists working on brain development, memory, language learning and social cognition.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Spectral decomposition of local field potentials uncovers frequency-tuned gain modulation of working memory in primate visual system

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Majid Roshanaei
   2. Mohammad Reza Daliri
   3. Zahra Bahmani
   4. Kelsey Clark
   5. Behrad Noudoost

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study offers a valuable contribution to understanding how working memory (WM) shapes neural processing in extrastriate cortex. By applying spectral decomposition to LFP recordings from primate middle temporal area (MT) during a spatial WM task, the authors show that lower-frequency components (theta, alpha, and beta, but not gamma or high-gamma) correlate with trial-by-trial gain modulation of visually evoked responses. However, certain aspects of the gain-modulation and statistical analyses are incomplete. A clearer and more comprehensive description of these components would substantially strengthen the manuscript.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Complimentary vertebrate Wac models exhibit phenotypes relevant to DeSanto-Shinawi Syndrome

   This article has 23 authors:

   1. Kang-Han Lee
   2. April M Stafford
   3. Maria Pacheco-Vergara
   4. Karol Cichewicz
   5. Cesar P Canales
   6. Nicolas Seban
   7. Melissa Corea
   8. Darlene Rahbarian
   9. Kelly E Bonekamp
   10. Grant R Gillie
   11. Dariangelly Pacheco Cruz
   12. Alyssa M Gill
   13. Hye-Eun Hwang
   14. Katie L Uhl
   15. Tara E Jager
   16. Marwan Shinawi
   17. Xiaopeng Li
   18. Andre Obenaus
   19. Shane Crandall
   20. Juhee Jeong
   21. Alex Nord
   22. Cheol-Hee Kim
   23. Daniel Vogt

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study establishes the first vertebrate models of DeSanto-Shinawi Syndrome, revealing conserved craniofacial and social and behavioral phenotypes across mouse and zebrafish that mirror key clinical features. The solid evidence is supported by behavioral, anatomical, and molecular analyses of Wac animal mutants that broadly support the authors' claims, though additional mechanistic investigation would strengthen the conclusions. This study sets a baseline for future mechanistic studies and reports a platform to test approaches to reverse phenotypes.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. A simplified and highly efficient cell-free protein synthesis system for prokaryotes

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Xianshengjie Lang
   2. Changbin Zhang
   3. Jingxuan Lin
   4. Zhe Zhang
   5. Wenfei Li

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The study presents valuable findings of an optimized E. coli cell-free protein synthesis (eCFPS) system that has been simplified by reducing the number of core components from 35 to 7; furthermore, the findings communicate a simplified 'fast lysate' preparation that eliminates the need for traditional runoff and dialysis steps. This study is an advance towards simplifying protein expression workflows, and the evidence provided is solid, starting with nanoluc, a protein that expresses readily in many systems, to applications to more challenging proteins like the functional self-assembling vimentin and the active restriction endonuclease Bsal. Data on the underlying mechanisms and efficiency of the presented system in terms of protein yield relative to other known cell-free systems would greatly enhance the findings' significance and the strength of the evidence. The paper remains of interest to scientists in microbiology, biotechnology and protein synthesis.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. A retrospective analysis of 400 publications reveals patterns of irreproducibility across an entire life sciences research field

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Joseph Lemaitre
   2. Désirée Popelka
   3. Blandine Ribotta
   4. Hannah Westlake
   5. Sveta Chakrabarti
   6. Li Xiaoxue
   7. Mark A. Hanson
   8. Haobo Jiang
   9. Francesca Di Cara
   10. Estee Kurant
   11. Fabrice David
   12. Bruno Lemaitre

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study presents an impressive large-scale effort to assess the reproducibility of published findings in the field of Drosophila immunity. The authors analyse 400 papers published between 1959 and 2011, and assess how many of the claims in these papers have been tested in subsequent publications. In a companion article they report the results of experiments to test a subset of the claims that, according to the literature, have not been tested. The present article also explores if various factors related to authors, institutions and journals influence reproducibility in this field. The evidence supporting the claims is solid, but there is considerable scope for strengthening and extending the analysis. The limitations inherent to evaluating reproducibility based on the published literature should also be acknowledged.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Defining the chromatin-associated protein landscapes on Trypanosoma brucei repetitive elements using synthetic TALE proteins

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Roberta Carloni
   2. Tadhg Devlin
   3. Pin Tong
   4. Christos Spanos
   5. Tanya Auchynnikava
   6. Juri Rappsilber
   7. Keith R Matthews
   8. Robin C Allshire

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This work significantly advances our understanding of chromatin organization within regions of repetitive sequences in the parasitic protozoan Trypanosoma brucei. Using cutting edge interdisciplinary tools, the authors provide compelling evidence for two discrete types of repetitive DNA element-associated proteins- one set involved in essential centromere function; and, the other involved in glycoprotein antigenic variation via homologous recombination. Thus, these fundamental findings have implications for this parasite's biology, and for therapeutic targeting in kinetoplastid diseases. This work will be exciting to those in the centromere/mitosis and parasite immunity fields.

   Reviewed by eLife, Review Commons

9. Microbiota/gut/neuron axis promotes Drosophila ageing via Acetobacter, Tachykinin, and TkR99D

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Diana Marcu
   2. David R Sannino
   3. Anthony J Dornan
   4. Rita Ibrahim
   5. Atharv Kapoor
   6. Miriam Wood
   7. Adam J Dobson

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study demonstrates that in Drosophila melanogaster, tachykinin (Tk) expression is regulated by the microbiota. The authors present convincing evidence that axenic flies raised with no microbiota are longer-lived than conventionally reared animals, and that Tk expression and Tk receptors in the nervous system are required for this effect. They further test individual bacterial strains for their role in these effects and connect the effect to loss of lipid stores and suggest that FOXO may be involved in the phenotype, results that are of interest to the fields of environmental perception, host microbiome interactions, and geroscience.

     [Editors' note: this paper was reviewed by Review Commons.]

   Reviewed by eLife, Review Commons

10. THE FAM53C/DYRK1A axis regulates the G1/S transition of the cell cycle

    This article has 15 authors:

    1. Taylar Hammond
    2. Jong Bin Choi
    3. Miles W Membreño
    4. Janos Demeter
    5. Roy Ng
    6. Debadrita Bhattacharya
    7. Thuyen N Nguyen
    8. Griffin G Hartmann
    9. Caterina I Colón
    10. Carine Bossard
    11. Jan M Skotheim
    12. Peter K Jackson
    13. Anca Pasca
    14. Seth M Rubin
    15. Julien Sage

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife Assessment

      This study identifies the uncharacterised protein FAM53C as a novel, potential regulator of the G1/S cell cycle transition, linking its function to the DYRK1A kinase and the RB/p53 pathways. The work is valuable and of interest to the cell cycle field, leveraging a strong computational screen to identify a new candidate. The findings are solid, although confidence in the siRNA depletion phenotypes would have been higher with rescue experiments using an siRNA-resistant cDNA and more robust quantification of some immunoassay data.

      [Editors' note: this paper was reviewed by Review Commons.]

    Reviewed by eLife, Review Commons