eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Staphylococcus aureus counters organic acid anion-mediated inhibition of peptidoglycan cross-linking through robust alanine racemase activity

   This article has 11 authors:

   1. Sasmita Panda
   2. Yahani P Jayasinghe
   3. Dhananjay D Shinde
   4. Emilio Bueno
   5. Amanda Stastny
   6. Blake P Bertrand
   7. Sujata S Chaudhari
   8. Tammy Kielian
   9. Felipe Cava
   10. Donald R Ronning
   11. Vinai C Thomas

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     In this useful study, the authors present convincing evidence linking the enzyme D-alanine-D-alanine ligase (Ddl), crucial for cell wall fortification, to organic acid exposure in Staphylococcus aureus. While it's established that organic acids impede bacterial growth, the researchers reveal a novel coping mechanism where S. aureus maintains elevated levels of D-alanine, the substrate for Ddl, to counteract this inhibition. This discovery illuminates a bacterial strategy for organic acid tolerance, offering new insights for microbiologists and potentially informing future antimicrobial approaches.

   Reviewed by eLife, Arcadia Science

2. Selective recruitment of the cerebellum evidenced by task-dependent gating of inputs

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Ladan Shahshahani
   2. Maedbh King
   3. Caroline Nettekoven
   4. Richard B Ivry
   5. Jörn Diedrichsen

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study reports a novel approach to studying cerebellar function based on the idea of selective recruitment using fMRI. It provides convincing evidence for task-dependent gating of neocortical input to the cerebellum during a motor task and a working memory task. The study will be of interest to a broad cognitive neuroscience audience.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Allosteric coupling asymmetry mediates paradoxical activation of BRAF by type II inhibitors

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Damien M Rasmussen
   2. Manny M Semonis
   3. Joseph T Greene
   4. Joseph M Muretta
   5. Andrew R Thompson
   6. Silvia Toledo Ramos
   7. David D Thomas
   8. William CK Pomerantz
   9. Tanya S Freedman
   10. Nicholas M Levinson

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This elegant study presents important findings into how small molecules that were originally developed to inhibit the oncogenic kinase, BRAF, instead trigger activation of this kinase target. Compelling and comprehensive evidence supports a new allosteric model to explain the paradoxical activation. This rigorous work will be of great interest to biochemists, structural biologists, and those working on strategies to inhibit kinases in the context of human disease.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. A multisite validation of brain white matter pathways of resilience to chronic back pain

   This article has 13 authors:

   1. Mina Mišić
   2. Noah Lee
   3. Francesca Zidda
   4. Kyungjin Sohn
   5. Katrin Usai
   6. Martin Löffler
   7. Md Nasir Uddin
   8. Arsalan Farooqi
   9. Giovanni Schifitto
   10. Zhengwu Zhang
   11. Frauke Nees
   12. Paul Geha
   13. Herta Flor

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study provides convincing evidence that white matter diffusion imaging of the right superior longitudinal fasciculus might help to develop a predictive biomarker of chronic back pain chronicity. The results are based on a discovery-replication approach with different cohorts, but the sample size is limited. The findings will interest researchers interested in the brain mechanisms of chronic pain and in developing brain-based biomarkers of chronic pain.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Input-specific gating of NMDA amplification via HCN channels in mouse L2/3 pyramidal neurons

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Viktor János Oláh
   2. Jing Wu
   3. Leonard K Kaczmarek
   4. Matthew JM Rowan

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     In this valuable study the authors use electrophysiology in brain slices and computer modeling and suggest that layer 2/3 pyramidal neurons of the mouse cortex have functional HCN channels on the proximal apical dendrite which allows distinct processing of input at that location from the input to distal apical dendrites. The revisions improved the solid paper but some of the concerns were not addressed sufficiently and many of these concerns could be addressed by further revision.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. FAK loss reduces BRAFV600E-induced ERK phosphorylation to promote intestinal stemness and cecal tumor formation

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Chenxi Gao
   2. Huaibin Ge
   3. Shih-Fan Kuan
   4. Chunhui Cai
   5. Xinghua Lu
   6. Farzad Esni
   7. Robert E Schoen
   8. Jing H Wang
   9. Edward Chu
   10. Jing Hu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     In this important study, the authors use a genetically engineered mouse model to reveal a tumor suppressive role for focal adhesion kinase in right-sided colon cancer. The evidence in support of the authors' claims is generally solid, although the data supporting the mechanism through which FAK deletion promotes tumorigenesis are incomplete. This work will be of interest to cancer researchers and others studying the biological consequences of tuning signal transduction pathways.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. The E3 ubiquitin ligase RNF220 maintains hindbrain Hox expression patterns through regulation of WDR5 stability

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Huishan Wang
   2. Xingyan Liu
   3. Yamin Liu
   4. Chencheng Yang
   5. Yaxin Ye
   6. Xiaomei Yu
   7. Nengyin Sheng
   8. Shihua Zhang
   9. Bingyu Mao
   10. Pengcheng Ma

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study focuses on gene regulatory mechanisms essential for hindbrain development. Through molecular genetics and biochemistry, the authors propose a new mechanism for the control of Hox genes, which encode highly conserved transcription factors essential for hindbrain development. The strength of evidence is solid, as most claims are supported by the data. This work will be of interest to developmental biologists.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Detection of TurboID fusion proteins by fluorescent streptavidin outcompetes antibody signals and visualises targets not accessible to antibodies

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Johanna Odenwald
   2. Bernardo Gabiatti
   3. Silke Braune
   4. Siqi Shen
   5. Martin Zoltner
   6. Susanne Kramer

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This valuable study demonstrates how proximity labeling with streptavidin can be used to boost fluorescence signals in otherwise hard-to-label regions of cells. The experimental verification of amplification of fluorescence near epitope tags in phase-separated compartments is solid, demonstrating enhanced signal-to-noise compared to immunofluorescence. This study will be of particular interest to those using correlative light and electron microscopy or expansion microscopy when the signal is limiting or inaccessible.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Artificially inserted strong promoter containing multiple G-quadruplexes induces long-range chromatin modification

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Shuvra Shekhar Roy
   2. Sulochana Bagri
   3. Soujanya Vinayagamurthy
   4. Avik Sengupta
   5. Claudia Regina Then
   6. Rahul Kumar
   7. Sriram Sridharan
   8. Shantanu Chowdhury

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This valuable study demonstrates that genomic insertion of a G4-containing sequence can be sufficient to induce chromosome loops and alter gene expression. The evidence supporting the conclusions is convincing. Effects were shown by Hi-C as well as qPCR for chromatin modifications and expression, and the specificity of the effects was controlled by mutating the G4-containing sequence or treating with LNA probes to abolish G4 structure formation. The work will be of interest to researchers working on chromatin organization and gene regulation.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Discarded sequencing reads uncover natural variation in pest resistance in Thlaspi arvense

    This article has 4 authors:

    1. Dario Galanti
    2. Jun Hee Jung
    3. Caroline Müller
    4. Oliver Bossdorf

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife Assessment

      This important study presents a significant methodological advance by leveraging previously discarded, unmapped DNA sequence reads to estimate pest infestation loads across plant accessions, and map variation in these apparent pest loads to defense genes. The bioinformatics approach is compelling, and the results should bear broad implications for phenotype-genotype prediction, especially regarding the use of unmapped reads for GWAS.

    Reviewed by eLife