eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Niche exclusion of a lung pathogen in mice with designed probiotic communities

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Kelsey E Hern
   2. Ashlee M Phillips
   3. Catherine M Mageeney
   4. Kelly P Williams
   5. Anupama Sinha
   6. Hans K Carlson
   7. Kunal Poorey
   8. Nicole M Collette
   9. Steven S Branda
   10. Adam P Arkin

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study reports a valuable method to predict the capacity of a candidate probiotic bacterium to metabolically outcompete a bacterial pathogen in the ecological niche of the murine respiratory tract (niche exclusion) based on the overlap of used carbon sources in vitro. The in vivo confirmation of the in vitro/in silico predicted efficacy is, at this stage, incomplete and would require more persuasive experimental evidence for the elimination of alternative mechanisms of action.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Subnational tailoring of ITN distributions to maximise malaria control

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Andrew C Glover
   2. Hannah Koenker
   3. El Hadji Amadou Niang
   4. Kate Kolaczinski
   5. Thomas S Churcher

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This paper describes a useful Bayesian model to estimate the probabilities of access, use, and use given access of insecticide-treated bed nets (ITNs), by using sub-national cross-sectional survey data and the annual number of ITNs received at the country level. The authors provide convincing evidence to support their modeling approach, which could be enhanced by more validation and exploration of model assumptions.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Global molecular landscape of early MASLD progression in human obesity

   This article has 21 authors:

   1. Qing Zhao
   2. William De Nardo
   3. Ruoyu Wang
   4. Yi Zhong
   5. Umur Keles
   6. Gabriele Sakalauskaite
   7. Li Na Zhao
   8. Huiyi Tay
   9. Sonia Youhanna
   10. Mengchao Yan
   11. Ye Xie
   12. Youngrae Kim
   13. Sungdong Lee
   14. Rachel Liyu Lim
   15. Guoshou Teo
   16. Pradeep Narayanaswamy
   17. Paul R Burton
   18. Volker M Lauschke
   19. Hyungwon Choi
   20. Matthew J Watt
   21. Philipp Kaldis

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The authors provide a useful resource and approach to identify early-stage biomarkers of MASLD progression, notably when no other apparent symptoms have arisen. The strength of evidence to support new MASLD signatures is solid as the work combines metabolomic and transcriptomic measures in blood and liver biopsies.

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

   Reviewed by eLife, Review Commons

4. Single molecule counting detects low-copy glycine receptors in hippocampal and striatal synapses

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Serena Camuso
   2. Yana Vella
   3. Souad Youjil Abadi
   4. Clémence Mille
   5. Bert Brône
   6. Christian G Specht

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The study presents convincing quantitative evidence, supported by appropriate negative controls, for the presence of low-abundance glycine receptors (GlyRs) within inhibitory synapses in telencephalic regions of the mouse brain. Using sensitive single-molecule localization microscopy of endogenously tagged GlyRs, the authors reveal previously undetected populations of these receptors. Although the functional significance of these low-abundance GlyRs remains to be established, the findings offer valuable insights and methodologies that will be of interest to neuroscientists studying inhibitory synapse biology.

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

   Reviewed by eLife, Review Commons

5. Lenacapavir-induced Lattice Hyperstabilization is Central to HIV-1 Capsid Failure at the Nuclear Pore Complex and in the Cytoplasm

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Arpa Hudait
   2. Ryan C Burdick
   3. Ellie K Bare
   4. Vinay K Pathak
   5. Gregory A Voth

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study investigates how the HIV inhibitor lenacapavir influences capsid mechanics and interactions with the nuclear pore complex. It provides important insights into how drug-induced hyperstabilization of the viral shell can compromise its structural integrity during nuclear entry. The modeling is technically sophisticated, and the analyses provide solid support for the mechanistic conclusions.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Linear and categorical coding units in the mouse gustatory cortex drive population dynamics and behavior in taste decision-making

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Liam Lang
   2. Camelia Yuejiao Zheng
   3. Jennifer M Blackwell
   4. Giancarlo La Camera
   5. Alfredo Fontanini

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important work advances our understanding of the single neuron coding types in the mouse gustatory cortex and the functional roles of these neurons for perceptual decision-making. The conclusions are based on compelling evidence from rigorous behavioral experiments, high-density electrophysiology, sophisticated data analysis, and neural network modeling with in silico perturbations of functionally-identified units. This work will be of broad interest to systems neuroscientists.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. 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

8. 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

9. 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

10. 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