eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. The Human Mitochondrial Genome Encodes for an Interferon-Responsive Host Defense Peptide

   This article has 14 authors:

   1. Michelle C Rice
   2. Maria Imun
   3. Sang Wun Jung
   4. Chan Yoon Park
   5. Jessica S Kim
   6. Rochelle W Lai
   7. Casey R Barr
   8. Jyung Mean Son
   9. Kathleen Tor
   10. Emmeline Kim
   11. Ryan J Lu
   12. Ilana Cohen
   13. Bérénice A Benayoun
   14. Changhan Lee

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study presents findings on the mode of action of MOTS-c (mitochondrial open reading frame from the twelve S rRNA type-c), and its impact on monocyte-derived macrophages. The authors present solid evidence for its increased expression in stimulated monocytes/macrophages, its direct bactericidal functions, as well as its role in the modulation of monocyte differentiation into macrophages. Since most of the data were generated from a cell line (THP1), future work is required to validate observations in primary cells and to further support the claims of this work.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. The protein domains of vertebrate species in which selection is more effective have greater intrinsic structural disorder

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Catherine A Weibel
   2. Andrew L Wheeler
   3. Jennifer E James
   4. Sara M Willis
   5. Hanon McShea
   6. Joanna Masel

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study develops a useful metric for quantifying codon usage adaptation - the Codon Adaptation Index of Species (CAIS). This metric permits direct comparisons of the strength of selection at the molecular level across species. The study is based on solid evidence, and the authors identify relationships between CAIS and the presence of disordered protein domains. Other correlations, such as the one between CAIS and body size, are weak and non-significant. In summary, the study introduces an interesting new approach to quantifying codon usage across species, which may be helpful in attempts to measure selection at the molecular level.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Reprogramming of cardiac phosphoproteome, proteome, and transcriptome confers resilience to chronic adenylyl cyclase-driven stress

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Jia-Hua Qu
   2. Khalid Chakir
   3. Kirill V Tarasov
   4. Daniel R Riordon
   5. Maria Grazia Perino
   6. Allwin Jennifa Silvester
   7. Edward G Lakatta

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study describes important results from cardiac-specific overexpression of adenylyl cyclase type 8 (TGAC8) mice that was integrated with transcriptomic and proteomic evidence. The paper convincingly provides new insights into how one can interpret signals from visceral organs.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Functional implications of the exon 9 splice insert in GluK1 kainate receptors

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Surbhi Dhingra
   2. Prachi M Chopade
   3. Rajesh Vinnakota
   4. Janesh Kumar

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study shows that a splice variant of the kainate receptor Glu1-1a that inserts 15 amino acids in the extracellular N-terminal region substantially changes the channel's desensitization properties, the sensitivity to glutamate and kainate, and the effects of modulatory Neto proteins. In the revised paper the authors have clarified several points raised by reviewers but the structural portion of the study has not been improved and consequently, more data are needed to determine the molecular mechanism by which the insert changes the functional profile of the channel. Even so, these solid findings advance our understanding of splice variants among glutamate receptors and will be of interest to neuro- and cell-biologists and biophysicists in the field.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Comparative interactome analysis of α-arrestin families in human and Drosophila

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Kyung-Tae Lee
   2. Inez KA Pranoto
   3. Soon-Young Kim
   4. Hee-Joo Choi
   5. Ngoc Bao To
   6. Hansong Chae
   7. Jeong-Yeon Lee
   8. Jung-Eun Kim
   9. Young V Kwon
   10. Jin-Wu Nam

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study provides a valuable resource that documents the protein-protein interactions (PPI) network for alpha-arrestins in both human and Drosophila based on affinity purification/mass spectrometry and the SAINTexpress method followed by a series of bioinformatic and functional assessments. Through these, the authors confirmed the roles of known and novel interactions, including proteins involved in RNA splicing and helicase, GTPase-activating proteins, and ATP synthase. This study represents a convincing example of how to adopt comparative molecular interactions and how to interpret the functional implications.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Enrichment of rare codons at 5' ends of genes is a spandrel caused by evolutionary sequence turnover and does not improve translation

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Richard Sejour
   2. Janet Leatherwood
   3. Alisa Yurovsky
   4. Bruce Futcher

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This is an important contribution to the origins and translational consequences of the relatively low rate of translation elongation in the first ∼30-50 codons of genes in most organisms. The authors provide convincing evidence that the prevalence of rare codons in the first ~40 codons in yeast is due to the relatively recent evolution of these coding sequences, or of lower purifying selection operating on them, and that a preponderance of codons encoded by rare tRNAs near the N-terminus is not associated with higher translational efficiency in the manner proposed by the "translational ramp" hypothesis. The work is incomplete in that the results of reporter assays may have been confounded by alterations of mRNA sequence or structure that could have influenced their translation or mRNA stability; that the work cannot fully account for a greater enrichment of slowly translated codons in N-terminal vs. C-terminal regions; and that the work does not resolve whether translation elongation through N-terminal coding is truly slow.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Removal of extracellular human amyloid beta aggregates by extracellular proteases in C. elegans

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Elisabeth Jongsma
   2. Anita Goyala
   3. José Maria Mateos
   4. Collin Yvès Ewald

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Using a newly developed C. elegans model of Alzheimer's disease that expresses Abeta aggregates extracellularly, the authors provide convincing evidence of a disintegrin and an ortholog of human ADAM9 that participate in removing these extracellular aggregates. The worm model presented in this important paper may be very useful to the Alzheimer Disease field.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. The kleisin subunit controls the function of C. elegans meiotic cohesins by determining the mode of DNA binding and differential regulation by SCC-2 and WAPL-1

   This article has 11 authors:

   1. Maikel Castellano-Pozo
   2. Georgios Sioutas
   3. Consuelo Barroso
   4. Josh P Prince
   5. Pablo Lopez-Jimenez
   6. Joseph Davy
   7. Angel-Luis Jaso-Tamame
   8. Oliver Crawley
   9. Nan Shao
   10. Jesus Page
   11. Enrique Martinez-Perez

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important paper reveals distinct dynamics of two meiosis-specific cohesin complexes containing either REC-8 or CHO-3/4 in C. elegans: REC-8-cohesin is essential for sister chromatid cohesion in meiosis I and DNA double-strand break repair, while COH-3/4-cohesin, whose binding to meiotic chromosomes is stabilized by the cohesin accessory protein SCC-2, is necessary for loop-axis formation. The experimental evidence in the paper is solid based on cytological analysis using a conditional depletion of the gene. The work will be of interest to researchers working on meiosis and chromosome dynamics.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Multi-ancestry meta-analysis of host genetic susceptibility to tuberculosis identifies shared genetic architecture

   This article has 11 authors:

   1. Haiko Schurz
   2. Vivek Naranbhai
   3. Tom A Yates
   4. James J Gilchrist
   5. Tom Parks
   6. Peter J Dodd
   7. Marlo Möller
   8. Eileen G Hoal
   9. Andrew P Morris
   10. Adrian VS Hill
   11. International Tuberculosis Host Genetics Consortium

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important manuscript, which describes the largest genetic association study to date, uses broadly compelling methods to address the genetic susceptibility to tuberculosis infection. A strength of the paper is that this multi-ancestry meta-analysis of genetic association studies than is more powerful than what has been done before. A weakness is that its main result is difficult to interpret due to the complexity of the genetic association signal.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Atypical cognitive training-induced learning and brain plasticity and their relation to insistence on sameness in children with autism

    This article has 7 authors:

    1. Jin Liu
    2. Hyesang Chang
    3. Daniel A Abrams
    4. Julia Boram Kang
    5. Lang Chen
    6. Miriam Rosenberg-Lee
    7. Vinod Menon

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife assessment

      This is an important study on learning strategy differences in autism vs typically developing controls. The study identifies similar learning rates but different learning strategies. The evidence provided by the authors is convincing, relying on well-done tasks and fMRI analyses.

    Reviewed by eLife