eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Genetic and karyotype divergence between parents affect clonality and sterility in hybrids

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Anatolie Marta
   2. Tomáš Tichopád
   3. Oldřich Bartoš
   4. Jiří Klíma
   5. Mujahid Ali Shah
   6. Vendula Šlechtová Bohlen
   7. Joerg Bohlen
   8. Karel Halačka
   9. Lukáš Choleva
   10. Matthias Stöck
   11. Dmitrij Dedukh
   12. Karel Janko

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This paper provides important insights into how asexual reproduction can arise in interspecific hybrids. The evidence supporting the conclusions is compelling, with rigorous molecular cytogenetic experiments showing the production of clonal gametes is common across hybrids between closely to moderately divergent sexual species. By highlighting the potential for asexuality to evolve in hybrids during a narrow window of species divergence, this work will be of broad interest to evolutionary biologists.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Separating phases of allopolyploid evolution with resynthesized and natural Capsella bursa-pastoris

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Tianlin Duan
   2. Adrien Sicard
   3. Sylvain Glémin
   4. Martin Lascoux

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study offers new insight into how floral and reproductive phenotypes and gene expression evolve in allopolyploids. The authors marshal compelling evidence, using well-constructed genetic lines, RNA sequencing, and phenotypic analyses to distinguish the roles of hybridization, whole genome duplication, and subsequent evolution in phenotypes associated with the selfing syndrome and in gene expression. The work will be of interest to researchers working in plant speciation and genomics, as well as those more broadly interested in the effects of genome copy number on phenotypic and expression evolution.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Computational analysis of long-range allosteric communications in CFTR

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Ayca Ersoy
   2. Bengi Altintel
   3. Nurit Livnat Levanon
   4. Nir Ben-Tal
   5. Turkan Haliloglu
   6. Oded Lewinson

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This manuscript presents a useful analysis of allosteric communication in the CFTR protein using a coarse-grained dynamic model and characterized the role of disease-causing mutations. The results and analyses are generally solid and validated with available experimental observations. The findings provide comprehensive insights into the allosteric mechanism of this protein.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Developmental Alterations in Brain Network Asymmetry in 3- to 9-Month Infants with Congenital Sensorineural Hearing Loss

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Guangfang Liu
   2. Xin Zhou
   3. Zhenyan Hu
   4. Yidi Liu
   5. Endi Huo
   6. Heather Bortfeld
   7. Qi Dong
   8. Haihong Liu
   9. Haijing Niu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study presents findings on changes in brain network asymmetry in infants with congenital hearing loss. The findings are valuable but the evidence supporting the claims is incomplete and needs more appropriate and strict statistical analyses. The findings will be of interest to psychologists, neuroscientists, and clinicians.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. MotorNet, a Python toolbox for controlling differentiable biomechanical effectors with artificial neural networks

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Olivier Codol
   2. Jonathan A Michaels
   3. Mehrdad Kashefi
   4. J Andrew Pruszynski
   5. Paul L Gribble

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This work will be of interest to the motor control community as well as neuroAI researchers interested in how bodies constrain neural circuit function. The authors present "MotorNet", a useful software package to train artificial neural networks to control a biomechanical model of an effector. The manuscript provides solid evidence that MotorNet is easy to use and can reproduce past results in the field, both at the neural and behavioural levels. Validation is limited to planar arm-like plants or point-masses, so future work exploring three-dimensional movements and other types of plants would strengthen the impact of the tool.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Prior information enhances tactile representation in primary somatosensory cortex

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Pegah Kassraian
   2. Finn Rabe
   3. Nadja Enz
   4. Marloes Maathuis
   5. Nicole Wenderoth

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study presents a valuable set of findings on how prior expectations modulate tactile sensory processing. The neuroimaging evidence supporting the main conclusions is solid, although the nature of the experimental task somewhat limits the interpretation of the findings. This work will be of interest to neuroscientists working on sensory processing and perception.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Male rats emit aversive 44-kHz ultrasonic vocalizations during prolonged Pavlovian fear conditioning

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Krzysztof Hubert Olszyński
   2. Rafał Polowy
   3. Agnieszka Diana Wardak
   4. Izabela Anna Łaska
   5. Aneta Wiktoria Grymanowska
   6. Wojciech Puławski
   7. Olga Gawryś
   8. Michał Koliński
   9. Robert Kuba Filipkowski

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study investigated the appearance of ultrasonic vocalizations around 44 kHz that occurs in response to prolonged fear conditioning in male rats. Evidence in support of the conclusions is solid and may be of interest to some researchers also investigating distress-related ultrasonic vocalizations.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Therapeutic doses of ketamine acutely attenuate the aversive effect of losses during decision-making

   This article has 2 authors:

   1. Mariann Oemisch
   2. Hyojung Seo

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     The authors use reinforcement learning modeling to study the alterations following acute ketamine in macaques. The evidence supporting the conclusion that ketamine reduces the impact of losses vs. neutral/gains is solid. In this version of this valuable study, the authors make more measured interpretations about the relationship between the processing of losses and ketamine's antidepressant effects.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. A dynamical computational model of theta generation in hippocampal circuits to study theta-gamma oscillations during neurostimulation

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Nikolaos Vardalakis
   2. Amélie Aussel
   3. Nicolas P Rougier
   4. Fabien B Wagner

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study presents a computational model to explore how neurostimulation could impact hippocampal theta oscillations. The computational model combines a detailed physiologically realistic hippocampus model and an abstract theta oscillator. The study could provide valuable predictions on pathological changes in this network. The modelling is based on convincing approaches that could be improved with experimental validation in future experiments.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Action sequence learning, habits, and automaticity in obsessive-compulsive disorder

    This article has 9 authors:

    1. Paula Banca
    2. Maria Herrojo Ruiz
    3. Miguel Fernando Gonzalez-Zalba
    4. Marjan Biria
    5. Aleya A Marzuki
    6. Thomas Piercy
    7. Akeem Sule
    8. Naomi A Fineberg
    9. Trevor W Robbins

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife assessment

      This study provides solid evidence for differences in habit-learning in obsessive-compulsive disorder versus controls. Contrary to previous studies that employed a single laboratory session to study habit-learning, here a smartphone app delivered motor-sequence tasks daily for a month. These results have important implications for our understanding of goal-directed versus habit learning in obsessive-compulsive disorder.

    Reviewed by eLife