eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Adolescent neurostimulation of dopamine circuit reverses genetic deficits in frontal cortex function

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Surjeet Mastwal
   2. Xinjian Li
   3. Rianne Stowell
   4. Matthew Manion
   5. Wenyu Zhang
   6. Nam-Shik Kim
   7. Ki-Jun Yoon
   8. Hongjun Song
   9. Guo-Li Ming
   10. Kuan Hong Wang

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This is an important study that addresses the interesting question of whether stimulation of DA input to prefrontal cortex during adolescence can be used to rescue genetic defects on DA regulation of PFC function. The conclusions are convincingly supported by the data together with discussion of some limitations of the approach. This story will of interest to a broad group of neuroscientists interested in regulation of prefrontal cortical function in behavior.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Catecholaminergic neuromodulation and selective attention jointly shape perceptual decision-making

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Stijn A Nuiten
   2. Jan Willem de Gee
   3. Jasper B Zantvoord
   4. Johannes J Fahrenfort
   5. Simon van Gaal

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study shows that pharmacologically enhanced catecholamine levels and increased voluntary spatial attention have overlapping as well as dissociable effects on performance on a visuospatial attention task and corresponding EEG markers. The findings provide solid evidence regarding how neuromodulatory arousal and selective spatial attention jointly shape perceptional decision-making.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Mechanistic and evolutionary insights into isoform-specific ‘supercharging’ in DCLK family kinases

   This article has 15 authors:

   1. Aarya Venkat
   2. Grace Watterson
   3. Dominic P Byrne
   4. Brady O'Boyle
   5. Safal Shrestha
   6. Nathan Gravel
   7. Emma E Fairweather
   8. Leonard A Daly
   9. Claire Bunn
   10. Wayland Yeung
   11. Ishan Aggarwal
   12. Samiksha Katiyar
   13. Claire E Eyers
   14. Patrick A Eyers
   15. Natarajan Kannan

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study expands on current knowledge of allosteric diversity in the human kinome by C-terminal splicing variants using as a paradigm DCLK1. The authors provide convincing evolutionary and some mechanistic evidence how C-terminal isoform specific variants generated by alternative splicing can regulate catalytic activity by means of coupling specific phosphorylation sites to dynamical and conformational changes controlling active site and substrate pocket occupancy, as well as protein-protein interactions. The data will be of interest to researchers in the kinase and signal transduction field.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Five years later, with double the demographic data, naked mole-rat mortality rates continue to defy Gompertzian laws by not increasing with age

   This article has 3 authors:

   1. J. Graham Ruby
   2. Megan Smith
   3. Rochelle Buffenstein

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This useful study aims to characterize patterns of demographic aging in naked mole rats by quantifying mortality rates in a captive colony, up to approximately the median age of death. The study system is a fascinating case of unusual longevity and physiology in mammals, but because of limited sampling at older ages and missing analyses, the evidence for the main conclusion – that naked mole rats do not experience actuarial senescence – is incomplete for younger animals and inadequate for older animals. The work nevertheless provides data of interest to biodemographers and biomedical researchers interested in naked mole rats as a model for aging.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Broad functional profiling of fission yeast proteins using phenomics and machine learning

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. María Rodríguez-López
   2. Nicola Bordin
   3. Jon Lees
   4. Harry Scholes
   5. Shaimaa Hassan
   6. Quentin Saintain
   7. Stephan Kamrad
   8. Christine Orengo
   9. Jürg Bähler

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study combines extensive phenotyping of genome-wide deletion mutants and machine learning-based prediction to generate a large scale resource for understanding the functions of thousands of fission yeast protein-coding genes. This resource is supported by convincing phenotyping data and state-of-the-art bioinformatic analyses and will be of interest to many geneticists.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Disulfide bridge-dependent dimerization triggers FGF2 membrane translocation into the extracellular space

   This article has 18 authors:

   1. Fabio Lolicato
   2. Julia P Steringer
   3. Roberto Saleppico
   4. Daniel Beyer
   5. Jaime Fernandez-Sobaberas
   6. Sebastian Unger
   7. Steffen Klein
   8. Petra Riegerová
   9. Sabine Wegehingel
   10. Hans-Michael Müller
   11. Xiao J Schmitt
   12. Shreyas Kaptan
   13. Christian Freund
   14. Martin Hof
   15. Radek Šachl
   16. Petr Chlanda
   17. Ilpo Vattulainen
   18. Walter Nickel

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This manuscript reports important findings, demonstrating a critical role for a cysteine-containing dimerization interface in the secretion of FGF2 through an unconventional pathway. The authors provide compelling evidence, combining in vitro biochemical assays with structural simulation. The work will be of interest to researchers working on protein trafficking and secretion.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. voyAGEr, a free web interface for the analysis of age-related gene expression alterations in human tissues

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Arthur L Schneider
   2. Rita Martins-Silva
   3. Alexandre Kaizeler
   4. Nuno Saraiva-Agostinho
   5. Nuno L Barbosa-Morais

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This work presents an important online platform designed to facilitate the exploration of genes and genetic pathways implicated in human aging. Leveraging a new inference methodology, the tool enables the identification and visualization of key genes and tissues impacted by aging, facilitating scientific discovery. The methods and analyses are convincing and will be broadly used by scientists aiming to mine human aging RNA-seq data.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Spatial transformation of multi-omics data unlocks novel insights into cancer biology

   This article has 6 authors:

   1. Mateo Sokač
   2. Asbjørn Kjær
   3. Lars Dyrskjøt
   4. Benjamin Haibe-Kains
   5. Hugo JWL Aerts
   6. Nicolai J Birkbak

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This valuable manuscript presents a new approach to transform multi-omics datasets into images and to exploit Deep Learning methods for image analysis of the transformed datasets. As an example, the method is applied to multi-omics datasets on different cancers. While the evidence in this specific case is solid, whether the method is working as advertised in other settings is not yet known.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Coordinated regulation of gene expression in Plasmodium female gametocytes by two transcription factors

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Yuho Murata
   2. Tsubasa Nishi
   3. Izumi Kaneko
   4. Shiroh Iwanaga
   5. Masao Yuda

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study offers important insights into the transcriptional regulatory networks driving female gametocyte maturation in rodent malaria parasites. The work is based on solid methodology and shows how two female-specific transcription factors, AP2-FG and PFG (aka Fd2), co-operate to up-regulate the expression of genes required for development after fertilization occurs in the mosquito midgut. This study will be of interest to scientists working on sexual differentiation and gene regulation in Plasmodium and other apicomplexan parasites.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Aging impairs cold-induced beige adipogenesis and adipocyte metabolic reprogramming

    This article has 9 authors:

    1. Corey D Holman
    2. Alexander P Sakers
    3. Ryan P Calhoun
    4. Lan Cheng
    5. Ethan C Fein
    6. Christopher Jacobs
    7. Linus Tsai
    8. Evan D Rosen
    9. Patrick Seale

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife assessment

      This fundamental study provides evidence that de novo beige adipogenesis from Pdgfra+ adipocyte progenitor cells is blocked during early aging in subcutaneous fat. The depth of the data at early ages is compelling, with rigorous cell tracing methodology employed. The study will aid in identifying new approaches to switch dormant adipocytes into an active thermogenic phenotype, and should be of interest to cell biologists at large.

    Reviewed by eLife