eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Transposons are important contributors to gene expression variability under selection in rice populations

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Raúl Castanera
   2. Noemia Morales-Díaz
   3. Sonal Gupta
   4. Michael Purugganan
   5. Josep M Casacuberta

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This valuable study reports on the role of transposable elements in gene expression variation in rice and how TE-associated expression changes could have been selected during domestication. The combination of evidence from linkage studies and selection scans for a subset of insertions is convincing, although it is difficult to know in how many cases linkage of TE insertions to other regulatory variants is responsible for altered gene expression and in how many cases the TE insertions themselves are the bona fide cause of altered gene expression. The work will be of interest to colleagues working on the role of transposable elements in adaptation and to biologists working on domestication.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Hunger- and thirst-sensing neurons modulate a neuroendocrine network to coordinate sugar and water ingestion

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Amanda J González Segarra
   2. Gina Pontes
   3. Nicholas Jourjine
   4. Alexander Del Toro
   5. Kristin Scott

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study identifies and characterizes a broad peptidergic network that coordinates nutrient-specific consumption needs for food or water. Using state-of-the-art methodology the authors combine a well-balanced set of exploratory anatomical analyses with rigorous functional experimental approaches to examine how ingestion is regulated based on internal needs. These significant and convincing new findings are of broad interest to the neuroscience field.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. What AlphaFold tells us about cohesin’s retention on and release from chromosomes

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Kim A Nasmyth
   2. Byung-Gil Lee
   3. Maurici Brunet Roig
   4. Jan Löwe

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study makes use of AlphaFold2 to predict the models of tens of cohesin subcomplexes from different species. The models, which are in most cases consistent with published cohesin variants with compromised in vitro and in vivo cohesin activity, provide convincing evidence that leads to testable hypotheses of cohesin dynamics and regulation. More broadly, this study serves as an example of how to use AlphaFold2 to build models of protein complexes that involve the docking of flexible regions to globular domains.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. We couldn't get details of this article at this time:
   10.1101/2023.01.16.524306

5. We couldn't get details of this article at this time:
   10.1101/2023.04.02.535239

6. Experimentally induced active and quiet sleep engage non-overlapping transcriptional programs in Drosophila

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Niki Anthoney
   2. Lucy Tainton-Heap
   3. Hang Luong
   4. Eleni Notaras
   5. Amber B Kewin
   6. Qiongyi Zhao
   7. Trent Perry
   8. Philip Batterham
   9. Paul J Shaw
   10. Bruno van Swinderen

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Drosophila is a powerful model organism for understanding the molecular and neural regulation of sleep. However, methodological limitations exist that would appear to limit the relevance of work done in the fly to our understanding of mammalian sleep. In this important work, the authors provide physiological, behavioral, and molecular evidence for the existence of two potential sleep stages in Drosophila. The experiments are generally well conducted and the authors' interpretations of their results are solid overall. Although technically innovative and conceptually provocative, there are aspects of the approaches used and results obtained that leave the central conclusions open to interpretation.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Novel regulators of islet function identified from genetic variation in mouse islet Ca2+ oscillations

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Christopher H Emfinger
   2. Lauren E Clark
   3. Brian Yandell
   4. Kathryn L Schueler
   5. Shane P Simonett
   6. Donnie S Stapleton
   7. Kelly A Mitok
   8. Matthew J Merrins
   9. Mark P Keller
   10. Alan D Attie

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     The authors provide a fundamental resource, detailing genetic variation of nutrient-responsive islet calcium regulation in mice through the lens of proteomics. The evidence for the mechanisms identified using this resource is compelling and strongly supported by integration with results from genome-wide association studies in humans. The construction of a streamlined and searchable web interface for the data will maximize their accessibility and utilization by the community.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Pathologic polyglutamine aggregation begins with a self-poisoning polymer crystal

   This article has 14 authors:

   1. Tej Kandola
   2. Shriram Venkatesan
   3. Jiahui Zhang
   4. Brooklyn T Lerbakken
   5. Alex Von Schulze
   6. Jillian F Blanck
   7. Jianzheng Wu
   8. Jay R Unruh
   9. Paula Berry
   10. Jeffrey J Lange
   11. Andrew C Box
   12. Malcolm Cook
   13. Celeste Sagui
   14. Randal Halfmann

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     The authors investigate the mechanism of amyloid nucleation in a cellular system using novel ratiometric measurements, providing fundamental insight into the role of polyglutamine length and the sequence features of glutamine-rich regions in amyloid formation. The problem addressed by this study is very significant and the ability to assess nucleation in cells is of considerable value. The data, as presented and analyzed, are mostly convincing.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Cell-type-specific control of secondary cell wall formation by Musashi-type translational regulators in Arabidopsis

   This article has 17 authors:

   1. Alicia Kairouani
   2. Dominique Pontier
   3. Claire Picart
   4. Fabien Mounet
   5. Yves Martinez
   6. Lucie Le-Bot
   7. Mathieu Fanuel
   8. Philippe Hammann
   9. Lucid Belmudes
   10. Remy Merret
   11. Jacinthe Azevedo
   12. Marie-Christine Carpentier
   13. Dominique Gagliardi
   14. Yohann Couté
   15. Richard Sibout
   16. Natacha Bies-Etheve
   17. Thierry Lagrange

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Secondary cell walls support vascular plants and conduct water throughout the plant body, and are crucial resources for lignocellulosic feedstocks. Here the authors present convincing genetic and biochemical evidence that secondary cell wall synthesis, known already to be under complex transcriptional control, is also controlled post-transcriptionally by MUSASHI-like RNA-binding proteins. These important results point to a new mechanism for control of secondary cell wall synthesis, which will be interesting to cell biologists and biochemists studying and attempting to manipulate plant biomass.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. β-Arrestin-dependent and -independent endosomal G protein activation by the vasopressin type 2 receptor

    This article has 7 authors:

    1. Carole Daly
    2. Akim Abdul Guseinov
    3. Hyunggu Hahn
    4. Adam Wright
    5. Irina G Tikhonova
    6. Alex Rojas Bie Thomsen
    7. Bianca Plouffe

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife assessment

      This is an important study that contributes to our understanding of the role of beta-arrestins in endosomal activation of the vasopressin type 2 receptors. While the use of a minigene as a tool is a weakness, the evidence is overall convincing and makes for significant findings whose theoretical and practical implications extend to other GPCRs.

    Reviewed by eLife