eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. High-resolution quantitative and functional MRI indicate lower myelination of thin and thick stripes in human secondary visual cortex

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Daniel Haenelt
   2. Robert Trampel
   3. Shahin Nasr
   4. Jonathan R Polimeni
   5. Roger BH Tootell
   6. Martin I Sereno
   7. Kerrin J Pine
   8. Luke J Edwards
   9. Saskia Helbling
   10. Nikolaus Weiskopf

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This manuscript will be of interest to a wide range of neuroscientists and clinicians employing imaging methods. Using a combination of cutting edge high resolution magnetic resonance protocols, the authors investigate the structure-function relationship of specialised compartments in the human cortex in vivo. Their results indicate different patterns of myelination across the "stripes" of visual area V2, but will require further independent validation with myelin staining in the human brain.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Membrane potential dynamics of excitatory and inhibitory neurons in mouse barrel cortex during active whisker sensing

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Taro Kiritani
   2. Aurélie Pala
   3. Célia Gasselin
   4. Sylvain Crochet
   5. Carl C. H. Petersen

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This manuscript reports the response by cortical interneurons from mice expressing genetically defined fluorescent markers to sensory stimulation performed in awake animals without anesthesia. The data show in some cases distinct responses in specific neuron types. This manuscript contains unique information that will be valuable to other researchers in the field and influence future research in the field of cortical GABAergic neurons.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Inhibition of the proton-activated chloride channel PAC by PIP2

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Ljubica Mihaljević
   2. Zheng Ruan
   3. James Osei-Owusu
   4. Wei Lü
   5. Zhaozhu Qiu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Combining electrophysiology, site-directed mutagenesis, lipid pharmacology, and single particle cryo-electron microscopy, this study provides solid evidence identifying a site on the extracellular half of the transmembrane domain of Proton-Activated Chloride (PAC) channels that could be occupied by PIP2 and related lipids to promote channel desensitization. These findings are important because pharmacological information for these biologically relevant ion channels is absent.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Fecal transplant from myostatin deletion pigs positively impacts the gut-muscle axis

   This article has 16 authors:

   1. Zhao-Bo Luo
   2. Shengzhong Han
   3. Xi-Jun Yin
   4. Hongye Liu
   5. Junxia Wang
   6. Meifu Xuan
   7. Chunyun Hao
   8. Danqi Wang
   9. Yize Liu
   10. Shuangyan Chang
   11. Dongxu Li
   12. Kai Gao
   13. Huiling Li
   14. Biaohu Quan
   15. Lin-Hu Quan
   16. Jin-Dan Kang

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Myostatin KO is known to increase muscle mass, but can transplanting the gut microbiome from these animals also increase muscle mass and strength? Based on the experiments performed in this paper, the answer is yes, and the positive impact of myostatin deletion on the gut-muscle axis may proceed through alteration of gut bacterial metabolism, including short-chain fatty acids. This is important work and will contribute to the expanding field of the gut-muscle axis.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Longitudinal fundus imaging and its genome-wide association analysis provide evidence for a human retinal aging clock

   This article has 14 authors:

   1. Sara Ahadi
   2. Kenneth A Wilson
   3. Boris Babenko
   4. Cory Y McLean
   5. Drew Bryant
   6. Orion Pritchard
   7. Ajay Kumar
   8. Enrique M Carrera
   9. Ricardo Lamy
   10. Jay M Stewart
   11. Avinash Varadarajan
   12. Marc Berndl
   13. Pankaj Kapahi
   14. Ali Bashir

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This paper is an important contribution to the biological aging field using eye image data to create an aging clock of the retina in data from eyePACS with validation in the UK Biobank. The authors provide compelling evidence that the clock correlates with chronological and phenotypic age, predicting mortality independently of chronological age. The work identifies novel genetic loci with a top site located in the ALKAL2 region, which is functionally validated in a Drosophila model.

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6. Single-cell analysis of the aged ovarian immune system reveals a shift towards adaptive immunity and attenuated cell function

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Tal Ben Yaakov
   2. Tanya Wasserman
   3. Eliel Aknin
   4. Yonatan Savir

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     The study by Ben Yaakov et al. describes a single cell analysis of the mammalian ovary in young, adult and old mice. Based on gene expression profiles, the authors identified cell clusters corresponding to immune cell populations in mouse ovaries and compared their abundance in aged compared to adult animals. In comparison with previous studies that used single cell RNAseq to characterize the heterogeneity of cell types in the ovary, this study focuses only on immune cells resulting in much better coverage to characterize the changes that these cells undergo as a function of age. The combination of single-cell RNA sequencing and flow cytometry used by the authors is a robust and unbiased approach to characterize immune cell alterations in aging ovaries. Overall, the data and analyses presented in this study reveal profound modifications of the immune system in the aging reproductive system in mice. However, while both the data and biology presented are quite interesting, this study is perhaps too wide in breadth such that no individual result is extensively and rigorously explored.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. A Bayesian approach to single-particle electron cryo-tomography in RELION-4.0

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Jasenko Zivanov
   2. Joaquín Otón
   3. Zunlong Ke
   4. Andriko von Kügelgen
   5. Euan Pyle
   6. Kun Qu
   7. Dustin Morado
   8. Daniel Castaño-Díez
   9. Giulia Zanetti
   10. Tanmay AM Bharat
   11. John AG Briggs
   12. Sjors HW Scheres

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Single-particle tomography (SPT) is a useful method to determine the structure of proteins imaged in situ. This important work presents an easy-to-use tool for SPT that approximates the use of 2D tomographic projections using a "pseudo-subtomogram" data structure, chosen to facilitate implementation within the existing Relion codebase. The examples shown provide solid support for the claims about the efficacy of the approach.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. ErbB Signalling is a Potential Therapeutic Target for Vascular Lesions with Fibrous Component

   This article has 20 authors:

   1. Henna Ilmonen
   2. Suvi Jauhiainen
   3. Pia Vuola
   4. Heta Rasinkangas
   5. Heidi H Pulkkinen
   6. Sara Keränen
   7. Miika Kiema
   8. Jade J Liikkanen
   9. Nihay Laham-Karam
   10. Svetlana Laidinen
   11. Einari Aavik
   12. Kimmo Lappalainen
   13. Jouko Lohi
   14. Johanna Aronniemi
   15. Tiit Örd
   16. Minna U Kaikkonen
   17. Päivi Salminen
   18. Erkki Tukiainen
   19. Seppo Ylä-Herttuala
   20. Johanna P Laakkonen

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     The authors address an important clinical entity and an important area of unmet clinical need. The authors use a combination of in vitro and in vivo experiments to learn how stromal cells surrounding vessels in venous malformations (VM) and angiomatosis of soft tissue (AST) contribute to the angiogenic activities driving the vascular lesions. They discovered that secretion of transforming growth factor-alpha (TGFa) from both endothelial cells and stromal cells, shows evidence for EGF-receptor phosphorylation. In addition, they show that afatinib, a pan-ErbB TKI inhibitor may have therapeutic benefits.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Conserved allosteric inhibition mechanism in SLC1 transporters

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Yang Dong
   2. Jiali Wang
   3. Rachel-Ann Garibsingh
   4. Keino Hutchinson
   5. Yueyue Shi
   6. Gilad Eisenberg
   7. Xiaozhen Yu
   8. Avner Schlessinger
   9. Christof Grewer

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     The goal of this study is to identify allosteric modulators of a SLC-1 amino acid transporter, ASCT2, which has been implicated in cancer progression. By combining computational and docking methods with functional measurements, this study provides solid evidence for specific aspects of allosteric SLC-1 inhibition mechanisms. The findings are important to transporter mechanism and pharmacology.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Neurophysiological basis of hemodynamic responses in the developing human brain before the time of normal birth

    This article has 10 authors:

    1. Tanya Poppe
    2. Jucha Willers Moore
    3. Mohammed Rupawala
    4. Anthony N. Price
    5. Felipe Godinez
    6. Kimberley Whitehead
    7. Sofia Dall’Orso
    8. A. David Edwards
    9. Lorenzo Fabrizi
    10. Tomoki Arichi

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife assessment

      This solid study addresses the functionality of neurovascular coupling in response to somatosensory stimuli in premature neonates based on a compelling methodology combining recordings with fMRI and EEG (microstates approach). While the findings are important for the understanding of the emergence of brain sensory processing, more extended analyses of inter- and intra-subjects' variability are required to support the results interpretation and determine the influence of important factors impacting brain maturation and activity. With the theoretical and analytical parts strengthened, this study will be of interest to developmental neuroscientists and neuroimaging specialists and might have important clinical implications in the field of neonatology.

    Reviewed by eLife