eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. The evolution and structure of snake venom phosphodiesterase (svPDE) highlight its importance in venom actions

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Cheng-Tsung Pan
   2. Chien-Chu Lin
   3. I-Jin Lin
   4. Kun-Yi Chien
   5. Yeong-Shin Lin
   6. Hsiao-Han Chang
   7. Wen-Guey Wu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This manuscript reports important findings regarding the evolution of snake venom proteins. The conclusions are convincing and are based on appropriate and validated methodology in line with the current state-of-the-art. The findings will be of interest to biologists and biochemists interested in the evolution of venoms as well as those generally interested in the evolution of molecular novelties.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Structural insights into regulation of CNNM-TRPM7 divalent cation uptake by the small GTPase ARL15

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Luba Mahbub
   2. Guennadi Kozlov
   3. Pengyu Zong
   4. Emma L Lee
   5. Sandra Tetteh
   6. Thushara Nethramangalath
   7. Caroline Knorn
   8. Jianning Jiang
   9. Ashkan Shahsavan
   10. Lixia Yue
   11. Loren Runnels
   12. Kalle Gehring

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     In this potentially important study, Mahbub and colleagues examine how the small GTPase ARL15 regulates ion transport. Using a complementary array of techniques, the authors gathered solid evidence for the binding of ARL15 to CNNM proteins, resulting in a proposal how this may affect the function of the TRPM7 channel. Additional experiments are required to fully substantiate the claims.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Recurrent hypoxia in a rat model of sleep apnea during pregnancy leads to microglia-dependent respiratory deficits and persistent neuroinflammation in adult male offspring

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Carly R. Mickelson
   2. Andrea C. Ewald
   3. Maia G. Gumnit
   4. Armand L. Meza
   5. Abigail B. Radcliff
   6. Stephen M. Johnson
   7. Jonathan N. Ouellette
   8. Bailey A. Kermath
   9. Avtar S. Roopra
   10. Michael E. Cahill
   11. Jyoti J. Watters
   12. Tracy L. Baker

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     These authors provide compelling evidence that gestational intermittent hypoxia, a component of sleep apnea during pregnancy, increases inflammation in the spinal cords of male mice. Increased inflammation is robustly linked to deficits in respiratory plasticity both biochemically and via functional depletion assays. These data are important given the fact that male infants have worse outcomes in the NICU and are at higher risk of sudden infant death syndrome.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Eelbrain, a Python toolkit for time-continuous analysis with temporal response functions

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Christian Brodbeck
   2. Proloy Das
   3. Marlies Gillis
   4. Joshua P Kulasingham
   5. Shohini Bhattasali
   6. Phoebe Gaston
   7. Philip Resnik
   8. Jonathan Z Simon

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Brodbeck et al. offer a timely and important contribution to how neural signals in response to continuous temporal modulations (as seen in speech and language processing) can be modelled effectively using temporal response functions. They offer a convincing new approach that includes a novel application of a boosting algorithm in addition to an accessible and didactically useful toolbox for analysis. With further comparison to existing toolboxes, or a more extensive comparison of boosting and ridge regression via simulation, this work will have a compelling impact on methods in speech and language neuroscience, as well as in cognitive neuroscience more broadly.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. The large GTPase Sey1/atlastin mediates lipid droplet- and FadL-dependent intracellular fatty acid metabolism of Legionella pneumophila

   This article has 15 authors:

   1. Dario Hüsler
   2. Pia Stauffer
   3. Bernhard Keller
   4. Desirée Böck
   5. Thomas Steiner
   6. Anne Ostrzinski
   7. Simone Vormittag
   8. Bianca Striednig
   9. A Leoni Swart
   10. François Letourneur
   11. Sandra Maaß
   12. Dörte Becher
   13. Wolfgang Eisenreich
   14. Martin Pilhofer
   15. Hubert Hilbi

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment:

     This important study advances our understanding of host-derived lipid droplets' interaction with intracellular pathogens. The use of amoeba species Dictyostelium discoideum as a host for Legionella pneumophila infection is compelling and goes beyond the current state of the art, but the strength of evidence is incomplete, and the main claims are only partially supported by the data. With the experimental part strengthened, this paper would be of interest to cell biologists and microbiologists working on the interaction of microbes with host cells.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Continuous muscle, glial, epithelial, neuronal, and hemocyte cell lines for Drosophila research

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Nikki Coleman-Gosser
   2. Yanhui Hu
   3. Shiva Raghuvanshi
   4. Shane Stitzinger
   5. Weihang Chen
   6. Arthur Luhur
   7. Daniel Mariyappa
   8. Molly Josifov
   9. Andrew Zelhof
   10. Stephanie E Mohr
   11. Norbert Perrimon
   12. Amanda Simcox

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This useful work describes the establishment and characterization of new cell lines derived from specific tissues of the fruit fly Drosophila. The evidence supporting the claims of the authors is solid, although the characterization of the cell lines is incomplete and the genomic findings are not presented in a user-friendly manner. These lines could be a useful resource that complements in vivo Drosophila genetics, improving biochemistry and facilitating high-throughput screening.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Association of close-range contact patterns with SARS-CoV-2: a household transmission study

   This article has 14 authors:

   1. Jackie Kleynhans
   2. Lorenzo Dall'Amico
   3. Laetitia Gauvin
   4. Michele Tizzoni
   5. Lucia Maloma
   6. Sibongile Walaza
   7. Neil A Martinson
   8. Anne von Gottberg
   9. Nicole Wolter
   10. Mvuyo Makhasi
   11. Cheryl Cohen
   12. Ciro Cattuto
   13. Stefano Tempia
   14. SA-S-HTS Group

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This important study examines the association between SARS-CoV-2 infection and close contact among household members, measured using proximity sensors deployed after the first case was identified in the household. The authors provide solid evidence that transmission of SARS-CoV-2 within households is not dependent upon close contact, but the study suffers from a number of limitations that are fully acknowledged.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Integrating analog and digital modes of gene expression at Arabidopsis FLC

   This article has 14 authors:

   1. Rea L Antoniou-Kourounioti
   2. Anis Meschichi
   3. Svenja Reeck
   4. Scott Berry
   5. Govind Menon
   6. Yusheng Zhao
   7. John Fozard
   8. Terri Holmes
   9. Lihua Zhao
   10. Huamei Wang
   11. Matthew Hartley
   12. Caroline Dean
   13. Stefanie Rosa
   14. Martin Howard

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     Regulation of gene expression in many biological systems occurs either through a binary mode where gene expression is either on or off (digital regulation), or through an analog mode leading to a graded modulation of gene expression. In this manuscript, the authors report how these two regulatory modes are integrated into a one-way switch pattern to control the expression of the Arabidopsis floral repressor gene FLOWERING LOCUS C (FLC). They suggest that an analog regulation in the autonomous pathway precedes a digital regulation conferred by Polycomb silencing before cold exposure, and this temporal switch correlates with the strength of transcription at the FLC locus in different genetic backgrounds.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Colour polymorphism associated with a gene duplication in male wood tiger moths

   This article has 9 authors:

   1. Melanie N Brien
   2. Anna Orteu
   3. Eugenie C Yen
   4. Juan A Galarza
   5. Jimi Kirvesoja
   6. Hannu Pakkanen
   7. Kazumasa Wakamatsu
   8. Chris D Jiggins
   9. Johanna Mappes

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife assessment

     This study combines different approaches to unravel the genetic basis of a pigmentation polymorphism in natural populations of a fascinating study system with well-studied ecology. The paper has the potential to be of general interest to biologists curious about the genetic basis of adaptive variation, which is especially relevant to evolutionary biologists and ecologists. The study reports substantial data and makes a strong case for the contribution of a duplication-derived gene acquiring a morph-specific function. Further information is required to implicate valkea in pigmentation morph formation and for diagnosing the duplicated segment as a supergene (associated with low recombination).

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Precision RNAi using synthetic shRNAmir target sites

    This article has 20 authors:

    1. Thomas Hoffmann
    2. Alexandra Hörmann
    3. Maja Corcokovic
    4. Jakub Zmajkovic
    5. Matthias Hinterndorfer
    6. Jasko Salkanovic
    7. Fiona Spreitzer
    8. Anna Köferle
    9. Katrin Gitschtaler
    10. Alexandra Popa
    11. Sarah Oberndorfer
    12. Florian Andersch
    13. Markus Schaefer
    14. Michaela Fellner
    15. Nicole Budano
    16. Jan G Ruppert
    17. Paolo Chetta
    18. Melanie Wurm
    19. Johannes Zuber
    20. Ralph A Neumüller

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife assessment

      This manuscript describes a valuable method to study the mechanism of action of essential genes and novel putative drug targets. Evidence for the effectiveness of the system, which is based on engineering pre-validated targets for RNA-mediated knockdown into genes of interest, is compelling, and the method should find use as an orthogonal method for generating gene specific knockdowns.

    Reviewed by eLife