eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Drosulfakinin signaling modulates female sexual receptivity in Drosophila

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Tao Wang
   2. Biyang Jing
   3. Bowen Deng
   4. Kai Shi
   5. Jing Li
   6. Baoxu Ma
   7. Fengming Wu
   8. Chuan Zhou

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     The manuscript by Wang and colleagues expands our understanding of the neural circuit mechanisms underpinning innate sexual behaviors in Drosophila. It exploits an arsenal of sophisticated tools to demonstrate that the neuropeptide Drosulfakinin (DSK) modulates female sexual receptivity via 71G01-neurons > Dsk-m-neurons > CCKLR-17D3 receptor expressing neurons. The study also introduces new transgenic tools that will be valuable for the community and will be of interest to neuroscientists exploring neuropeptide function and female sexual behavior.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

2. Genetic loci and metabolic states associated with murine epigenetic aging

   This article has 8 authors:

   1. Khyobeni Mozhui
   2. Ake T Lu
   3. Caesar Z Li
   4. Amin Haghani
   5. Jose Vladimir Sandoval-Sierra
   6. Yibo Wu
   7. Robert W Williams
   8. Steve Horvath

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     In this manuscript, Mozhui and colleagues used several epigenetic predictors, of which most come from other manuscript that have not yet been peer reviewed, to test how they differ between genetically diverse mice from the BXD family (by looking at metabolic traits and lifespan). They also identified several quantitative trait loci for the different predictors, using linkage analysis, which could shed some light on the underlying biology of epigenetic mouse ageing. One of the question that remains is how generalizable (some of) the findings are given that the follow-up analyses were only done using liver tissue.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Ontogeny of circulating lipid metabolism in pregnancy and early childhood – a longitudinal population study

   This article has 23 authors:

   1. Satvika Burugupalli
   2. Adam Alexander T Smith
   3. Gavriel Oshlensky
   4. Kevin Huynh
   5. Corey Giles
   6. Tingting Wang
   7. Alexandra George
   8. Sudip Paul
   9. Anh Nguyen
   10. Thy Duong
   11. Natalie Mellett
   12. Michelle Cinel
   13. Sartaj Ahmad Mir
   14. Li Chen
   15. Markus R Wenk
   16. Neerja Karnani
   17. Fiona Collier
   18. Richard Saffery
   19. Peter Vuillermin
   20. Anne-Louise Ponsonby
   21. David Burgner
   22. Peter Meikle
   23. Barwon Infant Study Investigator team

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Public Evaluation Summary:

     This manuscript is of interest to readers in the field of metabolomics, particularly lipidomics. It measures hundreds of cord and plasma lipid species in mother-child pairs in a longitudinal fashion starting in gestation up to four years after birth. The authors perform regression analyses of cord lipid species with clinical characteristics at birth and 4 years old to support the key claims of the paper.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 and Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Extensive age-dependent loss of antibody diversity in naturally short-lived turquoise killifish

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. William John Bradshaw
   2. Michael Poeschla
   3. Aleksandra Placzek
   4. Samuel Kean
   5. Dario Riccardo Valenzano

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     This study introduces the killifish as a potential model for immune aging and immunosenescence and characterizes the changes in age-associated immune-repertoire. The authors convincingly show a decrease in diversity of the large expanded B-cell clones that is greater than small clones and a more pronounced change in the intestinal antibody repertoire with age. These results strongly suggest that killifish undergo age-related immunosenescence. Adding functional measures of the immune system would strengthen this conclusion.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #2 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Fracture healing is delayed in the absence of gasdermin-interleukin-1 signaling

   This article has 13 authors:

   1. Kai Sun
   2. Chun Wang
   3. Jianqiu Xiao
   4. Michael D Brodt
   5. Luorongxin Yuan
   6. Tong Yang
   7. Yael Alippe
   8. Huimin Hu
   9. Dingjun Hao
   10. Yousef Abu-Amer
   11. Matthew J Silva
   12. Jie Shen
   13. Gabriel Mbalaviele

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     The paper by Sun et al. addresses the role of gasdermins GSDMD and GSDME in fracture healing and inflammation after injury. The study is very significant for the understanding the role of GSDMD and GSDME in bone homoeostasis and in particular fracture healing. The reported data are very strong and in support of the proposed/studied hypothesis.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Cerebellum encodes and influences the initiation, performance, and termination of discontinuous movements in mice

   This article has 3 authors:

   1. Michael A Gaffield
   2. Britton A Sauerbrei
   3. Jason M Christie

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     Gaffield and Christie investigate how the cerebellum contributes to the reward-driven, periodic licking behavior by using electrophysiology and calcium imaging in awake mice. The authors reveal that the cerebellar Purkinje cells can signal temporal information about the onset and offset of ongoing movements: this may be potentially important in understanding the mechanism for cerebellar temporal processing. However, further data analysis is required to support the main conclusion.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #2 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Molecular architecture of the human tRNA ligase complex

   This article has 11 authors:

   1. Alena Kroupova
   2. Fabian Ackle
   3. Igor Asanović
   4. Stefan Weitzer
   5. Franziska M Boneberg
   6. Marco Faini
   7. Alexander Leitner
   8. Alessia Chui
   9. Ruedi Aebersold
   10. Javier Martinez
   11. Martin Jinek

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     This manuscript describes a tour-de-force approach to determine how the five subunits of the human tRNA ligase complex interact with each other. The authors combine X-ray crystallography of individual protein domains with combinatorial reconstitution analysis and cross-linking mass spectrometry to define and purify a minimal tRNA ligase complex core. Their reductionist and highly analytical approach produces a treasure-trove of data with exceptional quality, the true value of which will become apparent once additional structural information (from e.g. cryo-electron microscopy) becomes available, enabling independent biochemical validation.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #2 and Reviewer #3 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Creation of photocyclic vertebrate rhodopsin by single amino acid substitution

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Kazumi Sakai
   2. Yoshinori Shichida
   3. Yasushi Imamoto
   4. Takahiro Yamashita

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     This manuscript describes an investigation of the evolution of monostable rhodopsins, typically found in vertebrates. It highlights that single amino acid changes in vertebrate rhodopsins can create a partial bistable retinal pigment that can be photoconverted back to the ground state or it will slowly convert back to the ground state retinal isomer. The rationale for the experiments came from the discovery of a very interesting activation mechanism of the nonvisual pigment Opn5L1. This work has important implications for how our visual pigments have been optimized during evolution, and it contributes important insights into engineering bistable pigments for optogenetic applications.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 and Reviewer #2 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Dithiothreitol causes toxicity in C. elegans by modulating the methionine–homocysteine cycle

   This article has 2 authors:

   1. Gokul G
   2. Jogender Singh

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     Evaluation Summary:

     Thiol agents, such as dithiothreitol (DTT), are toxic to many species, but the mechanisms of toxicity is incompletely understood. In this work, the authors use the animal C. elegans, a small worm, to propose a new mechanisms for how DTT causes organismal growth arrest. Specifically, they suggest that DTT causes reduction in the key molecule S-adenosyl methionine (SAM), which is used as a methyl donor to modify proteins, lipid, and/or other macromolecules. The genetic and supplementation experiments by the authors are compelling, but no direct evidence is provided that SAM levels are indeed lower following exposure of C. elegans to DTT.

     (This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 agreed to share their name with the authors.)

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Eco1-dependent cohesin acetylation anchors chromatin loops and cohesion to define functional meiotic chromosome domains

    This article has 4 authors:

    1. Rachael E Barton
    2. Lucia F Massari
    3. Daniel Robertson
    4. Adèle L Marston

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      Evaluation Summary:

      The cohesin complex is involved in both sister chromatid cohesion (SCC) and intra-chromatid loop formation. Combining molecular genetic and cytological tools with genome-wide calibrated ChIP and HiC analyses in budding yeast, the authors elegantly show that Eco1 and Eco1-mediated Smc3 acetylation promote the boundary formation of chromatin loops by cohesin, which is critical for both meiotic recombination in prophase I and sister chromatid segregation in meiosis II. Cohesin's role in the boundary formation is independent of meiotic DNA replication and of antagonizing a cohesion releasing protein, Wapl. Future studies will reveal the molecular mechanisms of how Eco1-mediated Smc3 acetylation stabilizes cohesin at convergent transcription sites for boundary formation.

      This preprint has been reviewed by eLife. We include the public reviews from the reviewers here; the authors also receive private feedback with suggested changes to the manuscript. Reviewer #1 and Reviewer #2 agreed to share their names with the authors.)

    Reviewed by eLife