eLife

Latest preprint reviews

1. Membrane curvature regulates Ups1 dependent phosphatidic acid transfer across lipid bilayers

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Fereshteh Sadeqi
   2. Dexin Dong
   3. Kai Stroh
   4. Marian Vache
   5. Jutta Metz
   6. Dietmar Riedel
   7. Andreas Janshoff
   8. Herre Jelger Risselada
   9. Caroline Kolenda
   10. Michael Meinecke

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This fundamental study combines in vitro reconstitution experiments and molecular dynamics simulations to elucidate how membrane lipids are transported from the outer to the inner membrane of mitochondria. The authors provide convincing evidence that a positive membrane curvature is critical for membrane lipid extraction. The work will be of broad interest to cell biologists and biochemists.

   Reviewed by eLife

2. GMCL1 controls 53BP1 stability and modulates taxane sensitivity

   This article has 10 authors:

   1. Yuki Kito
   2. Tania J González-Robles
   3. Sharon Kaisari
   4. Juhee Pae
   5. Sheena Faye Garcia
   6. Juliana Ortiz-Pacheco
   7. Beatrix Ueberheide
   8. Antonio Marzio
   9. Gergely Róna
   10. Michele Pagano

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study identifies 53BP1 as an interaction partner of GMCL1 (a likely CUL3 substrate receptor). The study proposes a novel mechanism by which cancer cells evade the mitotic surveillance pathway through GMCL1-mediated degradation of 53BP1, leading to reduced p53 activation and paclitaxel resistance. These data are the most useful aspect of the study, but the data supporting the authors' conclusions as to the clinical relevance of the study are inadequate. The authors have not taken relevant data about the clinical mechanism of taxanes into account.

   Reviewed by eLife

3. Progressive mural cell deficiencies across the lifespan in a foxf2 model of cerebral small vessel disease

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. Merry Faye E Graff
   2. Emma EM Heeg
   3. David A Elliott
   4. Sarah J Childs

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study provides important insights into mural cell dynamics and vascular pathology using a zebrafish model of cerebral small vessel disease. The authors present convincing evidence that partial loss of foxf2 function results in progressive, cell-autonomous defects in pericytes accompanied by endothelial abnormalities across the lifespan. By leveraging advanced in vivo imaging and genetic approaches, the work establishes zebrafish as a powerful and relevant model for dissecting the cellular mechanisms underlying cerebral small vessel disease.

   Reviewed by eLife

4. Deep learning reveals endogenous sterols as allosteric modulators of the GPCR–Gα interface

   This article has 18 authors:

   1. Sanjay Kumar Mohanty
   2. Aayushi Mittal
   3. Namra Farooqi
   4. Aakash Gaur
   5. Subhadeep Duari
   6. Saveena Solanki
   7. Anmol Kumar Sharma
   8. Sakshi Arora
   9. Suvendu Kumar
   10. Vishakha Gautam
   11. Nilesh Kumar Dixit
   12. Karthika Subramanian
   13. Tarini Shankar Ghosh
   14. Debarka Sengupta
   15. Shashi Kumar Gupta
   16. Arul Natarajan Murugan
   17. Deepak Sharma
   18. Gaurav Ahuja

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     The authors present a set of wrappers around previously developed software and machine-learning toolkits, and demonstrate their use in identifying endogenous sterols binding to a GPCR. The resulting pipeline is potentially useful for molecular pharmacology researchers due to its accessibility and ease of use. However, the evidence supporting the GPCR-related findings remains incomplete, as the machine-learning model shows indications of overfitting, and no direct ligand-binding assays are provided for validation.

   Reviewed by eLife

5. Mapping of in vivo cleavage sites uncovers a major role for yeast RNase III in regulating protein-coding genes

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Lee-Ann Notice-Sarpaning
   2. Mathieu Catala
   3. Catherine Stuart
   4. Sherif Abou Elela
   5. Ambro van Hoof

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This valuable study expands the inventory of polyadenylated RNAs cleaved by the double-stranded RNA endonuclease Rnt1 in budding yeast, using solid methodology based on high-throughput sequencing. Previous studies had anecdotally discovered mRNA substrates, and this global characterization is comprehensive with multiple complementary controls. This study sets the stage for deeper investigations into the biological function of Rnt1 and substrate cleavage.

   Reviewed by eLife

6. Gene expression variation across genetically identical individuals predicts reproductive traits

   This article has 5 authors:

   1. Amy K Webster
   2. John H Willis
   3. Erik Johnson
   4. Peter Sarkies
   5. Patrick C Phillips

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This important study addresses the role of non-genetic factors in individual differences in phenotype. Using C. elegans, the study finds that non-genetic differences in gene expression, partly influenced by the environment, correlate with individual differences in two reproductive traits. This supports the use of gene expression data as a key intermediate for understanding complex traits. The clever study design makes for compelling evidence.

   Reviewed by eLife

7. Extracellular vesicle-mediated release of bis(monoacylglycerol)phosphate is regulated by LRRK2 and glucocerebrosidase activity

   This article has 12 authors:

   1. Elsa Meneses-Salas
   2. Moises Castellá
   3. Marianna Arnold
   4. Frank Hsieh
   5. Rubén Fernández-Santiago
   6. Mario Ezquerra
   7. Alicia Garrido
   8. María-José Martí
   9. Carlos Enrich
   10. Suzanne R Pfeffer
   11. Kalpana Merchant
   12. Albert Lu

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This useful study presents the potentially interesting idea that LRRK2 regulates cellular BMP levels and their release via extracellular vesicles, with GCase activity further modulating this process in mutant LRRK2-expressing cells. However, some of the evidence supporting these conclusions remains incomplete, and additional work is suggested under certain conditions. Overall, the study will be of interest to cell biologists working on Parkinson's disease.

   Reviewed by eLife

8. Forecasting protein evolution by integrating birth-death population models with structurally constrained substitution models

   This article has 4 authors:

   1. David Ferreiro
   2. Luis Daniel González-Vázquez
   3. Ana Prado-Comesaña
   4. Miguel Arenas

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This manuscript introduces a useful protein-stability-based fitness model for simulating protein evolution and unifying non-neutral models of molecular evolution with phylogenetic models. The model is applied to five viral proteins that are of structural and functional importance. While the general modelling approach is solid, and effectively preserves folding stability, the evidence for the model's predictive power remains limited, since it shows little improvement over neutral models in predicting protein evolution. The work should be of interest to researchers developing theoretical models of molecular evolution.

   Reviewed by eLife

9. Convergent iridescence and divergent chemical signals in sympatric sister-species of Amazonian butterflies

   This article has 7 authors:

   1. Joséphine Ledamoisel
   2. Bruno Buatois
   3. Rémi Mauxion
   4. Christine Andraud
   5. Melanie McClure
   6. Vincent Debat
   7. Violaine Llaurens

   This article has been curated by 1 group:

   • Curated by eLife

     eLife Assessment

     This study presents a valuable assessment of and solid evidence for increased similarity in visual appearance combined with increased chemical differences between two butterfly species in sympatry compared with differences between three populations of one of the two species in allopatry. The similarity in visual appearance hints to an evolutionary response to shared predators (but alternative explanations are possible). Thus, the difference in chemical signaling likely helps to avoid between-species mating in sympatry.

   Reviewed by eLife

10. Unsupervised reference-free inference reveals unrecognized regulated transcriptomic complexity in human single cells

    This article has 7 authors:

    1. Roozbeh Dehghannasiri
    2. George Henderson
    3. Rob Bierman
    4. Tavor Baharav
    5. Kaitlin Chaung
    6. Peter Wang
    7. Julia Salzman

    This article has been curated by 1 group:

    • Curated by eLife

      eLife Assessment

      This study presents a valuable advance for the analysis of gene expression variation at the level of individual cells by introducing a novel reference-free framework that can detect splicing, fusion, editing, immune-receptor diversity and repeated elements in sequencing data. The evidence supporting these claims is solid, with rigorous validation on simulated datasets and extensive analysis of full-length single-cell sequencing data demonstrating improved performance over existing methods. This work will be of particular interest to researchers developing methods for high-resolution transcriptome analysis and to those studying cellular heterogeneity in health and disease.

    Reviewed by eLife, Arcadia Science