Evaluated articles

eLife Assessment

This study is important, with the potential to greatly impact future research on the evolution of chemical defense mechanisms in animals. The authors present compelling evidence for the presence of low quantities of alkaloids in amphibians previously thought to lack these toxins. They then integrate these findings with existing literature to propose a four-phase scenario for the evolution of chemical defense in alkaloid-containing poison frogs, emphasizing the role of passive accumulation mechanisms.

eLife Assessment

This study provides important new insights into the contributions of local DNA features to the complex molecular mechanisms and dynamics of copy number variation (CNV) formation during adaptive evolution. While limited to a single CNV of interest, the study is well-designed and carefully controlled, presenting compelling evidence that supports the conclusions. This work will be of general interest to those studying genome architecture and evolution from yeast biologists to cancer researchers.

eLife assessment

This solid and innovative study explores the uptake of fixed nitrogen in maize chloroplasts facilitated by symbiotic Gluconacetobacter diazotrophicus bacteria. The findings provide valuable insights into plant-microbe interactions, particularly highlighting a symbiotic mechanism of nitrogen delivery independent nodule formation. Additional controls would help to substantiate the findings and enhance the overall strength of the evidence.

eLife Assessment

This important study offers insights into the function and connectivity patterns of a relatively unknown afferent input from the endopiriform to the CA1 subfield of the ventral hippocampus, suggesting a neural mechanism that suppresses the processing of familiar stimuli in favor of detecting memory guided novelty. The strength of evidence is convincing, with careful anatomical and electrophysiological circuit characterization. The work will be of broad interest to researchers studying the neural circuitry of behavior.

eLife Assessment

This important study presents a new framework (ASBAR) that combines open-source toolboxes for pose estimation and behavior recognition to automate the process of categorizing behaviors in wild apes from video data. The authors present compelling evidence that this pipeline can categorize simple wild ape behaviors from out-of-context video at a similar level of accuracy as previous models, while simultaneously vastly reducing the size of the model. The study's results should be of particular interest to primatologists and other behavioral biologists working with natural populations.

eLife assessment

This valuable paper presents findings showing that different brain regions were best described by a distinct accumulation model, which all differed from the model that best described the rat's choices. These findings are solid because the authors present a very strong methodological approach. This work will be of interest to a wide neuroscientific audience.

eLife Assessment

This study presents a useful model of genetic drift by incorporating variance in reproductive success, aiming to address several apparent paradoxes in molecular evolution. However, some of the apparent paradoxes only arise in the most basic version of standard models and have been reconciled in more advanced models. Nonetheless, this paper offers intuitive explanations for these apparent paradoxes, by adopting a new perspective and solid modeling and analysis. More broadly, the proposed model provides an alternative framework to address puzzling observations in molecular evolution, which will be of interest to evolutionary and population geneticists.

eLife Assessment

This study on the loss of DEGS1 in the developing larval brain convincingly shows the accumulation of dihydroceramide in the CNS which induces severe alterations in the morphology of glial subtypes as well as a reduction in glial number. The localization of DEGS1/ifc primarily to the ER is also compelling and interesting, and the loss of DEGS1/ifc clearly drives ER expansion and reduces the levels of TGs. This is an important contribution to the role of lipid metabolism in neural development and disease.

eLife Assessment

The study describes a link between beta-amyloid monomers, regulation of microglial activity and assembly of neocortex during development. It brings valuable findings that have theoretical and practical implications in the field of neuronal migration, neuronal ectopia and type II lissencephaly. Unfortunately, the evidence is incomplete and the manuscript would benefit from additional experiments to clarify the relationship between Ric8a and APP and bolster the findings.

eLife Assessment

The authors design and implement an elegant strategy to delete genomic sequences encoding the dopamine receptor dop1R2 from specific subsets of mushroom body neurons (ab, a'b' and gamma) and show that while none of these manipulations affect short term appetitive or aversive memory, loss of dop1R2 from ab or a'b' block the ability of flies to display measurable forms of longer forms of memory. These findings are important in confirming and extending prior observations, and well supported by convincing evidence that build on precise techniques for genetic perturbation.

eLife assessment

This valuable research identifies Smim32 as a new genetic marker for the claustrum and generates transgenic mouse lines aimed at enhancing specificity when studying this brain region. However, the evidence supporting the increased specificity of this marker and its associated transgenic lines is inadequate, as Smim32's specificity to the claustrum is limited. Nevertheless, this work will be of interest to researchers studying the molecular organization of the claustrum.

eLife Assessment

This valuable study presents a resource for researchers using Drosophila to study neural circuits, in the form of a collection of split-Gal4 lines with an online search engine, which will facilitate the mapping of neuronal circuits. The evidence is convincing to demonstrate the utility of these new tools, and of the search engine, for understanding expression patterns in adults and larvae, and differences between the sexes. These resources will be of broad interest to Drosophila researchers in the field of neurobiology.

eLife Assessment

The study by Takagi and colleagues is an important contribution to the question of how homologous neuronal circuits might be wired differently to elicit specific behaviours. The authors combine genetic, neuroanatomical, and behavioral data to provide convincing evidence that Dfz2/DWnt4 signaling controls the innervation pattern of wave command neurons in the fly larva, and thereby behavioral locomotion program selection.

eLife Assessment

This paper explores how diverse forms of inhibition impact firing rates in models for cortical circuits. In particular, the paper studies how the network operating point affects the balance of direct inhibition from SOM inhibitory neurons to pyramidal cells, and disinhibition from SOM inhibitory input to PV inhibitory neurons. This is an important issue as these two inhibitory pathways have largely been studied in isolation. A combination of analytical calculations and direct numerical simulations provides convincing evidence that the interplay of these inhibitory circuits can separately control network gain and stability.

eLife Assessment

This study provides important information on pre-existing epigenetic modification in T cell plasticity. The evidence supporting the conclusions is compelling, supported by comprehensive transcriptional and epigenetic analyses. The work will be of interest to immunologists and colleagues studying transcriptional regulation.

eLife Assessment

This study convincingly shows that aquaporin-mediated cell migration plays a key role in blood vessel formation during zebrafish development. In particular, the paper implicates hydrostatic pressure and water flow as mechanisms controlling endothelial cell migration during angiogenic sprouting. This fundamental study is highly novel and significantly advances our understanding of cell migration during morphogenesis. As such, this work will be of great interest to developmental and cell biologists working on organogenesis, angiogenesis, and cell migration.

eLife assessment

The work provides valuable genomic resources to address the endocrine control of a life cycle transition in the Malabar grouper fish. The revised manuscript is more solid and the resources and experimental data help to build up a meaningful biological understanding of thyroid signaling in grouper fish.