Evaluated articles

eLife Assessment

The fundamental findings reported here provide insight into how the viscoelasticity of the fingertip skin influences the activity of mechanoreceptive afferents and thus the neural coding of force in humans. The basic principle studied was whether and to what extent the previous applied force directions impact the firing of FA-1, SA-1 and SA-2 neurons during the current applied force directions. The data and analyses are compelling and will be helpful for modeling the neural representations of force in the context of object grasping and manipulation.

eLife Assessment

This valuable study reports multi-scale molecular dynamics simulations to investigate a class of highly potent antibodies that simultaneously engage with the HIV-1 Envelope trimer and the viral membrane. The work provides insights into how broadly neutralizing antibodies associate with lipids proximal to membrane-associated epitopes to drive neutralization. After extensive revision, the level of evidence is considered solid, although a quantitative assessment of the underlying energetics remain difficult to obtain.

eLife assessment

This work presents important insights regarding the mechanism underlying the assembly, maintenance, and disassembly of a very stable microtubule-based structure, termed quiescent-cell nuclear microtubule (Q-nMT) bundle, which is formed in quiescent yeast cells to ensure cell survival and viability. This insight will help to elucidate how very stable microtubules can exist alongside very dynamic microtubules, which is still poorly understood. While the experimental support is overall solid, additional analyses using state-of-the-art methodology would further strengthen some of the claims.

eLife assessment

This fundamental study examines the effects of herbivory-induced maize volatiles on neighbouring plants and their responses over time. Measurements of volatile compound classes and gene expression in receiver plants exposed to these volatiles led to the conclusion that the delayed emission of certain terpenes in receiver plants after the onset of light may be a result of stress memory, highlighting the role of priming and induction in plant defences triggered by herbivore-induced plant volatiles. The evidence supporting the conclusions is compelling, with rigorous chemical assays of and state-of-the-art high throughput real time mass spectrometry. The work will be of broad interest to plant biologists and chemical ecologists.

eLife Assessment

This important study reveals insights into how calcineurin influences C. elegans pathogen susceptibility and lifespan through its role in controlling the defecation motor program. The authors provide convincing evidence to support a new mechanism through which calcineurin impacts longevity. This work will be of interest to investigators studying host-pathogen interactions and aging in a number of experimental systems.

eLife assessment

This paper reports a valuable set of new results. The main result is that the projection from adult-born granule cells in the dentate gyrus to the hippocampal subfield CA2 is necessary for the retrieval of a social memory formed during development, and solid evidence is provided to support this conclusion.

eLife assessment

This valuable paper examines gene expression differences between male and female individuals over the course of flower development in the dioecious angiosperm Trichosantes pilosa. Male-biased genes evolve faster than female-biased and unbiased genes, which is frequently observed in animals, but this is the first report of such a pattern in plants. In spite of the limited sample size, the evidence is mostly solid and the methods appropriate for a non-model organism. The resources produced will be used by researchers working in the Cucurbitaceae, and the results obtained advance our understanding of the mechanisms of plant sexual reproduction and its evolutionary implications: as such they will broadly appeal to evolutionary biologists and plant biologists.

eLife assessment

This study aims to explore the diabetes-bone paradox using the Mendelian Randomization approach. That diabetes itself is not the direct cause, but rather the complications or associated risk factors increase the risk of fracture, constitutes a valuable insight. Mendelian randomization to explain the relationship of two complex conditions is solid and conducted properly; however, the efforts to reconcile the discrepancies between the Mendelian Randomization analysis and observational studies are incomplete.

eLife assessment

This fundamental study reports differential expression of key genes in full-term placenta between Tibetans and Han Chinese at high elevations, which are more pronounced in the placenta of male fetus than in female fetus. The gene expression data were collected and analyzed using solid and validated methodology, although there is limited support for hypoxia-specific responses due to a lack of low-altitude samples. Several of the placental genes found in this study have been previously reported to show signatures of positive selection in Tibetans, pointing to a potential mechanism of how human populations adapt to high elevation by mitigating the negative effects of low oxygen on fetal growth. The work will be of interest to evolutionary and population geneticists as well as researchers working on human hypoxic response.

eLife assessment

This study provides valuable insights into the specificity and promiscuity of toxic effector and immunity protein pairs. While the work is improved over a previous version, there are still some questions regarding the methodology used to draw certain conclusions, rendering the study somewhat incomplete. Nevertheless, this work will likely be of interest to microbiologists and biochemists working with toxin-antitoxin systems and effector-immunity proteins.

eLife assessment

This valuable study presents a screening pipeline (SPICE) for detecting DNA motif spacing preferences between TF partners. SPICE predicts previously known composite elements, but experiments to elucidate the nature of the predicted novel interaction between JUN and IKZF1 are incomplete. These experiments would benefit from more rigorous approaches using other databases to explore additional relevant data. The work will be of broad interest to those involved in dissecting the regulatory logic of mammalian enhancers and promoters.

eLife assessment

This manuscript uses genetic mouse modeling to delve deeper into a rare human disease of aging. The targeted approaches employed lend greater pathophysiologic insight and makes this paper valuable to the field art large. Additionally, the approaches used are rigorous and solid in supporting their conclusions. Some minor weaknesses were noted along with suggestions to add greater clarity.

eLife assessment

This study provides a comprehensive whole genome transcriptomic analysis of three small mammals, including Peromyscus leucopus, after exposure to endotoxin lipopolysaccharide. The authors find that the inflammatory response of the three species is complex and that P. leucopus responds differently compared to mice and rats. The data are convincing and constitute an important advance in our understanding of inflammatory responses in animals that serve as reservoirs for relevant pathogens.

eLife Assessment

This paper provides fundamental insights into the control of Salmonella within human macrophages, with convincing evidence that Salmonella can replicate in the macrophage cytosol in the absence of inflammasome signaling. This paper, which improves our understanding of how the immune system fights bacterial infections, will be of broad interest to cell biologists, immunologists and microbiologists.

eLife assessment

This study presents a valuable finding for the immunotherapy of cancer. The data support the role of PDLIM2 as a tumor suppressor, and more immediately, its relevance for strategies to improve the efficacy of immunotherapy. The evidence supporting the conclusions is compelling and the work will be of interest to biomedical scientists working on cancer immunology.

eLife assessment

This is an important study, that adds to the field a new understanding of exercise or mechanical loading, microRNAs, and secreted extracellular vessicles in the field of lung cancer (NSCLC), which may have relevance to other osteolytic cancers. The strength of the evidence was mixed: whereas in vitro microRNA experiments were convincing, other elements were incomplete (e.g., proving the roles of osteocytes, as opposed to other mechanosensitive cells, in vivo). This work would be of broad interest to those investigating osteolytic cancers, and the role of exercise in bone cancer, preclinically.

eLife assessment

This valuable study advances our understanding that YAP/TAZ, as well as their target genes, play a prominent role in the formation of processing bodies (P-bodies). The evidence supporting the conclusions is convincing. The article could be improved through further analysis to elucidate the mechanistic link between P-body formation and oncogenesis. The work will be of broad interest to scientists working in the field of Hippo signaling and cancer biology.

eLife Assessment

Genetic analysis of complex traits in Drosophila provides a resource for exploring the relationship between genetic and phenotypic variation. The web tool DGRPool presented in this paper makes data and results from the Drosophila Genetic Reference Panel accessible that will enable downstream analyses of genetic association. The findings of this paper are considered to be important, with practical implications beyond a single subfield, supported by convincing evidence using appropriate and validated methodology in line with current state of the art.

eLife assessment

This structural and biochemical study of the mouse homolog of acidic mammalian chitinase (AMCase) enhances our understanding of the pH-dependent activity and catalytic properties of mouse AMCase, and it sheds light on its adaptation to different physiological pH environments. The methods and analysis of data are solid, providing several lines of evidence to support the development of mechanistic hypotheses. While the findings and interpretation will be valuable to those studying AMCase in mice, the broader significance, including extension of the results to other species including human, remain less clear.

eLife assessment

The work is a valuable contribution to understanding the mechanism of nuclear export of tRNA in budding yeast. The authors present solid evidence that Dbp5 functions in parallel with Los1 and Msn5 in tRNA export, in a manner dependent on Gle1 for activation of its ATPase activity but independently of Mex67, Dbp5's partner in mRNA export. It further presents biochemical evidence that Dbp5 can bind tRNA but that Gle1 and InsP6 are required for activating ATP hydrolysis by the Dbp5-tRNA complex, suggesting a possible mechanism for tRNA export by Dbp5.