In spite of the mixed/negative opinions I'm slightly tempted to commission some sort of (limited) evaluation of this or of the Khatri et al. paper, to get our hands dirty in what seems to be an important space that we might be well suited for. -- David Reinstein

@anirudh -- that sounds promising. Do you have a contact there?

Is within-method exact agreement really the best metric? Recommending to not run against a single stochastic agent is fine but what is the delta? Running many costs more for what benefit?

How does temperature/nucleus sampling/effort affect these results? Did you control for potential variation in these parameters?

Great experiment! I wonder what metrics are reported and how representative/relevant those metrics are given real life tasks.

Absolutely!! A challenge of great importance.

This is an NPR article in 2021 that discusses how Facebook elected not to notify its users of a potential data breach. This data was found by misusing a feature on Facebook where you could search people by phone number. Facebook elected not to tell people about it claiming that they did not know who they would need to notify. The article ends by showing that Facebook has struggled with user privacy before, having to settle for $5 billion dollars for breaking an agreement to protect privacy in 2019.

As hardware continues to advance with more powerful GPUs and specialized ASICs, does the work factor the cost parameter in bcrypt provide enough of a future-proof shield, or will we eventually reach a point where even the maximum slowness we can tolerate for a legitimate user login is no longer enough to deter a massive parallel attack?

What do you think? is there a limit to how much we can keep slowing things down before it breaks the user experience

This is a news source that talks about Facebook's data breach and how the data was published to a hacker group's website with lots of information, which wasn't super sensitive, but people most likely would not like being publicly available. The source also talked about how Facebook did not notify the users whose data was breached about this event.

Worth mentioning that this specifies the dialogue text to use for the first panel in the preview?

Not included in the MVP

"Minimum size" isn't a separate option anymore, but rather, if scale to fit is enabled, the font size option will have an upper and lower value you can choose on a slider

"Minimum Text Box Height". The unit isn't quite the "number of lines" anymore as it goes from 1 to 100, but it may be worth mentioning that the text box height is also proportional to the font size.

Technically speaking, a value of 10 means "one line", a value of 20 means "two lines", etc, but i'm not sure there's a simple and succinct way to get that across, so I'd suggest keeping it as simple as possible here

Not included in the MVP

One major incentive that social media companies have to protect privacy is that it makes their users feel more secure when using the technology, keeping a better user retention rate. This will also work as a reason that a user will select this social media. Another incentive is that better privacy protections make it less likely for a government to push regulations and sanctions against a social media company.

I think that this the be common practice is really outlandish. To have non-encrypted passwords for anyone with database access to have is crazy to me. There has to be a better way for personal information to be stored, correct?

I think this is only a risk if the company you're giving your information to is poorly managed. A majority of people give lots of sensitive information like credit card numbers, text messages, and other important data to Apple, however, they have one of the greatest cyber security teams in the world comparable to the US governments cyber security.

Let's eliminate this one. We don't care about the edges for now.

There is a table m_measurement_directions and I think this would be the result * camera_inverted = - 1 => flop * measured_along_vehicle_dir = -1 => flip + flop + toggleLR * measured_along_kilometrage_dir = -1 => flip + flop + toggleLR

with rotate180 = flip + flop

Let's skip the inverted edge for now, as we can subsume them with track direction, if necessary.

On 2026-04-22 01:29:29, user Layne Sadler wrote:

Supplemental table 8 (cancer sphere in response to ADCP + v.s. -) shows Twist2 isn't significantly upregulated while Sox9 and Vegfa are downregulated. Isn't that at odds with the cluster analysis and EMT claims?

On 2026-04-21 18:07:12, user Logan Suits wrote:

The figure 5 figure legend says that these scale bars are 50 um and 100 um, but this should be 50 nm and 100 mM, right?

On 2026-04-21 13:29:28, user jean r wrote:

Very interesting method to monitor AAV expression. I believe this recent article would be nice to cite in the discussion or introduction: https://doi.org/10.1093/brain/awag026

On 2026-04-20 07:54:22, user bagnaninchi wrote:

Please also consider these references from our group that were instrumental in establishing the field, and their application in monitoring drug toxicity in liver spheroids.

Bagnaninchi, P. O., Holmes, C., Drummond, N., Daoud, J., & Tabrizian, M. (2011). "Two-dimensional and three-dimensional viability measurements of adult stem cells with optical coherence phase microscopy." Journal of Biomedical Optics, 16(8), 086003

Holmes, C., Tabrizian, M., & Bagnaninchi, P. O. (2013). "Motility imaging via optical coherence phase microscopy enables label-free monitoring of tissue growth and viability in 3D tissue-engineering scaffolds." J Tissue Eng Regen Med, 9(5), 641-645.

Martucci, N. J., & Bagnaninchi, P. O., et al. (2018). "Nondestructive Optical Toxicity Assays of 3D Liver Spheroids with Optical Coherence Tomography." Advanced Biosystems, 2(3), 1700212.

On 2026-04-18 14:53:49, user Z. Brown wrote:

This manuscript makes a selective, and therefore potentially misleading, case for H3.3-Q5H. The authors pool Q5 mutations across all H3 genes, note that Q-H is the most frequent Q5 substitution, and then move directly into HA-tagged H3.3-Q5H follow-up in A549 cells, without the most obvious controls: side-by-side testing of canonical H3.1/2 Q5 transgenes. Under those conditions, observing a chromatin and growth phenotype from forced H3.3 expression is not especially persuasive. Given that the authors also acknowledge reliance on lentiviral cDNA overexpression rather than endogenous editing, the claim that H3-Q5H is a bona fide human oncohistone feels overstated relative to the evidence presented.

On 2026-04-18 10:15:30, user Prof. Emad M. Abdallah wrote:

I have some notes on the feasibility of such a combined approach to control or "eradicate" multidrug-resistant Serratia marcescens biofilms.

Using several antibiotics, phages, and antimicrobial peptides together seems more like a trial-and-error combination than a carefully designed treatment strategy!.

In addition, the study does not examine possible toxicity or the behavior of these "cocktail" agents in the body. or how they may interact with each other, which limits its clinical value???

Therefore, although the claimed in vitro results are promising, this approach is not yet ready for clinical use and should be presented as an early-stage strategy that still needs careful optimization and safety testing.

Regards,

Prof. Emad M. Abdallah

On 2026-04-18 02:05:56, user Alizée Malnoë wrote:

The manuscript by Boyeldieu et al. explores the cell-wall poisoning mechanism of the RumC1 bacteriocin, produced by Ruminococcus gnavus E1. The authors developed an ordered genome-wide mutagenesis strategy in Streptococcus pneumoniae to identify RumC1-resistant mutants. These studies helped confirm RumC1's inhibition of transpeptidase activity, thereby blocking peptidoglycan (PG) synthesis and cell growth. The selective binding of RumC1 to the nascent PG had not been reported before. They also identified the immunity protein RumIc1 from the RumC1 biosynthetic gene cluster as sufficient to counteract RumC1 toxicity in S. pneumoniae. The findings reported in this study have exciting implications for antimicrobial resistance, potentially shifting the paradigm for treating infections caused by multidrug-resistant pathogens. Overall, the data in this manuscript is well presented and supports the authors' claims. We enjoyed reading this manuscript and outline major and minor adjustments to improve clarity in reporting and presentation, as well as providing additional context for a broader audience.

Major comments<br /> - Figure 1D shows the morphology and HADA incorporation in WT and Rum1C-resistant mutants. In lines 206-208, you mention that Rum1C-resistant mutants show reduced HADA labeling; it would be helpful to include fluorescence quantification, as represented in Figure 6. Similarly, for Figures 2C and D, consider incorporating the quantification for cell width. It will also help support the results mentioned in lines 251-258. For instance, quantification of cellular morphology would provide clear evidence of “effects of RumC1 on cell morphology and PG synthesis differ from those caused by vancomycin”.<br /> - To strengthen the conclusion that variants of RumIc1 do not confer immunity, consider including evidence that the protein variants are stable by showing an immunoblot. Along this line, please provide immunoblots for the strains used in Figure 4 and onwards, in which genes are expressed from an ectopic promoter site.

Minor comments<br /> -All figures: Consider color coding the name of the strain and applying this color-coding across figures to improve reader comprehension. <br /> -Ensure all supplementary figures are referred to in the main text. <br /> -Statistic data representation: Consider changing “,” to “.” for the p values.<br /> -The introduction is well written. A description of WalR and WalK and how they play a role in PG homeostasis would benefit non-initiated readers.<br /> -RumC1 exhibits antibacterial efficacy against monoderm and LPS-poor strains, and an unencapsulated strain of Spn was used for this study. We understand how difficult it would have been to use an encapsulated strain for this work as they are more genetically recalcitrant, but clinically all pathogenic strains have a capsule. Please consider including discussion on the potential impact of RumC1 on an encapsulated strain.<br /> -Figure 1F: The controls were appropriate and nicely contextualizes RumC1 stress induction; Bacitracin targets undecaprenyl pyrophosphate (membrane carrier for cell wall precursors) which serves as a positive control and kanamycin, which targets protein synthesis, serves as a negative control. Please consider including this information in the legend.<br /> -Line 272: A little more background is needed about peptidoglycan (PG) synthesis, especially before mentioning the nascent PG.<br /> -Figure 4: At 0.4 µM RumC1, explain why rumIc2 is having a lag? Why are MIC and growth curves not corresponding?<br /> -Figure S9: How was the highest immunity achieved when all the immunity proteins were co-expressed? How did RumIc2 become neutral?<br /> -Figure 5C: Comment on the trend of growth of the strains at 0.4 µM RumC1 after 16 h, it appears that strains have started to grow again, likely because of suppressors. Consider including the growth curve for 24 h for clarity.<br /> -Figure 6F: Please explain how the cleavage sites from MD simulation were predicted. <br /> -Adding a few sentences in the discussion of how much RumC1 may be produced in the gut would be of interest, as well as speculation to what its effect on the gut microbiome may be.<br /> - Figure 1C: Consider modifying the color of the control (WT) so it’s clearly apparent that 0.6 µM RumC1 results in no growth.<br /> -Figure 1D: WT has debris; consider picking another field or enhancing the brightness.<br /> -Figure 1E: spr1875 appears to be a little stretched in the X axis.<br /> -Figure S3D: Please consider using in-text citations of Figure S3C and Figure S3D. Moreover, please provide an explanation of Figure S3D, in which the WT strain, when incubated with RumC1, shows lower expression of pcsB and spr1875 or is it a mislabeling?<br /> -Figure 6A: Consider color coding the last 2 D-Alanine in the model where the cleavage is happening.<br /> -Line 290: Consider defining sacculus and protoplast. <br /> -Lines 121, 141, 252: Missing references.<br /> -Line 200: Fluorescent microscopy should be changed to fluorescence microscopy.<br /> -Line 410: Points mutants should be changed to point mutants.<br /> -Figure S4: Please consider including the time of treatment on the graph for clarity.<br /> -Line 231: Refer to Figure S5C to improve clarity.<br /> -Figure 6C: This panel is not mentioned in the main text.

Josy Joseph and Tahreem Zaheer (Indiana University Bloomington) - not prompted by a journal; this review was written within a Peer Review in Life Sciences graduate course led by Alizée Malnoë with input from group discussion including Carter Collins, Camy Guenther and Lily Pumphrey. We are part of the Dept. of Biology where Malcolm E. Winkler’s group is located. Malcolm is a co-author on a publication in which one of the authors (Cécile Morlot) provided antibodies; this prior interaction did not influence the choice of this preprint for our class.

On 2026-04-17 11:28:23, user Roman Perez-Fernandez wrote:

Regarding the article titled “Reprogramming breast cancer cells to breast cancer stem cell-like by the POU1F1 transcription factor” published in BioRivx (doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.04.30.651395 ), I would like to inform that it has been published in the journal: npj Breast Cancer. doi: 10.1038/s41523-026-00929-w. (Avila L, Seoane S, Rodriguez-Gonzalez S, Gois M, Arias ME, Martinez-Delgado D, Gomez-Lado N, Garcia-Caballero T, Aguiar P, Perez-Fernandez R. POU1F1 induces cancer stem cell-like traits in breast cancer cells by IL-6/JAK2/STAT3 activation and enrichment of ALDH. npj Breast Cancer. 2026 Mar 19) . Although the title of the article is not exactly the same, the content is practically identical.<br /> Thank you.

Prof. Roman Perez-Fernandez, MD, PhD<br /> roman.perez.fernandez@usc.es

On 2026-04-17 07:29:57, user alex W wrote:

Think there is a typo in the method section (?):

quote: "B.2.12. Host tropism assay...50 ????L of phage stock at a concentration of<br /> ∼105 PFU/mL was then added to each well..."

I assume it should be "10^5 PFU/ ml" since "∼105 PFU/mL (around 10^2 PFU/ ml)" would be too little?

On 2026-04-16 23:36:11, user Paul wrote:

Link to the book chapter based on this pre-print:<br /> https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-0716-2617-7_6

On 2026-04-16 18:43:38, user Dan Eastwood wrote:

The relationship shown in the paper is entirely to be expected. Nucleotides that are overrepresented in the distribution (greater than expected frequency under the assumption of randomness) are more likely to mutate to a nucleotide that is underrepresented than the opposite. This makes the distribution more uniform, decreasing the Shannon Information.

EDIT: I misspoke: - the information should increase towards the maximum as the distribution becomes more uniform, yet the author shows it decreasing (table 2).<br /> I am also unable to replicate the values of IE shown in the IE Mutated column of table 2.

On 2026-04-16 13:35:50, user Brett wrote:

Hi, I really enjoyed your recent paper on cerebellar-focused ultrasound stimulation. I had one quick question: did your experiments control for possible auditory artifacts induced by the pulsed ultrasound (e.g., audible sounds from the transducer or pulse–skull interaction), which might have indirectly influenced the neural responses in the hippocampus or cerebellum? Thanks!

On 2026-04-15 19:16:56, user AM Burroughs wrote:

Our paper (Nucleic Acids Research, 2015; https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkv1267) specifically predicted the systems described here and highlights NA37/YejK-family proteins in defense-linked nucleotide-signaling architectures. It also predicted their role in “sensing DNA, perhaps with unusual structural or compositional features...” Given that, its absence from the reference list here is a rather inexplicable omission of the published literature on the topic.

On 2026-04-07 15:15:54, user Prof. T. K. Wood wrote:

Line 69: The first and therefore the seminal report that (i) linked TA systems to phage defense for the first time and (ii) the first report of shutoff of transcription is Hok/Sok (doi: 10.1128/jb.178.7.2044-2050.1996), not ToxIN and RnlAB.

On 2026-04-15 18:48:44, user Shahriar Kamal wrote:

Dear Authors, I think this work is very significant since the binding pocket of CDN1163 has always been elusive. <br /> However, I see that to visualize the interaction of CDN1163, you used MD simulation. Why did you not use the cryoEM structure for visualization?

On 2026-04-15 03:57:38, user Lois wrote:

Acriflavine is a nonspecific nucleic acid stain that binds both RNA and DNA (reference: Interaction of acriflavine with DNA and RNA, L.M. Chan and Q. Van Winkle, 1969), making it unsuitable for genome size estimation as conducted by the authors. The gold standard for flow cytometric genome size estimation is the use of DNA-specific fluorochromes, such as DAPI or PI.

On 2026-04-14 16:09:26, user molviro wrote:

Title: Methodological Discrepancies in Viral Inoculum Dosing and Challenges in the Mechanistic Interpretation of the Orexin-NeuN Axis

The study by Yoon et al. identifies a correlation between SARS-CoV-2-induced hypothalamic orexin suppression and persistent cortical neuronal pathology.<br /> While the study provides a novel framework for understanding Long COVID, several methodological and interpretative aspects warrant further clarification to ensure the robustness of the proposed mechanism.

1. Discrepancies in Viral Inoculum Titers

The experimental design utilizes significantly different viral loads across the various infection models, which complicates the comparative analysis of neuropathological signatures.

Intra-model Variation: The K18-hACE2 model was inoculated with 50 PFU for longitudinal assessment , whereas variant re-analyses (Beta and KP.3) used 2*10^3 PFU , and the vaccine challenge employeed 2*10^4 PFU.

Inter-model Disparity: The mouse-adapted (MA10) model used a titer of 4*10^5 PFU. In contrast, the Influenza A (IAV) model—intended to serve as a comparative control for neurotropic effects—received only 2*10^2 PFU.<br /> This thousand-fold difference between the SARS-CoV-2 MA10 titer and the IAV titer suggests that the absence of pathology in the IAV group may be a consequence of the lower inoculum dose rather than a virus-specific signature.

2. Supra-physiological NeuN Induction and "Rescue" Interpretation<br /> The study defines the exogenous administration of orexin as a "restoration" of neuronal integrity. However, the protein expression data suggest a different biological phenomenon:

Quantitative Baseline: While focal NeuN loss is observed via immunohistochemistry, the degree of loss relative to the whole-brain baseline is not fully quantified prior to treatment.

Supra-physiological Levels: In both in vitro and in vivo models, treatment with recombinant orexin-A/B induced NeuN levels approximately 1.8 to 2.8 times higher than those of the healthy (Mock) controls.<br /> Such high levels of induction suggest that orexin signaling may be acting as a potent stimulator of NeuN protein synthesis rather than simply returning the neurons to a pre-infection homeostatic state. This distinction is critical for defining a true "rescue" effect.

3. Generalized Hypothalamic Circuit Suppression<br /> The focus on the orexin system as the primary driver of pathology may be an over-simplification given the broader transcriptomic evidence presented in the study.

Concurrent Neuropeptide Suppression: Transcriptomic and network analyses indicate that Hcrt was part of a wider module of suppressed neuropeptides, including Ucn (urocortin), Avp (vasopressin), and Npvf (neuropeptide VF).

Systemic Failure: The authors acknowledge that this concurrent downregulation suggests a coordinated collapse of hypothalamic homeostatic circuits.<br /> Attributing the observed cortical pathology exclusively to disrupted orexin signaling potentially overlooks the synergistic impact of the simultaneous loss of these other critical homeostatic regulators.

Conclusion<br /> While the identification of the orexin system as a target for SARS-CoV-2 is compelling, the methodological discrepancies in viral dosing and the supra-physiological induction of NeuN pose challenges to the proposed mechanistic link. A more standardized dosing approach and a holistic analysis of the broader hypothalamic circuitry are necessary to validate the "Orexin-NeuN axis" as a definitive pathway for Long COVID pathogenesis.

On 2026-04-14 13:37:31, user gneifd wrote:

I found the discussion could do a better job at acknowledging one important limitation of the approach. The article does make a good job concerning ecology. Although somehow bizzare, the ecology is realistic to the level that there are independent agents freely interacting. The limitation is that there is no realistically complex genotype-phenotype map nor any process of development or protein folding or any similarly complex process leading from the genotype to the phenotype. Simply there is some sort of genotype that directly determines the phenotype by a set of non-physical rules chosen by the researchers. In nature genes do not determine phenotypes directly, genes determine amino acid sequences and these fold in complex non-linear ways that lead to a somehow finite (and slightly finite and partially predictable) set of phenotypes. The same happens with development, genes do not determine the shape of the nose but the sequences of the genes that need to interact, between themselves and the already existing mechanical properties of cells, to lead to the construction of a complex morphological phenotype. These rules are known to lead to some predictability of the possible phenotypes (not all phenotypes are possible) and this to some predictability. This is explained in here and in other places

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36739577/

On 2026-04-14 13:26:09, user gneifd wrote:

There is a mistake on the interpretation of one of the references. The article on Milocco and Salazar-Ciudad does not claim that evolution is unpredictable but that it is not predictable from quantitative genetics. In fact the same authors have an article proposing that some aspects of evolution are in fact predictable: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36739577/

On 2026-04-13 05:56:05, user Andrew Kinghorn wrote:

This is a potentially useful paper, but there is a major issue in that previous methods are misrepresented, being described as missing functionality compared to the proposed method, when in fact this is not the case.

• Page 1 Line 20: "Building on this, Kinghorn(2011) optimized contributions and mating simultaneously (optimal mate allocation, OMA)"

This is not just OMA. Optimising contributions is optimising selection, so this is Optimal Mate Selection.

• Page 7 Line 10: "diversity was controlled through the covariance between parental pairs, obtained from G relationship matrices (Kinghorn2011; Peixotoetal.2024a)"

This could be misleading: covariance between parental pairs might be taken as, for each pair, 'covariance between the male and female crossed. This relates to inbreeding of pairs, not population diversity. Diversity was controlled through the covariance among all selected individuals. For more up-to-date information, see https://mateseldocs.com/

• Page 9 Line 67:"instead of electing the top-performing individuals, we should find those who balance expected gains with variance (Figure1). This aspect was not considered by previous studies aimed at genetic diversity preservation (Kinghorn2011; AkdemirandSánchez2016; Gorjancetal. 2018; GorjancandHickey2018; DanguydesDésertsetal.2023; Sakuraietal.2024; Peixotoetal.2024b,a; Endelman2025)"

These authors did in fact consider both genetic merit and genetic variance (via coancestries). They did not just use truncation selection of "top-performing individuals", as implied here. They used optimal contributions involving both "performance" (some measure of genetic merit) and mean coancestry to the rest of the population.

On 2026-04-10 16:27:14, user Hao Wu wrote:

This preprint now published at the peer-reviewed journal: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13059-026-04061-7

On 2026-04-10 10:05:47, user Martin Lochner wrote:

Thanks for sharing this interesting manuscript as preprint. Please note that the shown structure of NBA is wrong (e.g. in Figure 5b and Extended Data Figures 9a and 9c).

NBA structure shown in your manuscript (SMILES): ClC1=CC=C(C(O)=O)C(NC(NC2=CC(C=CC=C3)=C3C=C2)=O)=C1

Correct NBA structure (SMILES): ClC1=CC=C(C(O)=O)C(NC(COC2=CC=CC3=C2C=CC=C3)=O)=C1

It is most obvious in Extended Data Figure 9c that the NBA this work (yellow) and NBA PDB: 8RD9 (cyan) are two differnt compounds.

Thank you for considering this correction.

On 2026-04-09 21:38:21, user Alizée Malnoë wrote:

The manuscript by Fridman et al. explores the unexpected finding that Aeromonas jandaei antagonistically employs a Type VI secretion system (T6SS) in a liquid environment. While researching the effector protein Awe1, which forms part of the T6SS apparatus, the authors observed T6SS-dependent intoxication of susceptible bacteria. Using a novel fluorescence-based screening method (named LiQuoR for liquid quantification of rivalry), the authors further determine that this intoxication is contact-dependent, and that contact between kin and non-kin Aeromonas bacteria in liquid is mediated by specific adhesins. Fridman et al. also identify additional marine bacteria capable of inflicting T6SS-mediated intoxication in liquid media, suggesting a mechanism for specific and contact-dependent bacterial competition and positing that such competition in liquid media may be more common in marine bacteria than previously documented. These findings have exciting implications for bacterial antagonism, potentially shifting the paradigm of how we view bacterial interactions in marine environments. We found this study to be well-written, containing high-quality data. Overall, the data presented in this manuscript are done well and support the claims made by the authors. We outline some major and minor adjustments aimed at aiding the clarity of reporting and presentation, strengthening the findings, as well as providing additional context for a broader audience.

Major Comments<br /> - We are interested in the broader implications of the LiQuoR assay, particularly pertaining to this workflow’s application to different bacteria. The observation that the amount of prey luminescence in WT on solid media grew/increased after 4 h seemed counterintuitive to us (Figure 1E). It seems as if this result could make the workflow less sensitive for experiments done solely on solid media, further explanation of this finding would clarify on the workflows applicability to other solid surface experiments. Is this related to surface area? While this does not change the findings that inhibition is occurring in both liquid and in solid, it would enhance the clarity of these results to provide speculation on why this was seen.<br /> - We are curious about your perspective on the observation that kin-kin aggregation facilitated by CaCl2 supplementation does not increase kin intoxication but does increase non-kin intoxication (Figure 2A). Please speculate on this result in the discussion. Is the concentration used physiological? <br /> - While the images shown in Figure 2B make it clear that aggregates are forming in liquid media, we have a suggestion to improve the strength of these results and account for the images not shown. For instance, quantification of the % of prey cells displaying Sytox staining would more strongly demonstrate the presence of permeabilized E. coli in multiple aggregates. This quantification could substitute Figure 2C (which can be moved into the supplemental): it was not totally clear to us why an orthogonal view was included here. If this is significant for the findings, it would increase clarity to include an explanation for an audience less familiar with this system.<br /> -Lines 192-214: From a genomics perspective, we think further explaining how potential adhesins were identified would be helpful to increase the clarity and reproducibility of the experimental design. Please explain how you narrowed down these adhesins and located them in the genome, and why adhesins were targeted for this analysis over other proteins that could facilitate a physical interaction between predator and prey species. Define the acronyms and provide rationale for naming. <br /> -Figure 6B nicely demonstrates that intoxication takes place in liquid between certain marine bacteria but not in Vpara. However, please include a control showing that V. para does intoxicate prey in solid media to strengthen these findings and confirm that this strain of V. para is capable of intoxicating prey under typical conditions.<br /> -Given the significance of the TssB deletion for the core message of this work that type VI intoxication occurs in liquid media, please consider including data that confirm the TssB deletion e.g. sanger sequencing in supplemental or as source data. A complementation assay of TssB to show that regaining TssB restores the awe1 toxicity would be valuable.<br /> - Lines 224-225/Figure 5: We are curious and excited about the implications of the balance between kin-aggregation and non-kin aggregation and how this may aid our understanding of bacterial interactions in marine environments. Based on our understanding of these results, the observation that deletion of CraAj (responsible for kin-kin aggregation) increased non-kin intoxication (mediated by LapAj) could suggest that aggregation between two kin cells, who both contain the needed immunity proteins, could dampen the intoxication of nearby non-kin cells. This result is implied by the data but not specifically speculated on or addressed. Though it may not be within the scope of this experimental design, our group was intrigued by these findings. Given your expertise in this area, consider discussing how these bacterial interactions may play out and/or include these observations as part of Figure 5.

Minor Comments<br /> -All figures: In the legends, it is stated “these experiments were repeated three times with similar results”. Please define what is meant by an experiment e.g. technical or biological replicate.<br /> -All figures: We felt that having the exact p-values indicating statistical significance is not necessary. For instance, in Figure 3B and 3D, we found it distracting that all of the values were significant by a factor of <1E-4, even when they appear different from each other. If this is simply a cutoff value, it would be helpful to keep that consistent between figures. Also, Figure 6A/B: The p-values presented, specifically the comparison between WT and T6SS – supplemented with 1 mM CaCl2 (6A) and the two left hand panels of 6B, do not appear to match the differences shown between the experimental groups. By eye, these groups do not appear different from one another but are shown to be either highly statistically significant or not statistically significant at all.<br /> - Figure 1A: To increase readability, we suggest that the colors could be more intuitive here- put WT in grey and then mix colors for double mutants. Bringing the light pink line (Δawei1 ΔtssB + pAwe1) to the front of the graph would further increase clarity.<br /> -Figure 1B/F: Making color scheme consistent between 1B and 1F would increase clarity.<br /> -LiQuoR assay: As there is often some level of variation in expression levels when working with a transformed population, confirmation that all prey strains luminesce to a similar level would provide further validation of this novel assay (similarly to what is done in FigS3B). <br /> -Figure 2A: The colored box legends showing whether CaCl2 is present or absent are inverted relative to one another, which we found to be confusing. To increase readability, please make them on the same side.<br /> -Figure 3B,C,D,E: To help guide the eye on the graphs, we suggest adding dashed lines between each new mutation group (+/- TssB).<br /> - Figure S1: Please include a loading control to verify assay input. <br /> - Table S1: Clarify the gene and strain for each mutation.<br /> - Line 112-113: It serves as an excellent control that the action of the T6SS apparatus is required for intoxication, however, since the T6SS apparatus is contained within the bacterium, would spent media contain free-floating T6SS proteins, or are these proteins only ejected from the bacterium in the presence of prey species? Please clarify. Direct evidence, such as immunoblotting, that effectors are present in the spent media from WT would make this claim more compelling.<br /> - Line 35: While this part of the introduction provides excellent background regarding the role of T6SS in interactions with eukaryotic cells, it would be helpful to also specifically mention the role of T6SS in prokaryotic communities, as much of the later work focuses on competition between bacteria.<br /> -Lines 70-71: A more thorough background on Aeromonas (lifestyle, importance, etc) is warranted.<br /> -Line 84: Please provide the exact genotype when first introducing this mutant, it would improve clarity for the reader to explicitly state that this is a double mutant.<br /> -Line 97: Clarify here that “Aj prey” in this paragraph refers to Aj which do not possess the cognate immunity protein, as the current phrasing could be interpreted to mean “prey of Aj”.<br /> -Line 138: “Desired conditions for competition” is vague. Is solid media also incubated with shaking or is it static?<br /> -Lines 156-157: The statement that all three effectors are injected into prey cells is broad and not necessarily supported within these findings. The injection of one effector could be favored, but other effectors could compensate in its absence.<br /> -Line 189: Describes Aj as stably binding to other competing bacteria. To this point, imaged aggregates have been fixed so stability of aggregates may not be known.<br /> -Line 248: Here, it is mentioned that there was a switch from using the Lux operon to using the RFP mCherry for improved cell detection. It might be helpful to clarify which fluorescent tag was used for each assay, as multiple different fluorescent tags are used.<br /> -Line 317: As the choice to test CaCl2 and the biological relevance of calcium for Aeromonas hosts is explained earlier in the manuscript, it would be interesting to include a brief explanation about the choice to include sodium chloride when assessing Vibrio intoxication rates. Presumably, sodium chloride was picked because Vibrio is commonly found in brackish water, but someone from outside the field may not be familiar with this biology. Additionally, since Aeromonas can be found in both fresh and brackish water, an interesting follow-up experiment would be to test the Aeromonas strains under different salinities.<br /> -Line 375-377: Needs citation.<br /> -Line 385: Clarify “under specific conditions not addressed within the scope of this study”.

Carter Collins and Lily Pumphrey (Indiana University Bloomington) - not prompted by a journal; this review was written within a Peer Review in Life Sciences graduate course led by Alizée Malnoë with input from group discussion including Camy Guenther, Josy Joseph and Tahreem Zaheer. We are part of the Dept. of Biology where Julia Van Kessel’s group is located, Julia is a collaborator of the corresponding author and did not influence the choice of this preprint for our class.

On 2026-04-09 11:08:10, user Selwin Wu wrote:

Correction to Fig. 5p: A blue divider separates the gel images https://figshare.com/articles/figure/Fig_5p/31971354?file=63580170 .

On 2026-04-09 08:53:08, user Stefan Kusch wrote:

The preprint has been published in a peer-reviewed journal in the meantime: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-63889-y

On 2026-04-08 13:17:35, user Hanna wrote:

The Table 2 does not correspond to its description (There is a combination of three assigned and PIK2CA E453K is two-color combination).

On 2026-04-08 09:56:56, user Mahmoud Alyosify wrote:

An exceptional achievement for Egypt and a long-overdue step in global genomics.

What makes this work truly impactful is not only the scale—1,024 whole genomes—but the fact that it begins to correct a fundamental bias in our field: the underrepresentation of MENA populations in genomic reference datasets.<br /> As someone working at the intersection of AI and Bioinformatics, this resonates deeply.<br /> For years, many predictive models—especially polygenic risk scores—have been trained on predominantly European data, leading to systematic miscalibration when applied to populations like ours.

EGP1K is more than a dataset;<br /> it is a recalibration of how we define “normal” in genomics.

It shifts Egypt from being a consumer of generalized models to a contributor of population-specific knowledge—enabling more accurate, fair, and clinically relevant AI-driven insights.

Proud to see science, data, and national identity intersect at this level✌️

On 2026-04-07 16:33:27, user Medhat Mahmoud wrote:

Congratulations to the team for this important achievement in population genetics research in Egypt. I have one question, and I hope you can help me better understand it:

We often hear that certain groups of genes are described as “Egyptian,” “Mediterranean,” or linked to some other geographic region. But I always wonder: how was that conclusion actually made?

If these labels are based mainly on samples taken from people who are living in those regions today, that does not necessarily prove that the same genetic patterns truly originated there or belonged to ancient populations from that area.

In other words, finding a gene frequently in people living in Egypt in 2025 does not automatically mean that this gene was also characteristic of people living in Egypt in the year 1000 AD, or in 2000 BC. Populations move, mix, and change over time. So attaching a modern geographic label to a gene can be misleading unless there is strong historical and ancient DNA evidence to support it.

On 2026-04-07 23:24:09, user Gabriel Lander wrote:

We acknowledge a typo in this manuscript: all instances of (v/v) should be (w/v). apologies for the confusion!

On 2026-04-07 14:45:59, user Yujia Huang wrote:

The manuscript is now published in Magnetic Resonance in Medicine<br /> https://doi.org/10.1002/mrm.70366

On 2026-04-07 08:39:09, user Guest wrote:

I must confess, on first reading I found the manuscript quite exciting, but having gone through the earlier comments, I now see rather more clearly the gulf between what the data actually show and what the authors claim.

One thing I would add to what has already been said: there is, quite remarkably, no protein localisation of KCNT1: not by GFP tag, not by antibody, in the multiciliated epidermis of Xenopus, mouse, or indeed human tissue. That is a rather glaring omission, to put it mildly. I would also agree that the proposed connection between KCNT1 and Piezo is tenuous at best.

On 2026-04-04 12:13:58, user Reader wrote:

1. The GOF vs. LOF problem is fundamental, not a caveat.<br /> All pathogenic KCNT1 variants are GOF missense mutations increasing channel conductance. This study models LOF exclusively (morpholino, pharmacological inhibition). A GOF channel hyperpolarizing the membrane and a LOF knockdown reducing potassium flux could have opposite effects on membrane potential, Piezo mechanosensitivity, and FOXJ1 regulation. The translational and therapeutic claims require demonstration that GOF variants also disrupt MCC development, e.g., overexpression of patient alleles in Xenopus epidermis. Without this, the disease relevance is speculative. The authors should also consider CRISPR-based LOF as a parallel genetic approach that would bypass the well-known limitations of morpholinos and strengthen the loss-of-function claims independently.

2. Respiratory morbidity is multifactorial; the MCC interpretation is overstated.<br /> The authors' own cohort undermines a simple MCC-defect explanation. With 59% hypotonia and 43% joint contractures, impaired cough mechanics, aspiration from oropharyngeal dysfunction, and neuromotor respiratory failure are obvious and likely dominant contributors to ventilator dependence common in severe encephalopathies regardless of cilia status. These alternatives are not discussed.

3. Human airway expression of KCNT1 is not supported.<br /> HPA classifies KCNT1 as "Tissue enhanced (Brain, Lymphoid tissue, Skeletal muscle)." Its expression cluster is "Cerebellum – Synaptic function" and all 15 nearest neighbors are neuronal genes (SCN2A, SNAP25, GABRD). Bronchus and nasopharynx show no RNA data; lung expression is minimal. At single-cell resolution, KCNT1 peaks in brain inhibitory neurons with no enrichment in respiratory ciliated cells or respiratory tissue. The authors should query human airway scRNA-seq datasets before building an airway-cilia narrative from Xenopus epidermis.

4. No gene-specific rescue for the morpholino phenotype.<br /> A kcnt1 mRNA rescue experiment is standard and missing. Pharmacological phenocopy does not rule out off-target morpholino effects. The Centrin-CFP observation (lost in morphants, present in controls) was abandoned rather than quantified a missed opportunity. CRISPR F0 knockouts would provide an independent genetic approach.

5. Quantification is insufficient for the claims.<br /> All functional data rely on categorical embryo scoring (mild/moderate/severe). This is acceptable for initial characterization but not for mechanistic or therapeutic conclusions. No MCC counts, cilia density/length measurements, basal body quantification, foxj1 qPCR, or flow assays are provided. The distinction between "fewer cilia per MCC" and "fewer MCCs" critical for mechanism cannot be made from these data.

6. Figure 4 does not establish a KCNT1–Piezo interaction.<br /> The KCNT1 antagonist-alone bars differ markedly between Fig. 4B and 4D, indicating high inter-experiment variability that undermines interpretation of co-treatment shifts. More critically, the representative embryo images are inconsistent with the stated conclusions: the KCNT1 antagonist condition in 4C and the KCNT1 antagonist + Piezo antagonist condition in 4A look essentially indistinguishable, yet the quantification claims a dramatic enhancement. The "rescue" in 4D is marginal: the majority of embryos remain moderate-to-severe. Without genetic validation of even one arm (e.g., Piezo1 morpholino + kcnt1 depletion), this is pharmacological correlation at best, compounding off-target effects at worst.

7. The therapeutic framing is unjustified.<br /> The abstract and discussion frame Piezo1 as a therapeutic avenue for KCNT1-related disease. This rests on a LOF model of a GOF disease, a weak pharmacological rescue with high variability, no evidence of KCNT1 expression in human airway MCCs, and no molecular mechanism connecting KCNT1 to Piezo signaling. The conclusions should be restricted to what the data show: KCNT1 perturbation in Xenopus disrupts epidermal MCC development, and this can be modulated by Piezo pharmacology under specific conditions.

On 2026-04-07 08:34:38, user Yue Jia-Xing wrote:

Author comment:<br /> This work has been formally published in PNAS recently under a different title:<br /> "Insights into cephalochordate genome and gene evolution from the early-diverging amphioxus Asymmetron lucayanum". <br /> Advanced online on 2026.03.20, formal publication in 2026.03.24<br /> DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2521280123<br /> Link: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2521280123

On 2026-04-07 03:53:05, user Prof. T. K. Wood wrote:

6 referrals to abortive infection yet it doesn't exist as Sorek defined it as cell suicide and certainly does not exist for TA systems (see doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2018.00814), since the claim of Abi is based on non-physiological over production of any toxin).

Not necessary, either, since first report of TA systems blocking phage found the mechanism is simply transcription shutoff in 1996 (doi: 10.1128/jb.178.7.2044-2050.1996), which should be cited here, for relevance of DarTG.

On 2026-04-03 20:00:51, user Amado Rosendo wrote:

Pyroptosis is a lytic form of programmed cell death mediated by members of the gasdermin family. However, the regulation of gasdermin activity, particularly after the cleavage event that releases the proteolytic N-terminal domain, remains poorly understood. The first identified palmitoylation was discovered in bacterial gasdermins by Johnson et al. (2022). Now, Du et al. (2024) have shown that Gasdermin D (GSDMD) is also palmitoylated during pyroptosis, suggesting that lipid modification may be an important, more broadly conserved mechanism for regulating gasdermin function. These findings shed light on events that occur after gasdermin cleavage and suggest that modifications to the liberated N-terminal domain may influence pyroptosis. In this research manuscript, Tao et al. examine whether Gasdermin A (GSDMA) is regulated by S-acylation, as is the case for other gasdermins. The authors used the known S-acylation mechanism, in which fatty acyl chains are attached to a cysteine via a thioester bond, and employed this system to determine which fatty acid length is preferred. They focus on S-palmitoylation, a specific type of S-acylation in which the attached fatty acid is palmitate, a 16-carbon saturated fatty acid. In this paper, the authors ask whether GSDMA is regulated by S-acylation at conserved N-terminal cysteines and whether dynamic control of this acylation, including deacylation by ABDHD17A, provides a new mechanism for regulating GSDMA-mediated pyroptosis. <br /> To assess GSDMA S-acylation, Tao et al. performed a click reaction with biotin-azide to test which acyl chains preferentially labeled GSDMA3 and found that the Alk-C16 and Alk-C18 probes gave the strongest labeling. They then tested whether endogenous GSDMA could be acylated with Alk-C16, a biologically relevant acyl chain, and showed that the protein was labeled using a second click-labeling approach. The authors further showed that GSDMA3 S-acylation is a dynamic process. After 1 hour of Alk-C16 labeling, GSDMA3 acylation was detectable and increased up to 12 hours. In transfected HEK293 cells, pulse-chase experiments showed that the turnover rate of GSDMA3 acylation was approximately 1.8 hours. This indicates that the lipid modification undergoes active cycling rather than remaining permanently attached. These data conclude that biologically relevant fatty acyl chains modify GSDMA3 and suggest that its S-acylation is a dynamic process regulated by the addition or removal of fatty acyl chains. <br /> The authors compared GSDMA sequences across different species and identified three conserved cysteine sites: C37, C205, and C225 in the N-terminal domain of GSDMA. They mutated each cysteine residue to alanine in GSDMA3 and found that each mutation reduced acylation, but a stable triple-cysteine mutant completely abolished GSDMA3 acylation. They sought to determine whether recombinant human GSDMA can be acylated independently of palmitoyl transferases via direct interaction with palmitoyl-CoA. They concluded that GSDMA can be S-palmitoylated in vitro and that this modification is influenced by both temperature and GSDMA concentration. The authors transfected HEK293 cells with the GSDMA N-terminal domain carrying a leucine 184 to aspartic acid mutation (NT-L) or the previously described triple cysteine-to-alanine mutant (NT-L-3CA). Using immunofluorescence imaging, they observed that GSDMA3-NT-L-3CA remained cytosolic and did not form oligomers. In contrast, GSDMA3-NT-L localized to the membrane and showed oligomer formation by Western blot. To test these effects in a more relevant cellular context, they performed cell viability and LDH release assays comparing GSDMA3-NT-L and GSDMA3-NT-L-3CA in an immortalized keratinocyte cell line. Tao et al. found that the triple cysteine mutant increased cell viability and decreased LDH release. Based on these results, they conclude that S-acylation of GSDMA3 is crucial for membrane localization, pore formation, and pyroptosis.<br /> In the section labeled “ABHD17A regulates GSDMA3 deacylation and pyroptosis,” the authors identified several deacylating enzymes that interact with GSDMA3. They proceed with ABHD17A, which removes the 16-carbon fatty acyl chain and demonstrates the strongest deacylating activity. Their data in Figures 4A and 4B show that ABHD17A, along with other deacylating enzymes, can reduce the acylation signal of GSDMA3. The quantitative data in Figures 4D and E show only a partial rescue of cell viability and LDH release in cells co-transfected with ABHD17A compared to GSDMA NT-L alone. While the authors report statistically significant differences, cells co-transfected with ABHD17A remain closer to the NT-L group than to the control. The microscopy data in Figure 4C are not representative of the quantitative data, as they show confluence levels more similar to those in the control. Therefore, it would be warranted to include representative images to maintain consistency with the quantitative data. As a result, Figure 4C appears to overemphasize the biological significance of ABHD17A overexpression, and the authors should consider scaling their conclusion accordingly, treating ABHD17A as a partial inhibitor rather than a pyroptosis suppressor. This concern follows with the latter half of Figure 4, as the knockdown experiments share a similar critique to the overexpression data. In the reviewer’s opinion, the microscopy image (Figure 4G) and the quantitative data (Figure 4H and I) are not in line with the author’s conclusion, “ABHD17A knockdown increased GSDMA3 acylation and exacerbated GSDMA3 NT-L-induced pyroptosis, measured by LDH release and cell viability.” Thus, the reviewer suggests including images that align with the author's conclusion. Additionally, single-cell analysis (e.g., SYTOX Green for flow cytometry, DAPI, or PI staining) would be warranted to quantify the fraction of cells undergoing cell death. If the authors continue to use microscopy, a quantitative, blinded assessment of multiple micrographs with a clearly stated n would be necessary to strengthen their work. <br /> “Dynamic S-acylation of GSDMA regulates pyroptosis” should be altered to “...GSDMA3 regulates pyroptosis” to specifically tailor to the authors’ findings. The original title gives readers the impression that the research is solely focused on human GSDMA; in fact, the authors perform experiments using a mouse homolog, GSDMA3, to transfect human cell lines. Hence, the paper's structure misleads readers and fails to encapsulate all aspects of the study.<br /> In conclusion, this preprint is well written and offers important insight into S-acylation and its role in regulating GSDMA3-mediated pyroptosis. The study presents a coherent mechanistic framework, multiple complementary assays, and has the potential to advance our understanding of gasdermin regulation. Overall, the authors did an excellent job of presenting most figures clearly and helped guide the reader in understanding this new pathway.

Minor critiques: <br /> -The preprint contains several spelling errors that should be corrected throughout. <br /> -Figure headings should be consistently aligned with the labeled lanes. <br /> References to figures in the main text should match the panel labels exactly. (e.g., “HEK293 cells were transiently transfected with GSDMA N-terminal domain carrying…cysteine residues were mutated to alanines (NT-L-3CA)” (pg. 9). However, Figure 3E, which describes the mutation above, is labeled as GSDMA3, not GSDMA.)<br /> -Figure panels should be labeled consistently throughout the figures (e.g., by numbering them A, B, C, etc). <br /> -Unclear data where Figure 2F is established. Supplemental Figure S2 shows a single time point; multiple time points at different concentrations of GSDMA are needed to justify Figure 2F and must be clearly organized. <br /> -The relevance of Figure 2A is unclear and unexplained. <br /> -Figure 4 cell viability (D and H) and LDH release (E and I) experiments compare adjacent conditions, where they should compare each condition to the Control of their systems.

Sincerely, <br /> Amado Rosendo, Undergraduate Researcher <br /> Special Topics 390 with Prof. Dovey <br /> Amherst College <br /> 4/2/26

On 2026-04-03 18:23:31, user איתי לוק wrote:

I learned so much from this article. It gave me new perspectives and deepened my understanding of the topic.<br /> Truly inspiring and makes me want to keep exploring and learning more.

On 2026-04-03 16:17:01, user Hesham Tawfeek wrote:

The findings here are very similar to those of a PKA transgenic mouse model that expresses a constitutively active PKA catalytic subunit in the osteoblast lineage cells. It is very surprising that the authors never discussed or referenced this paper:

Endocrinology<br /> . 2016 Jan;157(1):112-26. doi: 10.1210/en.2015-1614. Epub 2015 Oct 21.<br /> Activation of Protein Kinase A in Mature Osteoblasts Promotes a Major Bone Anabolic Response<br /> Liana Tascau 1, Thomas Gardner 1, Hussein Anan 1, Charlie Yongpravat 1, Christopher P Cardozo 1, William A Bauman 1, Francis Y Lee 1, Daniel S Oh 1, Hesham A Tawfeek 1

On 2026-04-02 18:58:32, user Flavia Costa wrote:

This is really interesting and lovely work! I was not sure if you were aware of a previously published paper on this locus ( https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms23126443 ) so I wanted to bring that to your attention in case it should be acknowledged and discussed in the context of your compelling data. Furthermore, I am curious if you had any thoughts about why the sequence conservation is lower and more variable in length between amino acids ~150-300 within the staphylococci. Great work and I hope the review process goes smoothly!

On 2026-04-02 17:04:46, user Claes Gustafsson wrote:

Co-authors Surya Karunakaran and Ferenc Boldog discuss this BioRxiv paper in a broader bio-manufacturing perspective in the linked Thought Leadership review in GEN https://reader.emagazines.com/issue/gen-magazine/march-2026/genome-editing-for-biopharmaceutical-manufacturing#p20

On 2026-04-02 15:35:26, user M Ganesh Kumar wrote:

Now published in the Proceedings of the 42nd International Conference on Machine Learning, PMLR 267:31892-31929, 2025. URL at https://proceedings.mlr.press/v267/kumar25a.html

On 2026-04-02 05:26:18, user Maninder wrote:

1) What was the rationale for administering Clozapine prior to immunization? Was post-immunization administration of clozapine considered to assess its therapeutic efficacy?<br /> 2) Could this paradigm be adapted to a milder or more chronic model in which delayed clozapine administration would be feasible?<br /> 3) On what basis were the observed behavioral features interpreted as psychosis rather than catatonia?

On 2026-04-01 16:40:03, user Prof. T. K. Wood wrote:

I note that we have recently shown phage infection itself induces persistence (<br /> DOI: 10.1111/1751-7915.145432024) and that the toxin/antitoxin system MqsR/MqsA/MqsC creates dormant cells and eliminates T2 phage while the cell is dormant (with the restriction system McrBC, doi 10.1128/spectrum.03388-23). Since there are few papers about phage and persisters, I would expect these two to be included in your work.

In addition, we have shown that for E. coli it takes two weeks for starvation to induce persistence in E. coli (doi:10.1111/1462-2920.14075, 2018).

Your paper middle page 2: my group was the first to show acid and oxidative stress induce persistence by 12,000-fold (doi:10.1111/j.1751-7915.2011.00327.x<br /> © 2012, 2012). This 3 years prior to your ref 27.

Page 3 end of Introduction: the most prevalent phage defense is not CRISPR-Cas but toxin/antitoxin systems, as we discovered in 1996 (doi: 10.1128/jb.178.7.2044-2050.1996) and the role of TA systems in persistence with phage should be referenced as indicated for MqsR/MqsA/MqsC above.

Discussion: there is ONLY one mechanistic model for persister cell formation and resuscitation ( https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbrc.2020.01.102 for ppGpp leading to ribosome dimerization, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004219305371?via%3Dihub ) and it fits well with your ‘hibernation’ text.

Results Section 7: not solely CRISPR shown to employ dormancy as we have shown, as indicated in previous e-mail, that toxin/antitoxin system induce persistence to fight phage (MqsR/MqsA/MqsC with T2 and E. coli).

On 2026-04-01 14:58:01, user Giuliano Zanchetta wrote:

The paper has now been published in NAR as "Decoding nucleic acid contributions to phase separation and ordering in biomolecular condensates":<br /> https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkag253

On 2026-04-01 14:11:04, user Willard Ford wrote:

The linked GitHub repository does not contain the code to run this tool. Is there a target date to actually publish the code?

On 2026-04-01 10:56:26, user Juan David Gutiérrez wrote:

Was the source of epidemiological information the national surveillance system (SIVIGILA)?

Did the authors include all dengue cases, or did they apply additional criteria (e.g., laboratory-confirmed cases, clinical confirmation)?

Did the authors control for allochthonous cases? This question is particularly relevant in large cities, where reported cases may represent a combination of infections acquired locally and infections acquired in other municipalities.

On 2026-03-31 23:39:18, user Kamal Md Mostafa wrote:

Please read and cite the updated and peer-reviewed version of the article. <br /> Titled "Environment-dependent mutualism–parasitism transitions in the incipient symbiosis between Tetrahymena utriculariae and Micractinium tetrahymenae." <br /> Now published in The ISME Journal

On 2026-03-27 21:42:54, user Priya Banerjee wrote:

Author's note (Priya Banerjee): We would like to note that an assembly error in Figure 3B is present in this preprint version of the manuscript due to an error during Figure 3 preparation. This issue has been corrected in the published version of the paper in Nature Communications (link below). As the article is now formally published, the BioRxiv version has not been updated. The correction does not affect the interpretation of the data or the conclusions of the study.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-69244-z

On 2026-03-27 07:33:01, user Clashing_titans wrote:

Interesting short report prvodong some specific insight! An exciting update to the growing KD-Th17 story writing itself in the literature.

On 2026-03-26 13:17:18, user Javier Ruiz wrote:

This work has now been published in Cell Reports ( https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2026.117163 <br /> ) under the title: Ecological specialization and admixture drive genomic and phenotypic diversity in Yarrowia lipolytica.

On 2026-03-26 09:26:07, user TGS wrote:

Is the analysis code publicly available?

On 2026-03-26 00:03:05, user Martin Kekchidis wrote:

This is an insightful study. Some minor feedback:<br /> Discussion (p.12): "Similarly, selective deletion of Nos1 from Sst cells results in deficits in delta rhythms." <-- would be helpful to clarify what "deletion of Nos1" means.<br /> Duplicate citations: 24 & 103; 60 & 104<br /> p.6: "subsequent"->"subsequently"<br /> It would be interesting to explore if mPFC SST-Chodl have unique projections (including to hypothalamus), due to its role in regulating sleep. Tossel et al. 2023 suggests this may be the case: SST neurons from mPFC were found to synapse in LPO and LH. Although they found that chemogenetically activating mPFC Nos1+ neurons didn't promote sleep (except for a significant increase in NREM), I wonder if activating specifically SST-Chodl (a subset of Nos1 neurons) would have shown positive effects.

On 2026-03-25 21:43:59, user Misha Koksharov wrote:

Actually I hope that at least Alphafold-like tools well predict when proteins DO NOT dimerize. This could be very useful, for example, when looking at a transition from monomeric to dimeric versions in protein families when no experimental data is yet available.

There is also an important point that these tools don't use thermodynamics, so they are unable to predict, for example, monomerizing mutations: they still predict that most of the monomizerized protein variants (of fluorescent proteins, for example) form the original complexes perfectly fine, since the difference on the interface is very small.

On 2026-03-24 00:02:50, user Rui Han wrote:

Hi ~ thanks for great job! <br /> I have a few questions regarding the Figure 6, in the same binding pocket, predicted amino acids involved in ligand binding are quite different when cellotriose, cellotetraose and XXXG were used as ligands? which amino acids will be your candidates when site-directed mutagenesis is performed? <br /> Have you tried to co-crystallize XXXG and this SBP? how was it? <br /> Based on the genome and transcriptome information, other potential proteins including intracellular enzymes for XyG complete degradation might be figured out to complete the proposed model in Figure 7.

some tips: Anaerocellum bescii and Caldicellulosiruptor bescii are the same strain, could you clarify in the manuscript? it is a little confusing that protein sequence conservation was carried out in two genera if readers dont know this strain is also classify into another genus.

Thank you!

Good luck!

Best wishes,<br /> Rui

On 2026-03-23 06:54:50, user Tomas Ros wrote:

Walkthrough video of the paper can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSM5narynzc

On 2026-03-22 18:30:41, user Wei Wang wrote:

A coding error leads to inflated performance and the uploaded dataset is inconsistent with the published preprint.

We have identified two significant concerns regarding this preprint:<br /> 1) Dataset does not match the preprint: The dataset uploaded by the authors to Zenodo https://zenodo.org/records/18019781 is missing approximately 8 million datapoints compared to what is reported in the preprint, and the preprint figures cannot be precisely reproduced from the shared code and data.<br /> 2) Author claimed ultra-resolution is partially due to a coding error: The authors introduce an F-to-D ratio to support their claim of “ultra-resolution” and “unprecedented” spatiotemporal resolution relative to prior work. However, this claim appears to stem from a bug in their code that artificially inflates their performance compared to earlier studies.<br /> Further details on each point are provided below.

1. Dataset issues<br /> A central claim of the preprint is the achievement of ultra-resolution and unprecedented spatiotemporal resolution and data volume. Main Figure 2 is largely devoted to this point. Specifically, Fig. 2K and 2L emphasize the quantity of data collected, and Fig. 2L states that the authors obtained 18 million 3D distance observations. The main text further refers to “>18 million datapoints.”

However, the dataset deposited on Zenodo ( https://zenodo.org/records/18019781) contains only 10,450,620 measurements, not >18 million. Thus, nearly half of the reported data appears to be missing. This discrepancy has also been raised on PubPeer ( https://pubpeer.com/publications/5E2C872645F18730F49DCA98D54026) but, to our knowledge, has not received a response from the authors.

A fundamental principle is that the preprint should accurately reflect the deposited data, and the deposited data should correspond to the preprint. We therefore respectfully request that the authors either revise the preprint to align with the dataset currently available on Zenodo, or update the Zenodo dataset so that it fully matches the published claims.

2. The claimed ultra-resolution appears to result from a bug in the code<br /> Main Figure 2 is devoted to demonstrating improved spatiotemporal resolution relative to prior work. To support this, the authors introduce a new metric termed the F-to-D ratio, defined in Section 6.2 (page 22) of the Supplementary Information. Here, F represents frame-to-frame movement, and D represents the interquartile range (25th to 75th percentile) of 3D distances.<br /> Figure 2 emphasizes that the F-to-D ratio in this study (approximately 0.15, see Fig. 2I) is substantially lower than in prior work (approximate 0.5), supporting the claim of vastly superior resolution.

However, the reported F-to-D ratio of approximately 0.15 does not appear to be correct and instead seems to result from a bug in the published analysis code. Specifically, the interquartile range (IQR) for the authors’ own data is calculated incorrectly. The code implements:

IQR(X) = Q75(X) − min(X),

with X representing 3D distance values. This corresponds to the 0th to 75th percentile range, rather than the correct interquartile range (25th to 75th percentile). Importantly, this issue affects only the authors’ own data. For previously published public datasets, the IQR is computed correctly as:

IQR(X) = Q75(X) − Q25(X).

This discrepancy leads to artificially reduced F-to-D ratios (approx. 0.15) for the authors’ data, while prior datasets yield ratios in the range of approximately 0.5. When the IQR is computed consistently (25th to 75th percentile) for all datasets, the F-to-D ratio for the authors’ data falls within approximately 0.25–0.5. Because the F-to-D ratio is central to establishing the preprint’s claim of “unprecedented spatiotemporal resolution,” this coding error substantially undermines a key conclusion of the work.

This issue has also been discussed on PubPeer. In Comment #4 ( https://pubpeer.com/publications/5E2C872645F18730F49DCA98D54026) , Chromohalobacter israelensis attempted to reproduce the published F-to-D ratio but obtained values of 0.25–0.5 instead of those reported in the preprint.

The bug itself was identified in Comment #6 on PubPeer ( https://pubpeer.com/publications/5E2C872645F18730F49DCA98D54026) by Eontia ponderosa. As shown on GitHub ( https://github.com/BoettigerLab/TRACK-IT/blob/master/FigureCode/Fig2_Ultraresolution_and_Supp1.m , commit 9fb3d2f), line 54 uses:

iqr_h(c) = quantile(trac,mx,2) - min(trac)

for the authors’ own data, effectively computing the 0th to 75th percentile range and thereby inflating their apparent performance.

By contrast, GitHub line 119 uses:

iqr_h(c) = quantile(trac,mx,2) - quantile(trac,mn,2);

for public datasets, correctly computing the 25th to 75th percentile interquartile range.

Thus, the claimed superiority is at least partly attributable to applying a more favorable (and incorrect) formula to the authors’ own data, while applying the correct formula to the public data used for comparison.

Summary<br /> The dataset deposited at https://zenodo.org/records/18019781 does not appear to match the dataset described in the published preprint. In addition, the central claim of “ultra-resolution,” as presented in the title and supported by the F-to-D ratio analysis in Figure 2, appears to be largely due to a coding error that applies different formulas to the authors’ own data and to public comparison datasets, thereby artificially inflating the reported performance. These have been raised on PubPeer, but not received a response. A response from the authors appears necessary as does an update to this preprint.

On 2026-03-21 15:33:47, user Ben Scott wrote:

Really interesting paper. I had some questions/suggestions for investigation that I hope you find useful. Particularly in relation to Figure 4

• Does the location of the variant in the primary amino acid sequence have any connection to concordance? I would assume that variants at N and C termini have more accurate predictions of function (generally not impacting protein function), and therefore methods may agree more.

• Do the number of known protein-protein interaction partners for each protein analysed have an effect on model concordance, and also on the predicted severity of variants? Since many models use this information to compute variant effect, it may reveal concordance. This would of course be highly dependent on the accuracy of such protein-protein interaction data, which is biased towards a fraction of proteins

On 2026-03-20 21:27:49, user disqus_2UwkiK23H2 wrote:

Table 1 says the Alpha Amylase one to many set has 412 train/77 val/3217 test, but the downloaded csv from the website has 3218 entries with "train" in the column and 488 entries with "test" in the column. Are these flipped?

On 2026-03-20 19:21:30, user Misha Koksharov wrote:

I hope that at least when Alphafold-like tools predict that proteins do not dimerize - it is probably indeed so. <br /> This could be very useful, for example, when looking at a transition from monomeric to dimeric versions in protein families when no experimental data is yet available.

There is also an important point that these tools don't use thermodynamics, so they are unable to predict, for example, monomerizing mutations and still predict that most of the monomizerized protein variants (of fluorescent proteins, for example) form the original complexes perfectly fine, since the difference on the interface is very small.

On 2026-03-20 16:01:10, user Leyla Ovchinnikova wrote:

Thank you for this valuable work. Databases focused on autoimmune diseases are critically important, and we have been waiting for a resource like this for a long time. Bringing MS BCR-sequencing data together in a uniform and accessible format will be highly useful for the community. I would like to share a brief comment on this research.

The two cited papers — Lomakin (Multiple Sclerosis Is Associated with Immunoglobulin Germline Gene Variation of Transitional B Cells) and Zvyagin (Deconvolution of B cell receptor repertoire in multiple sclerosis patients revealed a delay in tBreg maturation. 2022) — come from the same research group, use the same patient cohort, and rely on the same BCR sequencing data (ArrayExpress: E-MTAB-10859). As a result, the number of sequences reported in Lomakin and Zvyagin should be identical.

If the sequence counts shown in Figure 1B are taken directly from the articles, the observed discrepancy likely stems from different filtering criteria applied in each study. Nevertheless, because the underlying raw sequences are identical, the sequence numbers should match.

Additionally, the patients in these studies can be categorized under RRMS (blood) as well, and not exclusively under the total MS group. It is important to note that Highly Active Multiple Sclerosis (HAMS) and Benign Multiple Sclerosis are not distinct forms of the disease; instead, they describe, respectively, a severe and treatment-resistant subgroup or a mild clinical course within Relapsing-Remitting Multiple Sclerosis (RRMS).

It is indicated in the article (Table S1) that the BCR datasets from Lomakin and Zvyagin partially overlap, and different SRA references are provided – this should also be corrected. Furthermore, as stated in ArrayExpress (accession E-MTAB-10859) and the study "Deconvolution of B cell receptor repertoire in multiple sclerosis patients revealed a delay in tBreg maturation," different subpopulations of peripheral B cells were analyzed: total peripheral B cells and transitional peripheral B cells with the phenotype CD19(+)CD24(hi)CD38(hi). It is not entirely clear from the article whether both of these populations were included in the database or only one of them?

On 2026-03-20 15:51:25, user Michael Hothorn wrote:

Dear Dr. Wang, thank you for your comments on our preprint. We have decided to experimentally address the different points, the outcome of which you can find in our updated preprint. Please find a point-by-point response below:

1. BSL/PPKLs are not plant orthologs of human PP1s,. Plant genomes encode many PP1s that are more similar to human PP1s than BSLs to human PP1s in the catalytic domain.
2. BSLs/PPKLs are conserved in green algae, plants, and Apicomplexa, but are absent in fungi and animals (10.1128/mbio.02254-23).

Our response: Our structural (Fig. 1 H) and sequence analyses (SI Appendix Fig. S1) reveal that the phosphatase domain of BSU1 shares very strong structural homology with yeast, animal and plant (TOPP) PP1 enzymes. However, we agree that this does not imply that BSU1/BSLs are functional orthologs of PP1 in plants. We have added a comparison with the canonical TOPP family of PP1 phosphatases to our revised manuscript (revised Appendix Fig. S1), and the following statement to our discussion section (lines 450-451) “Whether Kelch phosphatases share redundant functions with type-one serine/threonine protein phosphatases (TOPPs) in plants remains to be characterized (102).”

1. Human PP1-gamma displayed tyrosine phosphatase activity (FEBS Letters 397 (1996) 235-238).<br /> AND
2. The peptide (RKLRRKYGKRGSY) synthesized and tested in this study is based on a substrate sequence of animal PP1, and is distinct from the two reported BSL substrates, BIN2 (anisyicsrfy, Nat Cell Biol 11 (2009):1254-60) and CDKB (grgtygkvyk, Nat Plants, 2025 Nov;11(11):2395-2408), which share some sequence similarity (Maybe BSLs/PPKLs are sequence-specific, not residue-specific phosphatases? Both pT14 and pY15 of CDKB seem to be dephosphorylated – see Fig. 5d in Nat Plants, 2025 Nov;11(11):2395-2408).

Our response: We have synthesized the suggested substrate peptides for the reported natural substrates AtBIN2 and CrCDKB1 suggested by you, and performed enzyme kinetic phosphatase assays. The new data are shown in revised Fig. 1J and K. Fully consistent with our enzyme assays using designed synthetic substrate peptides, we found no detectable activity against the suggested BIN2 peptide containing pTyr200 (revised Fig. 1J and K). The corresponding statement in the text reads (lines 159-161): “In agreement with the dephosphorylation experiments using full-length BIN2 as substrate (Fig. 1G), BSU1 showed no detectable activity against a short BIN2 substrate peptide containing pTyr200 (193-KGEANIS(pY)ICSRFYR-207) (Fig. 1 J and K).”<br /> This experiment is also consistent with our dephosphorylation assay of full-length BIN2 shown in Fig.1G. We have added another enzyme assays to revised Fig. 1G, which demonstrates that also full-length BSU1 is not able to dephosphorylate pTyr200 in BIN2, or in other words a putative tyrosine phosphatase activity of BSU1 is not encoded in its N-terminal Kelch domain. The corresponding statement in the result section now reads (lines 137-139):”No dephosphorylation of pTyr200 was observed when BIN2 was incubated with either the isolated BSU1 phosphatase domain, or with full-length BSU1, even at a 4:1 substrate-to-enzyme ratio (Fig. 1G).”

For CrCDKB1, two neighboring amino-acids have been reported to be phosphorylated in planta (doi: 10.1038/s41477-025-02145-z), Thr14 and Tyr15. BSU1 could readily dephosphorylate pThr14 but not pTyr15 in CrCDKB1 substrate peptides, again confirming that BSU1 is a Ser/Thr, not a tyrosine phosphatase. The revised statement in the result section reads (lines 161-167): “Recently, the CYCLIN-DEPENDENT KINASE B1 (CDKB1) was identified as an in vivo substrate for the Chlamydomonas reinhardtii Kelch phosphatase BSL1 (58) (SI Appendix, Fig. S1). Specifically, Thr14 and neighboring Tyr15 in CrCDKB1 were identified to be hyperphosphorylated in a bsl1-1 mutant phosophoproteome (58). We found that BSU1 was able to de-phosphorylate a synthetic CrCDKB1 peptide containing pThr14 (kcat/KM ~1 × 103 M-1 s-1), but not the pTyr15-containing substrate peptide (kcat/KM ~0.04 × 103 M-1 s-1) (Fig. 1 J and K).”

Together, the newly added enzyme assays further support and substantiate our finding that BSU1 is a serine/threonine phosphatase, not a tyrosine phosphatase targeting BIN2 pTyr200. Our revised discussion statement reads (lines 371-374): “However, based on our structural and enzyme kinetic analyses, the BSU1 phosphatase domain consistently behaves as PP1-like Ser/Thr phosphatase and we could not detect dephosphorylation of BIN2 pTyr200, either in the full-length kinase or in a synthetic peptide containing this site (Fig. 1G, J–L).”<br /> The revised abstract reads (lines 52-53): “Taken together, our experiments suggest that plant Kelch phosphatases act as PP1-like cell cycle regulators, rather than as tyrosine phosphatases in brassinosteroid signaling.”

1. PP1 substrate specificity varies with metals (Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry 149 (2015) 1–5), and metal loading to PP1 depends on chaperones (FEBS Letters 598 (2024) 2876–2885).

Our response: That is indeed an important point to consider, which we have addressed experimentally. We chose the preferred BSU1 pThr-containing substrate peptide and its corresponding pTyr variant and assayed the ability of BSU1 to dephosphorylate these peptides in the presence of different metal salts. These assays confirm that that BSU1 is a Mn2+-dependent Ser/Thr phosphatase. Importantly, no significant enzyme activity is detected for the pTyr peptide, independent of the catalytic metal chosen. The new results are shown in newly added Fig. 1L. The corresponding statement in the result section reads (lines 167-172): “It has been previously reported that the substrate specificity and enzyme activity of animal PP1 are in part determined by the type of metal ions present in the catalytic center (Fig. 1I) (70). We therefore assayed BSU1-mediated dephosphorylation of the synthetic pThr- and pTyr-containing substrate peptides in the presence of different metal ions (Fig. 1 K and L). These assays confirmed BSU1 to represent a Mn2+-dependent Ser/Thr protein phosphatase (Fig. 1L).”

1. The authors acknowledged that "It remains formally possible that a single BSL2 or BSL3 allele can support BR signaling to wild type-like levels (Fig. 2 D and E).”. I was confused by other statements inconsistent with this.

Our response: Our structural and biochemical analyses of BSU1 show that this enzyme is not mediating BIN2 dephosphorylation at pTyr200. The reanalysis of the bsu1-D allele in addition suggests that BSU1 acts as a neomorph in bri1-5. However, we agree with you that this does not exclude the possibility the BSU1 and BSLs redundantly regulate other aspects of BR signaling, such as the direct dephosphorylation of BZR1 (as shown in Fig. 2G and H). To accurately reflect the outcome of our reverse genetic analysis, we have therefore rephrased our discussion section. The revised text reads (lines 417-419): “However, our genetic experiments and previous studies (37) do not provide compelling evidence for the involvement of these broadly acting Ser/Thr phosphatases in BR signaling.” This leaves the possibility that other bsu1 bsl alleles in Arabidopsis and/or in other plant species, or other assay conditions may still reveal functions for BSU1 or BSLs in BR signaling.

Thank you for critically reading our manuscript and for your suggestions. On behalf of the authors, Michael Hothorn, corresponding author, University of Geneva, CH

On 2026-01-23 01:30:29, user Zhiyong Wang wrote:

Here is some information for the authors and readers. <br /> 1. BSL/PPKLs are not plant orthologs of human PP1s,. Plant genomes encode many PP1s that are more similar to human PP1s than BSLs to human PP1s in the catalytic domain. <br /> 2. BSLs/PPKLs are conserved in green algae, plants, and Apicomplexa, but are absent in fungi and animals (10.1128/mbio.02254-23). <br /> 3. Human PP1-gamma displayed tyrosine phosphatase activity (FEBS Letters 397 (1996) 235-238).<br /> 4. PP1 substrate specificity varies with metals (Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry 149 (2015) 1–5), and metal loading to PP1 depends on chaperones (FEBS Letters 598 (2024) 2876–2885). <br /> 5. The peptide (RKLRRKYGKRGSY) synthesized and tested in this study is based on a substrate sequence of animal PP1, and is distinct from the two reported BSL substrates, BIN2 (anisyicsrfy, Nat Cell Biol 11 (2009):1254-60) and CDKB (grgtygkvyk, Nat Plants, 2025 Nov;11(11):2395-2408), which share some sequence similarity (Maybe BSLs/PPKLs are sequence-specific, not residue-specific phosphatases? Both pT14 and pY15 of CDKB seem to be dephosphorylated – see Fig. 5d in Nat Plants, 2025 Nov;11(11):2395-2408). <br /> 6. The authors acknowledged that "It remains formally possible that a single BSL2 or BSL3 allele can support BR signaling to wild type-like levels (Fig. 2 D and E).”. I was confused by other statements inconsistent with this.

On 2026-03-19 20:13:03, user FAISAL MADANAT wrote:

This preprint presents a convincing genetic case that UHRF1 is required for RB progression and contributes to a tumor-promoting inflammatory microenvironment.<br /> In the Results section describing Fig. 2C, the authors state that “there were no significant differences” in the expression of multiple retinal markers between Uhrf1 cKO and Cre-negative controls. However, in the Fig. 2 legend, there are reported significant changes (e.g., increases in Chx10 and Prkca and a decrease in Rho in EGFP+ cells). This creates confusion on whether the claim is meant to apply to whole retina qPCR or recombined (EGFP+) populations specifically. It would help to clarify in the text what population was analyzed for the “no significant differences” statement (whole retina vs sorted EGFP+ cells), and to align the wording with the legend.

Figure 6 and the model in 6F suggest that loss of UHRF1 reduces NF-κB pathway activity and chemokine secretion, which then reduces microglial infiltration. While the downstream observations are convincing, the upstream mechanism remains unclear: how does UHRF1 increase NF-κB signaling in retinoblastoma cells? A useful follow-up would be genome-wide mapping of UHRF1 occupancy (e.g., CUT&RUN or ChIP-seq) combined with RNA-seq integration to identify direct targets, especially any NF-κB regulators that could explain the pathway shift.

Because most experiments are in mouse genetics and mouse-derived tumor cells, it would strengthen the translational argument to include at least one human system (e.g., patient-derived xenografts, primary retinoblastoma samples, or human retinoblastoma cell lines with UHRF1 alterations, especially for the NF-κB/chemokine/microglia axis. Even limited validation that UHRF1-high tumors show correlation to NF-κB/chemokine signatures in human data would help.

Overall, I found the study interesting and the genetic result (tumor suppression upon Uhrf1 loss) particularly strong.

On 2026-03-05 18:17:45, user Pearl Macias wrote:

In your results (page 6), the authors state that "There were no significant differences in the expression of Arr3, Calb1, Chx10, Crx, GS, Hes1, Lhx1, Nr2e3, Pax6, Prkca, Prox1, Rcvrn, and Rho between Uhrf1 cKO and Cre-negative controls" for figure 2C. But when you go to the figure, we do see a difference in Chx10, Prkca, and Rho and this difference is even mentioned in the description section below figure 2C, so this is a bit confusing.

For figure 6F the authors propose a mechanism of UHRF1's role in retinoblastoma, however it is still unclear how UHRF1 turns on the NF-kB inflammatory pathway. I recommend for a future direction to perform a ChIP-seq assay to map where UHRF1 binds to the genome in retinoblastoma tumor cells. This may show us how UHRF1 blocks an inhibitor of the NF-kB, to constantly promote this pathway.

Since you only test experiments using mouse models I would recommend performing these tests on patient derived xenografts for patients that have retinoblastoma.

For some of the western blots like figure 6E, I still see a band for the UHRF1 knockout and it is not explained why we still see expression. I recommend addressing this result in your discussion because it is one of your more important assays that is used to confirm that removing UHRF1 decreases tumor progression.

Overall, I liked your paper and I found it interesting learning about some of the epigenetics behind what contributes to retinoblastoma.

On 2026-03-19 14:03:34, user Jonathan Legrand wrote:

That's a much needed initiative, congratulations! Will you release the list of the ImmPort study IDs that you used for pretraining?

On 2026-03-17 21:38:34, user markus wrote:

This is a review of the preprint “Mental calculation speeds surpass known limits for high-level cognition”, by Wiederhold, B., M. Stemmler, and A.V.M. Herz. 2026. bioRxiv.<br /> https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.05.28.656137v2

This article regards the information rate of brain processing in humans. It is organized in large part in reference to a recent review article (ref 1), which claims that the information throughput of a human being is limited to about 10 bits per second. We are the authors of that article and so have a special interest in the topic. The present report represents a valuable and substantive addition to the field, including new experimental data, new analysis, and even a mathematical theorem.

We summarize briefly the claims of our article (ref 1) to the extent that they relate to the present report. The literature review from much of the past century suggests that the total information throughput of a human being – from sensory input to motor output – is limited to about 10 bits per second. Remarkably, this is independent of the precise nature of the task. It applies equally for simple motor challenges, like moving a ballpoint pen from one small circle on the page to another, as to complex tasks, like solving a Rubik's cube while blindfolded. We further argued that this throughput is the result of many stages of lossy information processing, starting with the visual image sampled by the cones of the retina. Along the way one finds very high rates of information processing, for example the transformation from cone signals to retinal ganglion cell signals proceeds at megabits per second. Each stage discards much of the information received from the previous one, leading eventually to an abstract mental representation of the digits on the screen, irrespective of their size, color, or position. All those intermediate processing stages with high information rates are subconscious.

The present report considers specifically information processing by mental calculators: individuals who compete in contests to calculate sums or products or square roots in the shortest possible amount of time. The authors explain the special techniques these human calculators employ. Then they compute the Shannon information needed in order to complete all these intermediate steps that lead to the final result. They argue that these steps are a form of conscious mental processing, and therefore the total information rate they obtain should be considered a lower bound on the conscious throughput rate of a human being. In fact, the rate they compute of 93 bits per second (or perhaps 215 bits per second, see questions below) is much greater than what the literature cites as the throughput rate of a human being. This result would extend in interesting ways our understanding of how information processing is limited in the human brain. In particular the article recommends a reliable method for estimating the entropy of an algorithmic step during cognition.

Main recommendations

1. Definitions of entropy<br /> The authors define a number of different entropy measures related to the mental calculation task: input entropy, extended input entropy, algorithmic entropy, and output entropy. They each show some systematic relationship to the calculation time. Among these, only the algorithm entropy and the output entropy seem related to Shannon information, defined as the reduction in entropy through the communication process.

The output entropy divided by the calculation time is the throughput rate, to be compared to the values obtained on other tasks, as reviewed in ref 1.

The algorithmic entropy is the sum of the output entropies of intermediate calculations performed by the mental calculator. This total divided by the calculator time represents the information rate of those mental calculations. This number can be legitimately compared to throughput rates or other mutual information rates in the literature. The highest algorithmic rate of 93 bits/s (Table 1) is in fact considerably higher than the typical throughput rate of 10 bits/s. The power law relationship between calculation time and algorithmic entropy (Fig 1B) is impressive.

We do not understand why one should sum the various entropy measures (line 96, Fig 2), leading to the “peak rate” of 215 bits/s. This sum does not seem to represent mutual information, in which case it cannot be compared to the numbers in ref 1. This summing step should be explained better, if it is in fact justified.

2. Conscious vs unconscious processing<br /> The distinction between unconscious and conscious processing deserves some elaboration. As noted above, the preconscious processing rates in the early visual system are enormously higher than anything discussed here. The rate of processing grows systematically as one reaches further and further back into the system from the final output of the mental calculation to the sensory signals. As the authors tease apart the steps of mental calculation preceding the result, is it obvious that all those steps are “willful” or “conscious”? For example, should we apply that label to lookup in the memorized product tables (line 138), or do those precomputed results present themselves to the subject automatically in a subconscious way? Some introspection from these performers might be useful here.

As explained in the text, the mental calculators lose track of those intermediate results as soon as they are used, and cannot recall those numbers even one or a few seconds later. One could argue that such a fleeting internal result is not really experienced consciously. Instead the mental calculator has trained a reflex-like subconscious procedure that delivers these intermediate results and uses them for further calculations. This would be more akin to the rapid reflexes trained by a competitive tennis player returning a serve, which also do not involve conscious deliberation in the loop.

If, in fact, these intermediate sums are subconscious events, then they simply form part of the long subconscious processing chain starting in cone photoreceptors, that we already know involves much higher processing rates. More discussion of this issue would help the report.

Other suggestions<br /> Line 88: “The resulting ratios are conservative measures, as they assume all processes run in parallel, instead of sequentially”. That seems like an unreasonable assumption, because some steps of mental calculation depend on the results of preceding steps. On the other hand, the total information rate one computes is the same whether the sub-processes are carried out in series or parallel.

The algorithmic entropy estimates are obtained based on an error-free performance in the shortest time of many attempts (see line 147). In practice the mental calculations come with some error rate and the performance times scatter. How large would the correction be if one takes finite error rates and typical calculation times into account, for example using results during training sessions, rather than only the medal-winning performance.

The output rates are almost all below 10 bits/s, and as the authors note (line 95) “exhibit almost no correlation with calculation time.” This seems to extend the observation of ref 1 – namely that the throughput rate is limited to 10 bits/s – to a whole new range of cognitive tasks. This seems worth mentioning. In table 1, please list the output rates in all cases, to allow this comparison.

Line 270: It is unclear why the algorithmic entropy of one lookup step should equal the size of the lookup table. The Shannon information between the inputs to the lookup (previous intermediate result and new number) and the output is simply the entropy of the output (the result of the operation), not the combined entropy of input and output. The subsequent section “Algorithm” (line 316ff) seems to only count the entropy of the output.

Small things<br /> The main text would benefit from more precise references to Method subsections.

Line 136 “as competitors must attend to each digit shown, the estimated visual processing rate should be reliable.” Meaning unclear.

Line 174 “eights”

Line 248: maybe add “where $H_i$ is the entropy in bits.”

Line 302 “An outline of the entropy of mental calculations has previously been given by Timms.” This reference is a blog post. The bit counting there is somewhat ad hoc and poorly justified and doesn’t necessarily match the authors’ approach.

Line 346 “The output entropy can be considered a lower bound on the “perceived” entropy”. Meaning unclear.

Line 402: “first” should be “last”?

Line 440: “the multiplicities above reduced the number of distinct products by a factor of roughly four to six.” Meaning reduced the entropies by about 2 bits?

Line 462: “ · log2(7)” should be “3 · log2(7)”?

Line 556: “multipliation”

- Markus Meister and Jieyu Zheng, Caltech

On 2026-03-17 19:17:16, user Sarah Lindsey wrote:

Great paper! Would the E2-induced decrease in stiffness then be enhanced in an OVEX SMC-ERa-KO? Did you look at whether SMC-ERa-KO enhanced the expression of any other hormone receptors? Which of these is most likely - that ERa is constitutively active, is responding to local E2 synthesis, or is being activated by other factors such as IGF-I?

On 2026-03-17 18:12:11, user markus wrote:

This is a review of the preprint Connectome of a human foveal retina, by Kim, Y.J., O. Packer, T. Macrina, A. Pollreisz, C.A. Curcio, K. Lee, N. Kemnitz, D. Ih, T. Nguyen, R. Lu, S. Popovych, A. Halageri, J.A. Bae, J. Strout, S. Gerhard, R.G. Smith, P.R. Martin, U. Grünert, and D.M. Dacey. 2026. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.04.05.647403v5 , version of Jan 28, 2026.

This report describes a remarkable new data set, which is being made available for public use: The connectomic reconstruction of the neuronal network in a small volume of a human fovea, based on 3D electron microscopy.

The fovea is the very central portion of our retina, responsible for all our high-acuity vision at the center of gaze. In some sense, this is the part of the retina most precious to us, and an inordinately large fraction of the visual brain is busy processing signals from the fovea. Much earlier research has focused on retinas of model animal species, in particular the closely related macaque retina. This is the first time a full sample of neurons, processes, and synapses has been assembled from the human fovea. I expect that many interesting discoveries will come from exploring this data set.

In addition to describing the process used in the connectome assembly, this article also reports some early results of the analysis. Topics include the electrical coupling between cones of different spectral sensitivity, the connections of horizontal cells to different cone types, the connectivity of the AII amacrine cells, and the number of ganglion cell pathways that encode the foveal output. My review and suggestions here focus on this part of the article reporting scientific claims.

The data set<br /> Is this the same data set as used for the reports in Kim 2023 (ref 44) and Kim 2024 (ref 106)? If so, please state that early on, and explain what are the methods enhancements since then.

Some of the results overlap with the Kim 2023 report: Fig 2 has a close relative in Kim 2023 Figs S2 and S3. Fig 7 top shows some of the same things as Kim 2023 Fig S8.

Line 124 "including those related to processes extending into or through the volume but not linked to cell bodies": It would be useful to state, for each cell type, how many complete neurons are in the 180 x 180 um EM volume vs those with only partial dendritic fields (e.g. Fig 6H).

Line 330 "Moreover, all cell types in the HFseg1 volume are identified": Meaning? Presumably not every process is identified.

Coupling of S to LM cones<br /> Line 127: "17 cone pedicles were identified as short wavelength-sensitive (S) cones (Fig. 2A)(44)." Please state how this was achieved. Ref 44 says "A clear population of likely S cone pedicles was not conspicuous in the human retina". Identifying these is essential for the subsequent claims of cone coupling.

Line 221 "We found abundant S-LM cone contacts": The authors already reported this in ref 44. Please emphasize what is new here.

Model of the S-cone spectral sensitivity<br /> The coupling between S and LM cones is a puzzle. In other retinas, biology goes to some trouble to avoid it. The principle extends to amphibians, in fact it was first reported in turtle (Detwiler 1979). The unexpected departure in human retina has been reported and debated for some time. One would hope that the modeling effort here would shed additional light on the issue.

Line 412: "A network model of this connectivity showed that ... mixing S and LM cone signals can alter the action spectrum of the S cone light response." This much was obvious from the outset and didn't require any modeling. *How much* does it alter the action spectrum, and does that explain any puzzles from human color vision? Given all the quantitative detail that went into the model, one would like to see a quantitative interpretation of the result.

Line 421: "Coupling among the S, L, and M cones prior to this connection may serve to preserve the smaller S cone signal within the H1 cell network." The meaning here is unclear. How does mixing in other signals serve to preserve the S cone signal?

Constraints on the number of ganglion cell pathways<br /> The authors report finding "only 11 visual pathways, with 5 high-density RGC pathways accounting for over 95% of foveal output to the brain: a dramatic contrast to the 40+ ganglion cell types recognized in mouse retina." (line 50). This difference between human fovea and mouse may well be correct, but the present study does little to support the claim. The volume included 599 RGCs (line 141). If we subtract the obvious midgets and parasols, that leaves only 37 RGCs. In the mouse, many of the RGC types have a prevalence of less than 1%. Under a Poisson distribution, there is therefore a good probability of missing such rare types within the relatively small sample here.

The complementary analysis of the "vertical connectome" (line 294ff) rests on the assumption that every cone must ultimately have an excitatory pathway to every ganglion cell. That is an assumption, not a natural law. If the probability of connection is less than 1, then tracing the output of just 3 LM cones may well miss some ganglion cells (line 319).

That said, the transcriptomic analysis of human fovea in Yan 2020 poses much more stringent limits on the existence of rare RGC types, because it included 11404 RGCs. The present work is consistent with the idea that there are only 11 or 12 pathways in human fovea, but doesn't strengthen the evidence much.

Synaptic circuitry of AII cells<br /> The textbook picture is that the AII cell feeds signals from rod bipolars into cone on and off bipolars, with opposite sign, via gap junctions and glycinergic synapses respectively. When rod signals aren't available, e.g. at very high light levels, the cone on bipolar excites the AII through the gap junctions, which leads to crossover inhibition of the cone off bipolar cells.

The current report (line 282ff) adds at least two non-canonical connections: (1) ribbon synapses from cone off bipolars and (2) ribbon synapses from cone on bipolars, both presumably glutamatergic and excitatory. Both these components have been described before in the mammalian retina. However, in the presence of the overwhelming input from rod bipolars, they were seen as a minor distraction; for example Strettoi 2018 say that the large majority of inputs in the On sublamina is from rod BCs, with only 23% from cone BCs. This raises a few questions about the present data set from human fovea:

What fraction of the ribbon synapses in the on sublamina are from rod bipolars? Clearly there are some rod bipolars in the data set (Fig 4B), but no results are presented about them. One would like to hear more.

The AII in Fig 9 gets more synapses from Off bipolars than from On bipolars. So should one expect the human AII cell to have a net Off response, unlike those in other retinas? Or is it conceivable that the postsynaptic response at Off bipolar synapses is sign-inverting?

Line 290 "to provide an inhibitory pathway from ON to OFF bipolar cells under photopic conditions". But also an excitatory pathway from OFF to ON bipolars? How can one reconcile that with the idea of "crossover inhibition"?<br /> Seeing how intensely the AII cell has been studied across species, it would be remarkable if it plays a very different functional role in the human fovea. More detail on this would be useful.

Abstract<br /> As it stands, I feel the abstract does not optimally highlight the unique contributions of the report. The biophysical model is new, but in the present form doesn't add new insight (see above). The small number of visual pathways compared to the mouse retina has been reported elsewhere with stronger numerical evidence (see above). There is reference to "novel synaptic pathways" and "distinctive features of human neural circuitry"; perhaps these could be spelled out? For example the cone connectivity of H1 vs H2 cells seems to be a new result (line 255ff). Similarly the observation of the "monopolar bipolar" cells previously seen in mouse retina (Fig 4B, line 270ff).

Other things<br /> Where is "SI Appendix" and Tables 1-4?<br /> Line 121 "We were therefore able to use the original segmentation": Meaning unclear.<br /> Line 233 "We used a fixed ratio of L to M cones of ~1.7:1": What motivated that choice? Empirically that ratio varies a lot across humans. How much does it matter, i.e. what would be the effect on the final modeling results of different ratios?<br /> Line 291 "while at the same time suggesting specialized synaptic alterations for the AII cells in the human fovea in relation to the midget circuit": Unclear to what this refers.<br /> Line 335 "The HFseg1 volume permits a comparison of the two approaches": Which two?<br /> Line 422 "This in turn may be critical for the unique requirements of human color vision": Unclear. What are those unique requirements? Something imposed by the ecology of humans vs macaques?<br /> Line 521 "White arrowhead shows branching processes of unknown significance arising from the cell body": These look remarkable. Other RGC types don't do that? Is there functional circuitry within the RGC layer? What is at the end of those processes? Gap junctions? This seems worth following up.<br /> Line 198 "Vesicle clouds were detected with high sensitivity": Please explain "vesicle cloud"? What is its functional meaning?<br /> Line 740 "Vesicle cloud detection and conventional synapse assignment in the IPL." These methods seem rather ad hoc. What is the ground truth here? How did the human annotators distinguish "vesicle clouds"?<br /> Line 620 "as previously described1.": Meaning of the superscript 1?<br /> Line 839 "La rètine des vertèbrès": Please check the direction of those accents.<br /> Line 846 "et al.": Now that we're not killing trees anymore for publications, there's no cost to listing all the authors of a cited paper.

• Markus Meister, meister@caltech.edu

On 2026-03-17 13:21:53, user Dennis Botman wrote:

Hey Stefano, sorry for the late reply. We do not provide any biliverdin as we want to know the brightness of these FPs in "standard" conditions for yeast. Apparently in yeast there is sufficient biliverdin to have fluorescence of the iRFPs.

On 2026-03-16 21:35:51, user Andreas De Keersmaeker wrote:

Dear authors,

Thank you for sharing this interesting work on CELLECTION. I am currently reviewing the preprint but noticed that the Supplementary Material (including Figure S1 and others mentioned in the text) does not seem to be available on the bioRxiv landing page or appended to the main PDF.<br /> Could you please clarify where these supplemental figures can be accessed, or consider uploading them to the 'Supplementary material' section?

Best regards<br /> Andreas De Keersmaeker

On 2026-03-16 20:46:12, user An_evolutionary_biologist wrote:

HSR locus is not the first vertebrate driver with a toxin-antidote mechanism. The first TA driver to be described is t-haplotype - which codes for multiple poisons!! <br /> Papers on t-haplotype poison(s): Segregation distortion of mouse t haplotypes the molecular basis emerges (2000), The t complex-encoded GTPase-activating protein Tagap1 acts as a transmission ratio distorter in mice (2005), The t-complex-encoded guanine nucleotide exchange factor Fgd2 reveals that two opposing signaling pathways promote transmission ratio distortion in the mouse (2007), The nucleoside diphosphate kinase gene Nme3 acts as quantitative trait locus promoting non-Mendelian inheritance (2012). <br /> Papers on antidote:A protein kinase encoded by the t complex Responder gene causes non-Mendelian inheritance (1999).

On 2026-03-16 11:26:41, user Bettina Böttcher wrote:

This preprint is now published as:<br /> Rasmussen, T., Küspert, J., Schönemann, L. et al. The gene-regulating proteins NONO and SFPQ assemble into ordered filaments. Commun Biol 9, 117 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-025-09396-8

On 2026-03-14 15:13:35, user Joachim Ruther wrote:

This is an interesting and timely contribution that addresses an important question. The manuscript presents valuable data that will be of interest to researchers working in this area.

For completeness, the authors may wish to consider discussing earlier work that reported related observations in a non-Drosophila model some years ago. A brief comparison with that prior study ( https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2021.2002 ) could help situate the present results within the existing body of literature and clarify the relationship between the findings reported here and previous reports.

Providing this additional context might further strengthen the manuscript and assist readers in appreciating the development of the field.

With best regards,<br /> Joachim Ruther

Chemical Ecology Group, Institute of Zoology,<br /> University of Regensburg, Germany

On 2026-03-13 16:57:43, user HunterMoseley wrote:

It is best to look at the PDF version. Some of the equations are not properly rendered in the "Full Text" html version.

On 2026-03-13 02:50:44, user XF Yang wrote:

The preprint has been published in Cell Discovery ( https://www.nature.com/articles/s41421-025-00805-0) . Please link these two studies.

On 2026-03-11 14:53:20, user Davide Maspero wrote:

The paper has been published in npj system biology and application: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41540-026-00654-x

On 2026-03-10 14:45:07, user Julien MOZZICONACCI wrote:

"Lu et al. [16] discovered that the SINE-B1/Alu SINE elements and the LINE-1 (L1) elements correlate strongly with the A and B compartments, respectively, in both mouse and human cells" . See also https://academic.oup.com/nar/article/44/1/245/2499640 and discussion therein.

On 2026-03-10 10:18:03, user Darren Thomson wrote:

Nice advance on much needed imaging tools in fungal pathogens. Can you please share details on how these images were captured, such as exposure time, LED/laser power, filter sets used etc? This will allow us to evaluate (and replicate) the performance of these FPs.

On 2026-03-10 02:24:30, user AL wrote:

Such beautiful work! I just noticed a small typo in the 2nd sentence of the discussion section (pg 18): "in this work, introduce a novel approach..."

On 2026-03-09 22:15:06, user Katrina Derieg wrote:

Fantastic paper! This is really foundational work for this widespread and diverse species.

I have one pedantic comment... Table S4 lists the specimen sample numbers, including museum catalog numbers. I noticed that a few are not presented in the Darwin Core Triplet: InstitutionAbbrv:Coll:####. This may seem trivial but this is crucial for museums to be able to tie publications back to their specimens to demonstrate impact. Namely, the specimens from DMNS and UMNH only list the institutional abbreviation and the number. The the problem with this is that these museums typically have other taxa with the same numbers, so having "Mamm" in the identifier makes the catalog number unique to the mammal specimen in question. For example, DMNS:Mamm:13043 is a Peromyscus maniculatus, but DMNS:Bird:13043 is a Baeolophus ridgwayi. DMNS_13043 leaves ambiguity. (I should note that I am not affiliated with DMNS, just an example) Most museums' loan policies will stipulate how specimens should be cited. When in doubt, you can always just ask the museum that issued the loan. We are more than happy to help and I promise we won't bite!

Again, very small thing, but just hoping to advocate for museum collections and how we as researchers can make their lives easier.

Excited to see more awesome Museomics research from this group!!

On 2026-03-09 20:06:42, user Michal Rindoš wrote:

Many described species are missing from the Tree of Life due to an insufficient literature review. The Tree of Life primarily reviews article databases, but it largely omits taxonomic revisions that have been published in book form, particularly those from small or private presses. Consequently, the Tree of Life is missing thousands of species, meaning any numbers used for evaluation in this article are highly biased and inaccurate.

On 2026-03-09 07:01:38, user Peter H Uetz wrote:

I find the use of "Byr" (e.g. in Fig 3 and Fig. 4) confusing. First, it's never spelled out, but it appears to mean "billion years". So, how can phylogenetic diversity be measured in 8 or 128 billion years when earth is supposedly only 4.5 billion years old?

On 2026-03-09 18:33:39, user Giorgio Giardina wrote:

Please see the published paper:<br /> Structure-based mechanism of riboregulation of the metabolic enzyme SHMT1<br /> Spizzichino et al., 2024, Molecular Cell 84, 2682–2697 July 25, 2024 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.molcel.2024.06.016

On 2026-03-09 07:45:57, user Ashwanisoni wrote:

This snippet highlights research on degrading PET plastic (the material commonly used in food packaging and textiles) using engineered environmental bacteria @theansh

On 2026-01-20 03:06:42, user Nosheen wrote:

This preprint presents a novel biological strategy to address PET plastic pollution by engineering environmental bacteria capable of directly utilizing PET as a carbon source. PET is widely used in packaging and textiles and persists in the environment as macro- and microplastics, posing environmental and health concerns. While PET-degrading enzymes have been studied extensively in vitro, practical whole-cell microbial solutions for environmental PET degradation have remained limited.<br /> The authors isolated a strain of Pseudomonas umsongensis that can metabolize terephthalate, a key monomer released from PET hydrolysis. To enable direct PET degradation, the strain was genetically engineered to secrete the high-activity PET hydrolase PHL7 using a recombinant twin-arginine translocation (TAT) secretion signal. This allowed extracellular degradation of PET into assimilable products. Additionally, PET was pre-treated with an organic solvent to create an amorphous and macroporous structure, significantly improving enzyme accessibility and bioavailability.<br /> The study demonstrates that the engineered bacterium can grow using PET-derived carbon, providing evidence of true microbial consumption rather than simple enzymatic breakdown. This represents an important advancement toward sustainable plastic upcycling and bioremediation approaches that could operate outside controlled laboratory conditions.<br /> However, the work remains a preprint and has not yet undergone peer review, so conclusions should be considered preliminary. The requirement for PET pre-treatment and the existence of a related patent may also influence scalability and environmental application. Despite these limitations, the study offers a valuable proof of concept for whole-cell microbial systems in plastic waste management and highlights a promising direction for future research.

On 2026-03-06 16:55:41, user Bhoj Raj Thapa wrote:

Update: This preprint has now been revised and published as a peer‑reviewed data paper: <br /> Thapa, B.R., Boggess, J. & Bae, J. A large electroencephalogram database of freewill reaching and grasping tasks for brain machine interfaces. Scientific Data 12, 1760 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-06039-9

For users, please refer to the peer‑reviewed version above.<br /> Please link this bioRxiv preprint (DOI: https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.05.09.653170) to the revised, published version.

On 2026-03-06 13:13:03, user Feng Lin wrote:

Dear bioRxiv team,

this article has been published in Molecular Autism, please update the information on the preprint. Thanks!

doi: 10.1186/s13229-026-00707-2.

Best <br /> Feng Lin

On 2026-03-06 08:39:59, user Oliver Pescott wrote:

Looks like a nice paper, although I note that you group Boyd et al. 2025 with lots of other general reviews of causal graphs for causal inference, whereas that paper actually deals with generalising from a non-probability sample to a target population, analogous to the generalisation or transport of in-sample causal estimates to particular populations. The analogy between these has been much discussed and is reviewed in this preprint, to appear in the journal Quality and Quantity: https://arxiv.org/abs/2308.11458

On 2026-03-05 23:24:09, user Brandon Coventry wrote:

Hello! I am the corresponding author for this manuscript, which has been published and has yet not been linked to this preprint. This is likely due to a title change during the review process. The link to the final manuscript is at the Journal of Systems Architecture, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sysarc.2026.103749

Cheers!<br /> Brandon

On 2026-03-05 21:13:24, user David Mobley wrote:

What force field was used for the physical free energy calculations, with AQFEP?

On 2026-03-05 11:24:50, user Nathan Lee wrote:

This is incredibly exciting work! However, I do not see the supplementary material attached, which I would love to see. Less importantly, I believe there is also a typo in paragraph 3 of the introduction, where the sentence regarding "deletion events... NRPS diversification" has been duplicated

On 2026-03-04 09:44:07, user Joan Duprez wrote:

Hi Daniele, thank you for your interest and sorry for the (very) late response :

1. to which extent this is specific to functional connectivity and not to EEG activity? Like, is EEG activity more, or less, "driven by" 1/f activity than FC? To which extent are the results here different from the evidence that if you filter a signal in a specific band you get some nonzero number even if you don't have a pure oscillation at that frequency throughout the duration of the signal?

This is not specific to functional connectivity. We’ve published plenty to that effect. Here we are illustrating just how impactful the aperiodic component of the EEG is to the specific domain of functional connectivity, as well.

As a related aside, you keep calling it “1/f” which is technically correct in that power is inversely proportional to frequency. But often “1/f” is additionally implied to mean fractal or scale free, which the EEG often is not. Even if oscillations are not present, there is often a “knee” in the spectrum, which goes against the scale-free perspective. More on this below.

1bis. If you would like to look at the differences (or lack thereof) between 1/f of a single variable and 1/f of FC between two variables, you could compute FC as cross spectral density and relate the 1/f of the cross spectrum with the 1/f of the two time series. Spoiler: the relation is quite unsurprising, figure here, from the internship work of Thibault Marichal, Ghent University Btw in the left panel you can see that 1/f changes linearly with time as anesthesia kicks in. What this is due to? Creation of aperiodic activity coming from where? From nonstationary (some waxing some waning) oscillations (see points below)? From somewhere else? Who knows. https://imgur.com/tYyAqCN

“Who knows” is correct, though we have theories. If we take the “standard model” – as Mike X. Cohen calls in in his paper “Where does EEG come from” – as true, which seems to be at least a very good approximation, then all we’re really measuring are various ways in which postsynaptic currents can integrate. Those postsynaptic currents can be long or short, they can co-occur or oscillate or be totally asynchronous. So this anesthesia effect you show could be a change in the balance of global postsynaptic currents driving the EEG, or in their synchrony, or more likely: both.

2. computing FC in 4 seconds long windows assumes that the series (and the oscillations in this case) are stationary across the whole duration, like you have sustained alpha, theta, gamma, beta, delta for 4 seconds. Actually for the whole duration of the recording. Why epoching in 4 seconds then? The thing is that even if you have nothing else than perfectly nice and sinusoidal oscillations, but their amplitude fluctuates in time, a 1/f part of the spectrum is generated.<br /> See this figure, again courtesy of Thibault Marichal https://imgur.com/y7WJCam

This is unavoidable, but it does not mean that there are no oscillations, simply that our stationarity assumptions are not met. And that's why I think that the activity should be called 1/f but not "aperiodic", at least when we re conflating spatiotemporal (neuronal) scales as we do in EEG.

But your example here shows clear spectral peaks at the frequencies where there are oscillations, of course. Many EEG spectra show no peaks. We’re not saying that the 1/f-like portion can only come from non-oscillatory phenomena, but rather that we cannot with confidence say that connectivity is purely oscillatory if there are no clear oscillations in the raw time series or in the spectra. Our message is that you can’t blindly apply filtering and calculation of connectivity because then you make the implicit assumption that oscillations are present everywhere all the time, and this holds whether aperiodic or 1/f activity is partly coming from oscillations or not. As for the duration of the epoch, we chose a duration that is common in the resting state FC literature precisely to emphasize that this is also an assumption of sustained oscillatory activity. This is more discussed in the final version of the paper.

2bis. The spectrum is a whole, separating it in oscillatory bands and "aperiodic" or 1/f is as artificial as separating it in bands. But the bands are at least associated to some behavior and to some neuronal activity. 1/f is a bag of everything else, including oscillations (perhaps not when you consider spikes, there 1/f is more specific, but this is not the case here). To this extent, is not surprising that 1/f accounts for a lot of stuff.

Again, our paper isn’t about the origin of the 1/f-like component.

3. What does the percentage mean, when in the abstract you write that X% of {alpha, beta, etc.} networks are driven by 1/f? I read it as "we have 100 alpha networks, of which 23 to 55 are driven by 1/f". Now, apart from what "driving a network" means, it's not clear what these networks are. From the text, I think you refer to connections being retained. In this case you should refer to connections, and specify that this is an average at the group level.

It means that when you calculate connectivity matrices (often referred to as a network in the literature) using the common approach, X% of the connections in the band of interest are here although there are no oscillations that can be seen on the spectra, which amounts to correlating the aperiodic part of the signal. This is explained in the paper.

4. what's the rationale of extracting "networks" from full correlation matrices? What does "efficency", or "shortest path", or "centrality" means when computed on a thresholded correlation matrix?<br /> The fact that these quantities can be defined does not mean that they are meaningful. And if they do correlate with something interesting, is most likely because they are connected to (local) spectral features, see https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1746809419303416 and https://pubpeer.com/publications/0732054EAAF1E3BC7C8248A8296CFC <br /> The only reason we looked at these metrics is that they are commonly used in the literature to infer network properties and to try to find relevant biomarkers based on FC calculation. Again, our goal was to show that what is usually done can be biased by the fact that oscillations are not present everywhere at every time, not to discuss the relevance or meaningfulness of each metric.

5. What is the justification to the fact that the 95% of connections that you threshold away are "spurious"? Just based on the value? This seems off. And this artificial sparsification of the matrix conflate the thresholding issue with the oscillatory vs 1/f issue.<br /> This is based on the literature. Again, this was done only to reproduce usual pipelines. The relevance of thresholding or not a FC matrix is irrelevant to what we did. Besides, whether matrices were 95%-thresholded or not did not change anything about the presence/absence or oscillations and thus to the message of our paper.

6. speaking of "conflating", you write of oscillations "conflated by aperiodic activity". Do you mean "inflated by" or "conflated with"?<br /> We mean “conflated” in the sense that traditional filtering / wavelet approaches contain a mix of – often mostly – aperiodic activity, with oscillations.

7. There's a sentence on covariance matrix computed in the pre-stimulus part, but it's not clear how this is used, and why a stimulus is relevant here. Maybe just a leftover from a study investigating some stimulus activity.<br /> Indeed this was an error that we corrected in the final version of the paper.

In summary, many of the issues raised reflect well-known challenges in EEG analysis, but they do not undermine the core contribution of the manuscript. On the contrary, they underscore the need for explicitly accounting for aperiodic activity when interpreting FC and derived network measures, which is precisely the motivation and conclusion of our work.

On 2026-03-02 19:25:17, user Jose Agosto Rivera wrote:

How can I find the supplementary methods mentioned in the text. For instance, the article says "Detailed strain information and culturing protocols are provided in Supplementary methods, section 1." But I can not find this section.

On 2026-03-01 19:38:26, user Samir Ghadiali wrote:

I would like to point out that our group has already used a mannose-functionalized LNP to preferentially delivery mir-146a to mice and shown that it is superior to unfunctionalized LNP in a hemmoraghic shock induced model of ARDS and ventilation induced lung injury. The authors should at minimum cite our work.<br /> https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsnano.3c01814

On 2026-02-28 00:29:09, user Liliana Florea wrote:

This final version of this article has been published in the NAR Genomics and Bioinformatics Journal: https://academic.oup.com/nargab/article/7/4/lqaf140/8313458 <br /> https://doi.org/10.1093/nargab/lqaf140

On 2026-02-27 21:14:36, user Christoph Baumann wrote:

This preprint has now been published in a revised form in The EMBO Journal. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44318-026-00711-5

Best wishes, Christoph Baumann

On 2026-02-27 20:27:06, user molviro wrote:

Title: Questions regarding adjuvant formulations, biophysical stability, and structural flexibility

Comment:This preprint presents a very interesting approach to structure-based vaccine design using AI-driven scaffolding. However, while reviewing the data, a few critical methodological and biophysical questions arose that would greatly benefit from the authors' clarification:

1. Difference in adjuvant formulations between efficacy and safety models: In Figure 2, the protective efficacy and immunogenicity of aRF6 were evaluated using a combination of Alum (50 µg) and poly(I:C) (50 µg). However, in the ERD challenge model (Figure 3), the formulation was changed to Alum alone (50 µg) without the Th1-biasing poly(I:C).Could the authors clarify why different adjuvant conditions were used? It would be highly informative to see the FRNT50 titers and viral challenge protection data for aRF6 using Alum alone, or conversely, the ERD pathology results using the Alum + poly(I:C) formulation. This would help rule out the possibility that the lack of ERD is tied to reduced overall immunogenicity under the Alum-only condition.

2. Visualization of neutralization titers:In Figure 2b, the FRNT50 titers are plotted on a log2 scale. While visually the difference appears moderate, a roughly 3-log difference on this scale translates to an approximately 8-fold reduction in actual neutralizing titers for aRF6 compared to the full-length stabilized pre-F. Given this substantial drop, are there plans to further optimize the scaffold to bridge this efficacy gap while maintaining the safety profile?

3. Solution-state stability and structural flexibility:The cryo-EM data is impressive, but it shows that the critical Site Ø epitope has an RMSD of 1.296 Å compared to the pre-F head, with the top loop remaining unresolved due to flexibility. This structural wobbiness in the primary neutralizing epitope might explain the 8-fold drop in neutralization efficacy.Additionally, given that several initial candidates failed to express or bind (Extended Data Fig. 2), is there any biophysical data available (such as Tm from DSF/nanoDSF, or SEC-MALS) demonstrating the actual thermodynamic stability of the purified aRF6 trimer in solution at $37C

Thank you for sharing this intriguing work, and I look forward to your insights.

On 2026-02-27 19:48:04, user Bruno Rezende Souza wrote:

The peer-reviewed published article "The gold standard control groups in physiological and pharmacological research are not that shiny: Intraperitoneal saline injection and needle pricking affect prepubescent mice's behavior in a sex-specific manner" ( https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yhbeh.2025.105707) is the final version of the preprint "Beyond control: experimental control protocol slightly affects prepubescent mice behavior in a sex-specific manner" ( https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.04.06.487373) .

On 2026-02-27 15:31:24, user Donna Marshall wrote:

I recently came across your fascinating research on berberine as a promising modulator of mitochondrial permeability transition pore (mPTP) dynamics, and its potential therapeutic application for SPG7 and other related disorders.

Given your findings, I am curious about how berberine's role as a mitochondrial inhibitor aligns with its ability to support physiological flickering of the mPTP. Could you elaborate on the mechanisms by which berberine facilitates this transition, despite its inhibitory characteristics?

Additionally, how does berberine's action compare to other agents like BZ423 in terms of efficacy and safety for promoting mPTP dynamics?

Thank you for your groundbreaking work and for considering my questions. I look forward to your insights.

On 2026-02-27 10:46:43, user Chris Khadgi Sørensen wrote:

How do the authors know that this isolate belongs to Puccinia striiformis f. sp. hordei.? I see no evidence of that in the manuscript. Normally you would do a phylogenetic study and/or an infection study to confirm this.

On 2026-02-26 03:58:38, user Petra Youssef wrote:

Hello!

I enjoyed reading this paper, and found it to be interesting and comprehensive. I appreciated that you included many types of controls to evaluate MedDiet anti-tumor effects. However, there are a few comments have about the paper, in particular to the figures and statistical analysis.

Some figures were inconsistently labeled relative to the descriptions provided in the text.

For example, in Figure 1, Figure 1D is described to be "female C57BL/6 mice bearing MC38 colon carcinoma." However in the figure, it is labeled as male mice MCA205 sarcoma. In Fig 1E., it is described to represent "male C57BL/6 mice bearing 1299<br /> MCA205 sarcoma" but the figure shows female bearing MC38 colon cancer. I assume that there was a mistake in the labeling of the images, that led to this inconsistency in labeling, however clarification would be helpful.

In Figure 3F, there seems to be a discrepancy between the figure and the written results. The figure shows a significance between E.coli intervention and B. thetaiotaomicron, indicating that E.coli leads to decreased tumor size, not B. thetaiotaomicron.

Additionally, because the colors to distinguish between Ecoli (orange) and B. thetaiotaomicron (red) are very similar, it can become confusing trying to distinguish between the two groups. Perhaps consider changing one of the colors so that the findings are more clear.

Statistical Analysis.<br /> l also had a couple notes about the statistical analysis done in the study. While it's great that many controls were used, many of the groups share similar overlapping components. . For example if we look at these groups: high fiber, high-fiber+olive, high-fiber+soybean, high-fiber+fish, high-fiber+palm, each experimental group has a high fiber component. Because there is overlap between the experimental groups, these are non independent variables, and should be treated as such. Thus, I would suggest conducting statistical analysis with this dependency in mind. For example, you might consider doing a 2-Way ANOVA.

It would also be helpful to specify which test was used to assess normality, as that was not mentioned.

Since many of your conclusions are based on significance, it would be helpful to label which experimental groups were significant or non-significant. While this is done in some figures, such as Figure 2D, it is not done in many others. For example in figure 1C, significance is only mentioned or marked (with ***) if related to the MedDiet. No other diets, such as high fiber, highfiber+olive, high fiber+soybean, or high-fiber+palm, have an indication that they are non-significant or significant. Was a statistical analysis performed on these experimental groups, or just on the MedDiet group? If statistical analysis was preformed on every group, why is it not mentioned or demarcated?

Other than that, I appreciated that you quantified the immunohistochemistry results. In the future,  it may be useful to include a lower-magnification image of the tumor microenvironment in addition to the high-magnification images, allowing readers to better assess overall spatial trends. Also, in figure 2 A and B, different cancer cell lines are used. Is there any reason for that? Would it not be more consistent to stick to just one cell like (ex. MC38)?

Overall, great paper! It was incredibly interesting to read about how something as simple as your diet, can notably aid in anti-tumor responses. Looking forward to your next findings.

On 2026-02-05 07:55:06, user Delna Cherian wrote:

This was a very informative paper. The authors undertook a variety of different experiments, which was impressive, but also may have lessened the quality of their research. While much of the science appeared to be quite convincing, a closer look reveals some inconsistencies between stated findings and figures. I noticed many typos within the legends on the figures, and differences in the experimental process described in words versus the experimental process reflected by figures.

Some things to take note of: in Figure 1, procedures are not clear; when were the measurements taken? Was the glucose checked in the mice? What is the "endpoint" for the experiment, and why does it change from experiment to experiment? Did the mice die or were they sacrificed? Survival curves would also have been appreciated. Furthermore, i believe it would benefit the research to have conducted studies on male and female mice for all conditions, to test for any changes between sex.

In Figure 2, I noticed that different cancer cell lines were utilized in the experimental process, but no explanation was given for why this was the case.

In Figure 3, many of the colors and shapes do not match across panels, which makes it difficult to track the data (ex. for E.coli). Similar to above, the data in Figure 3F does not match the analysis given in the "results" section.

Figure 4 and 5 featured a bubble plot, which presented very informative data, however the paper seemed to focus on aspects of the heat map that were not necessarily proven by the data. For example, the passage states: “This analysis revealed a prominent activation of the tryptophan metabolic pathway in the MedDiet group” (260), but this is not necessarily proven by figure 4; the data shows that there seems to be other metabolic pathways that are upregulated by the MedDiet group than the Tryptophan metabolic pathway. It might be worth considering addressing this issue, to avoid introducing any accidental bias into the findings.

Some other issues that were noticed: it was assumed that the reader had context for this study, but many readers may be coming in to read this paper with no background on the MedDiet. Many acronyms were used without providing appropriate definitions which made it difficult to follow the paper. It seemed as though the paper jumped to many conclusions without providing an accurate backing or "proof". Much of the statistical analyses used in this paper also seemed to be inconsistent.

Some things that can be appreciated about this paper: the authors covered a lot of bases and tried to include many sample groups (different diets, cancer lines, mice sexes, etc.). I appreciate that they tested for reproducibility, at least at the beginning. They also tried to investigate the mechanism of the MedDiet, not just general effects. They also used a variety of different techniques to evaluate their hypothesis: flow cytometry, genomic sequencing, immunohistochemistry, etc.

All things considered, this was a huge undertaking. I am sure that with further review, this could become quite beneficial for the scientific community. Thank you for sharing!

On 2026-02-25 17:33:27, user Ian wrote:

What happens if you swab vagina & swatch it onto the baby's face/nose after C section? Any reduction in inflammatory cytokines? <br /> Perhaps there may be some sort of vaginal-signal or vaginal cells that transfer "information" to the baby?

On 2026-02-24 23:57:18, user Clarissa Yiu wrote:

Hello,

My name is Clarissa, and I am an undergraduate student at UCLA. I enjoyed reading your paper and had a great time discussing it in our journal club. As we were reading and discussing your paper, some comments came up that I would like to share with you!

Figure 1: We felt that it was unclear why you decided to log transform your data for Figure 1A while not doing so for Figure 1B. Log-transforming one set of data but not the other makes it more difficult to compare the two figures. We were also confused about how you log-transformed the data (e.g., natural log, log base 10, log base 2, etc.). Some clarification on your log transformation process would be helpful. In addition, we felt the y-axes in these figures were somewhat misleading because the tick intervals varied across the figures.

Figure 2: We appreciated how you color-coded your data to differentiate the experimental groups. The colors were useful for interpreting the data. However, the colors for the significance bars in Figure 2B were confusing because they were too similar to those used for the experimental groups. We suggest changing the colors of your significance bars to colors different from those used to represent your experimental groups. We were also confused about what exactly “AUC” and “AOC” referred to throughout Figure 2. It may be beneficial to define these acronyms clearly.

Figure S1: We were confused why the data presented in this figure was not included in Figure 2, as it seems like critical data. It may be better to include the data from Figure S1 in Figure 2.

Figure 5: We feel that the shades of gray used in this figure are quite similar and somewhat difficult to differentiate. It may be beneficial to either choose more distinct shades of gray or use different colors instead. We were also confused about why plasma AMH and FSH levels were measured specifically on the first day of diestrus. It may be beneficial to provide a rationale for this choice.

Statistical analysis: The rationale for selecting specific statistical analyses was unclear to us. It would be great if there were more rationale behind your choices!

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed reading your paper and learned a lot from it. Your experiments were well designed. This is a fascinating area of study, and I look forward to reading about any future progress!

On 2026-02-23 07:38:15, user EI YADANAR NAING wrote:

I really enjoyed reading the paper. The experiments are thoughtfully designed and provide compelling evidence on how elevated insulin contributes to reproductive aging and ovarian dysfunction.<br /> The figures are well organized. I appreciated the use of different colors for each experimental group; however, the colors of the asterisks are overlapping with two of the experimental groups, which makes some figures confusing. <br /> Figure 2B includes bars of varying lengths, but it is not clearly specified what the bar length represents. <br /> For figures 2E-N, it would be helpful to explicitly define the terms: AUC and AOC, and specify how these metrics were calculated in the Methods section for reproducibility. While AUC is commonly used, AOC is less standard terminology and would benefit from a clear definition in the figure legend. <br /> FSH and AMH levels were measured specifically during diestrus. Given that the gonadotropin levels fluctuate across the estrous cycle, it would be helpful to clarify the rationale for restricting measurements to this stage.<br /> Overall, an interesting and insightful study. Great work!

On 2026-02-15 04:07:03, user ANDREW AMBROSE wrote:

Overall, I enjoyed reading your paper. I thought your figures were easy to read. Your paper was overall clear and concise. Just a few notes:

Figure 1: I'm a little confused why you decided to show log insulin levels for Figure 1A, but then showed insulin levels in quartiles for Figure 1B. It makes it a little difficult to compare the two figures.

Figure 2: I think how you decided to show statistical significance between groups in Figure 2B was a little confusing. The colors used for the significance bars are similar to some of the colors used to differentiate the genotype and diet groups. It may be beneficial to use different colors for the significance bars to make it clearer which groups are significantly different. Also, with the way the bars are formatted, it looks like it was determined that body mass significantly increased over time, but as I understood it, you didn't test for that. If I'm reading it correctly, then you used bars to show at what time point significant differences began. It may be beneficial to clarify this and make the graph larger so it's easier to interpret.

I'm also a little confused about why you combined data from facilities A and B in Figure 2, but not in the other figures. It may be better to show the data shown in Supplemental Figure 1 in Figure 2.

Aside from that, I felt the bar charts you used made the data easy to read. Interesting paper!

On 2026-02-24 13:44:45, user omer darel wrote:

A peer-reviewed version of this paper was published in Journal of Zoology, and is publicly available on the publisher's website: https://zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jzo.70073

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.70073

On 2026-02-24 12:32:44, user Hugo Verli wrote:

Beautiful work, without doubt point to a likely future of molecular simulations! Two doubts: 1) how the sampling of just BioEmu compares to the BioEmu-MD approach?; and 2) how conventional MD compares on this ensemble? Both from multiple short simulations and a long simulation? Just as a benchmark. Finally, how have you considered the possibility of spurious conformations generated by BioEmu?

On 2026-02-24 10:09:04, user Rafał Krela wrote:

Really nice and thorough work.

I would suggest to change the nomenclature of newly identified protein - there is already different protein CAN1 described in Arabidopsis<br /> https://www.arabidopsis.org/locus?key=36342

On 2026-02-24 06:44:30, user Philip Shaw wrote:

The PF3D7_0811600 gene modified by trangenesis in this study was previously identified as gametocyte egress vesicle protein 1 (GEVP1) that interacts with G377 and MDV1 proteins in proximity labeling experiments performed in P. falciparum gametocytes (Sassmannshausen et al 2024; https://doi.org/10.1111/mmi.15125 ). Although the GEVP1 gene was placed under the control of the glmS ribozyme, no knockdown phenotype was reported.

On 2026-02-23 20:37:09, user Mostafa Aakhte wrote:

This manuscript was published in Nature Biotechnology last year, in November. Please correct the associated link.<br /> Here is the link to the paper:<br /> https://www.nature.com/articles/s41587-025-02882-8

On 2026-02-23 15:09:44, user Julien Y. Dutheil wrote:

This article is now published in the Molecular Ecology Resource journal: https://doi.org/10.1111/1755-0998.70105

On 2026-02-23 00:13:52, user protocelte wrote:

Check out:

A polyplex qPCR-based binding assay for protein–DNA interactions <br /> https://doi.org/10.1039/C2AN35703H

And

Combining RNA–DNA swapping and quantitative polymerase chain reaction for the detection of influenza A nucleoprotein<br /> https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ab.2011.09.009

On 2026-02-22 09:20:02, user Prof. T. K. Wood wrote:

These results are exciting since we have shown phages induce persistence to protect the host (2024, doi 10.1111/1751-7915.14543) and that (p)ppGpp makes persisters by ceasing translation (2000, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbrc.2020.01.102 ), so it makes sense that now it has been found that phages inhibit (p)ppGpp to prevent persistence. Authors should cite the relevant literature.

This is similar to our seminal discovery that toxin/antitoxin systems stop phage in 1996 ( https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jb.178.7.2044-2050.1996) , then phage proteins like antitoxins were found to inhibit TA systems.

On 2026-02-01 09:59:17, user Prof. T. K. Wood wrote:

These results are exciting since we have shown phages induce persistence to protect the host (2024, doi 10.1111/1751-7915.14543) and that (p)ppGpp makes persisters by ceasing translation (2000, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbrc.2020.01.102 ), so it makes sense that now it has been found that phages inhibit (p)ppGpp to prevent persistence. Authors should cite the relevant literature.

This is similar to our seminal discovery that toxin/antitoxin systems stop phage in 1996 ( https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jb.178.7.2044-2050.1996) , then phage proteins like antitoxins were found to inhibit TA systems.

On 2026-02-21 12:02:04, user Fen wrote:

Could you please explain why the "percent indel reads" in supplementary Fig. 2 F and G are on different scales? It seems that you improved the efficiency by at least 10-fold.

On 2026-02-20 17:18:07, user Jérémie Kalfon wrote:

One of the best perturbation papers I have seen! congrats :)

On 2026-02-20 09:51:40, user Meg wrote:

This reads less like a research paper and more like a preliminary note: the motivation is underdeveloped, the introduction is largely missing, and the results are difficult to evaluate because they appear presented without sufficient context. Overall, it is unclear why this was released and framed as a “paper.”

On 2026-01-23 11:49:36, user Jay wrote:

The text invokes “phasic activation” and “phasic dopamine transients,” yet never measures neuronal firing or dopamine release, in practice, only a light train is applied, and its relationship to actual in vivo phasic dopamine transients is left entirely unvalidated. The Introduction likewise fails to clarify this conceptual and mechanistic gap and is, in addition, noticeably out of step with recent work on subsecond dopamine dynamics and their behavioral relevance.

On 2026-02-20 03:05:27, user YN wrote:

Thanks for the comment, and we apologize for the delayed reply. The apparent discrepancy arises because, in OCP holoproteins, the extinction coefficient at 280 nm cannot be attributed solely to the protein component. The carotenoid chromophore also exhibits significant absorption in the UV region, including at 280 nm; therefore, the A280/A476 ratio differs from that expected for the apoprotein alone. Although the exact extinction coefficient of the carotenoid within the protein at 280 nm is not precisely known, its contribution increases the absorbance at 280 nm and affects the apparent relationship between protein concentration and the absorption at 476 nm. When this contribution is taken into account, the measured absorbance values are consistent with a predominantly holoprotein sample rather than a ~50% apo/holoprotein mixture.

On 2026-02-19 17:37:07, user Salvador Herrando Pérez wrote:

"In an analysis of a dataset of over 100,000 radiocarbon dates from Holarctic large-bodied mammal collagen, Herrando-Pérez and Stafford (2025) shed light on data curatorial shortfalls, in which they found that unpublished pretreatment information (50% in their dataset) was often challenging to trace when laboratories were directly approached, emphasising the importance of effective data reporting at the outset"

We screened >100,000 radiocarbon records. However, the 50% absence of pretreatment information applies specifically to the subset of >11,000 radiocarbon dates included in our final dataset (MEGA14C; https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.27826200 <br /> ), as these met our pretreatment criteria. For this 50%, we collated previously unpublished pretreatment information, along with other missing data such as the dated bone element, DNA-radiocarbon date concordance and taxonomic identity.

Salvador Herrando-Pérez (salherra@gmail.com)

On 2026-02-19 01:44:58, user Eric wang wrote:

I wanted to ask if you are planning to test L1 lysate or L4 lysate in the future. They may have effects that are comparable to, or even better than, those observed with Day 1 adult worm lysate.