Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors established a new virtual reality place preference task. On the task, rats, which were body-restrained on top of a moveable Styrofoam ball and could move through a circular virtual environment by moving the Styrofoam ball, learnt to navigate reliably to a high-reward location over a low-reward location, using allocentric visual cues arranged around the virtual environment.<br /> The authors also showed that functional inhibition by bilateral microinfusion of the GABA-A receptor agonist muscimol, which targeted the dorsal or intermediate hippocampus, disrupted task performance. The impact of functional inhibition targeting the intermediate hippocampus was more pronounced than that of functional inhibition targeting the dorsal hippocampus.<br /> Moreover, the authors demonstrated that the same manipulations did not significantly disrupt rats' performance on a virtual reality task that required them to navigate to a spherical landmark to obtain reward, although there were numerical impairments in the main performance measure and the absence of statistically significant impairments may partly reflect a small sample size (see under Weaknesses, point 3.).

Overall, the study established a new virtual-reality place preference task for rats and established that performance on this task requires the dorsal to intermediate hippocampus. It also established that task performance is more sensitive to the same muscimol infusion when the infusion was applied to the intermediate hippocampus, compared to the dorsal hippocampus. The authors suggest that these differential effects of muscimol infusions reflect that dorsal hippocampus is responsible for 'precise' spatial navigation and intermediate hippocampus for place-value associations, but this idea remains to be tested by further studies. In their first revision to the paper, the authors toned down this claim, but I still think it would be good to consider more explicitly potential alternative explanations for the differential effects of dorsal and intermediate muscimol infusions (see under Weaknesses, point 2.).

Strengths:

(1) The authors established a new place preference task for body-restrained rats in a virtual environment and, using temporary pharmacological inhibition by intra-cerebral microinfusion of the GABA-A receptor agonist muscimol, showed that task performance requires dorsal to intermediate hippocampus.

(2) These findings extend our knowledge about place learning tasks that require dorsal to intermediate hippocampus and add to previous evidence that the intermediate hippocampus may be more important than other parts of the hippocampus, including the dorsal hippocampus, for goal-directed navigation based on allocentric place memory.

(3) The hippocampus-dependent task may be useful for future recording studies examining how hippocampal neurons may support behavioral performance based on place information.

Weaknesses:

(1) The new findings do not strongly support the authors' suggestion that dorsal hippocampus is responsible for precise spatial navigation and intermediate hippocampus for place-value associations (e.g., final sentence of the first paragraph of the Discussion). The authors base this claim on differential effects of the dorsal and intermediate hippocampal muscimol infusions on different performance measures on the virtual reality place preference task. More specifically, dorsal hippocampal muscimol infusion significantly increased perimeter crossings and perimeter crossing deviations, whereas other measures of task performance are not significantly changed, including departure direction and visits to the high-value location. However, these statistical outcomes offer only limited evidence that dorsal hippocampal infusion specifically affected the perimeter crossing, without affecting the other measures. Numerically the pattern of infusion effects is quite similar across these various measures: intermediate hippocampal infusions markedly impaired these performance measures compared to vehicle infusions, and the values of these measures after dorsal hippocampal muscimol infusion were between the values in the intermediate hippocampal muscimol and the vehicle condition (Figs 5-7). In my opinion, these findings could reflect that dorsal and intermediate hippocampus play distinct roles, as suggested by the authors, but the findings are also consistent with the suggestion that intermediate hippocampal muscimol had a quantitatively stronger, but qualitatively similar effect to dorsal hippocampal muscimol. However, I am largely content with the authors acknowledging within the paper that their suggestion would need to be confirmed by additional studies.

Moreover, I do not find it clearly described in the paper which distinct aspects of navigation the departure direction and perimeter crossing deviation measures capture. The authors suggest that departure direction and perimeter crossing deviation are indices of the navigational efficiency and precision of navigation, respectively (e.g., from p. 7, line 195). However, both departure direction and perimeter crossing deviation measure how accurate/precise, in other words 'close to the target', the rat's navigation is. Efficiency of navigation may rather be reflected by the path length taken (a measure that was not reported). It appears to me that a key difference between the two measures is that departure direction measures the rat's direction towards the goal at the beginning of the rat's navigational path, whereas perimeter crossing deviation measures this further toward the end of the navigational path. This would suggest that departure direction may depend more on directional orienting mechanisms early on in the rat's journey, whereas perimeter crossing deviation may also depend on fine-grained place recognition as the rat approaches the goal. Given the fine-grained place representations in the dorsal hippocampus, the latter may, therefore, depend more on the dorsal hippocampus than the former. I think this would fit with the authors' suggestion 'that the dHP represents a fine-scaled spatial map of an environment' (p. 18, first line). If the authors agree with my interpretation of the different measures, they may consider clarifying this in the Results and Discussion sections.

(2) The claim that the different effects of intermediate and dorsal hippocampal muscimol infusions reflect different functions of intermediate and dorsal hippocampus rests on the assumption that both manipulations inhibit similar volumes of hippocampal tissue to a similar extent, but at different levels along the dorso-ventral axis of the hippocampus. However, this is not a foregone conclusion (e.g., drug spread may differ depending on the infusion site or drug effects may differ due to differential distribution or efficiency of GABA-A receptors), and the authors do not provide direct evidence for this assumption. Therefore, an alternative account of the weaker effects of dorsal compared to intermediate hippocampal muscimol infusions on place-preference performance is that the dorsal infusions affect less hippocampal volume or less markedly inhibit neurons within the affected volume than the intermediate infusions (e.g., due to different drug spread following dorsal and intermediate infusions or due to different distribution or effectiveness of GABA-A receptors in dorsal and intermediate hippocampus). I would recommend that the authors explicitly state this limitation in the limitations section of the Discussion. In their response to my original comments, the authors argue that it is unlikely that muscimol exerts stronger effects in intermediate compared to dorsal hippocampus, based on the finding that in vitro paired pulse inhibition is reduced in ventral compared to dorsal hippocampal slices (Papatheodoropoulos et al., 2002). However, this claim is not strongly supported by the in vitro paired-pulse inhibition findings. First, these findings relate to differences between dorsal and ventral hippocampus, whereas differences between dorsal and intermediate hippocampus were not investigated. Second, reduced paired pulse inhibition may not necessarily reflect reduced GABA-A receptor expression/efficiency (which would be likely to reduce muscimol effects), but may also reflect reduced GABAergic input, which would not be expected to reduce muscimol effects.

(3) It is good that the authors included a comparison/control experiment using a spherical beacon-guided navigation task, to examine the specific psychological mechanisms disrupted by the hippocampal manipulations. However, the sample size for the comparison experiment (n=5 rats) was lower than for the main study (n=8 rats, and the data shown in Fig. 8 suggest that the comparison task may be affected by the hippocampal manipulations similarly to the place-preference task, albeit less markedly. This effect may well have been significant if the same sample size had been used as in the main experiment. Therefore, I would recommend that the authors acknowledge this limitation in the Discussion (perhaps, in the Limitation section).

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors propose to invert a mechanistic model of phototransduction in mouse and rod photoreceptors to derive stimuli that compensate for nonlinearities in these cells. They fit the model to a large set of photoreceptor recordings, and show in additional data that the compensation works. This can allow to exclude photoreceptors as a source of nonlinear computation in the retina, as desired to pinpoint nonlinearties in retinal computation. The recordings made by the authors are impressive and I appreciate the simplicity and elegance of the idea. The data support the authors conclusions.

Strengths:

- The authors collected an impressive set of recordings from mouse and primate photoreceptors, which is very challenging to obtain.<br /> - The other proposes to exploit mechanistic mathematical models of a well understood phototransduction to design light stimuli which compensate for nonlinearities.<br /> - The authors demonstrate through additional experiments that their proposed approach works and is useful for offering insights into retinal computation.<br /> - The biophysical modeling approach is well described.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors attempted to understand the effect of Spns1 deficiency in the brain using a brain-specific knockout mouse model. Basic phenotyping of the brain KO line was performed that included mass spectroscopy for lipids, metabolomics, mass spec imaging of brain tissue, and some histology. Similar methods were used for characterising the liver KO model. The main findings supported by the data are that brain KO results in hypomyelinated brains, brain KO mice presented with symptoms akin to epilepsy, and postnatal lethality at 5 weeks of age. In addition, biochemical studies showed that brain KO mice had significant accumulation in whole brain lysates of the lysolipids LPC and LPE and sphingosine with reduced levels of ceramide, sphingomyelin, and sulfatide. Some of the substantial claims made by the authors in an attempt to provide a mechanistic understanding of the data are not strongly supported by experimental data. Some of the major concerns are that the authors claim hypomyelination is not caused by changes in oligodendrocyte differentiation, but experimental evidence to support this was not provided. The authors also claim that hypomyelination and other neurological phenotypes are caused by reduced sphingosine transport by Spns1 leading to reduced sphingolipid synthesis. However, this conclusion is not supported by experimental data and the authors do not address other equally plausible hypotheses.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Floeder and colleagues measure dopamine signaling in the nucleus accumbens core using fiber photometry of the dLight sensor, in Pavlovian and instrumental tasks in mice. They test some predictions from a recently proposed model (ANCCR) regarding the existence of "ramps" in dopamine that have been seen in some previous research, the characteristics of which remain poorly understood.

They find that cues signaling a progression toward rewards (akin to a countdown) specifically promote ramping dopamine signaling in the nucleus accumbens core, but only when the intertrial interval just experienced was short. This work is discussed in the context of ongoing theoretical conceptions of dopamine's role in learning.

Strengths:

This work is the clearest demonstration to date of concrete training factors that seem to directly impact whether or not dopamine ramps occur. The existence of ramping signals has long been a feature of debates in the dopamine literature and this work adds important context to that. Further, as a practical assessment of the impact of a relatively simple trial structure manipulation on dopamine patterns, this work will be important for guiding future studies. These studies are well done and thoughtfully presented.

Weaknesses:

It remains somewhat unclear what limits are in place on the extent to which an eligibility trace is reflected in dopamine signals. In the current study, a specific set of ITIs was used, and one wonders if the relative comparison of ITI/history variables ("shorter" or "longer") is a factor in how the dopamine signal emerges, in addition to the explicit length ("short" or "long") of the ITI. Another experimental condition, where variable ITIs were intermingled, could perhaps help clarify some remaining questions.

In both tasks, cue onset responses are larger, and longer on long ITI trials. One concern is that this larger signal makes seeing a ramp during the cue-reward interval harder, especially with a fluorescence method like photometry. Examining the traces in Figure 1i - in the long, dynamic cue condition the dopamine trace has not returned to baseline at the time of the "ramp" window onset, but the short dynamic trace has. So one wonders if it's possible the overall return to baseline trend in the long dynamic conditions might wash out a ramp.

Not a weakness of this study, but the current results certainly make one ponder the potential function of cue-reward interval ramps in dopamine (assuming there is a determinable function). In the current data, licking behavior was similar on different trial types, and that is described as specifically not explaining ramp activity.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Recent work in systems neuroscience has highlighted the importance of studying the populations of neurons during naturalistic behaviors, which necessitates the use of cutting-edge devices in freely moving animals. However, it has been costly and experimentally difficult to conduct such experiments. In response to this need, Horan et al. developed and thoroughly tested a system called Repix which allows neuroscientists to record from multiple brain areas in freely moving rodents over many days, even weeks. The authors show that this device enables reasonably stable long-term recordings and that the probe can be reused for different experiments.

Strengths:

I deeply appreciated how thoroughly the authors have tested this across labs and different versions of Neuropixels probes (and even other probes). This is unlike many other papers that describe similar devices, which have almost always only been developed and tested in one lab. As such, I think that the Repix device and procedure are very likely to be adopted by even more labs given the robustness of the evidence provided here. The willingness of the authors to allow others to test their device, iterate on the design, and obtain feedback from users is a shining example of how open science and publication should be conducted: with patience and diligence. I'm grateful to the authors for providing this example to the research community.

On a related note, in the discussion, the authors nicely summarize their focus on ease-of-adoption and highlight other examples from the community that have been successful. I would encourage the authors to think about what else - culturally, economically, etc. -- has been helpful in the open science adoption of software and hardware for electrophysiology, and to think critically about what these movements are still lacking or missing. Given the authors' collective experience in this effort, I believe the broader community would benefit from their perspective.

The final strength of this manuscript is the highly detailed protocol that has itself been peer-reviewed by many users and can be adapted for multiple use cases. The authors also provide specific protocols from individual labs in the main manuscript.

Weaknesses:

(1) Claims about longevity. Given the clear drop-off in units in the amygdala and V1, I felt that the claims about long-term stability (particularly at the one-year mark) were oversold. Readers should note the differences between the length of the curves in Figure 3B, and take these differences into consideration when setting expectations on the durability of these probes for recordings in V1 or the amygdala (and possibly nearby areas).

(2) Clarity around curve fitting, statistics, and impact of surgical procedures. I believe the manuscript could benefit from more detail around the curve fitting that was implemented, as well as some of the statistical tests, particularly related to the dexamethasone experiments. It seems the authors fit exponential decay to the unit curves over time, but it is not clear that this kind of fit makes sense given the data, which is a bit hard to see. Relatedly, there is a claim on page 10 about the similarity between mouse and rat decay constants in the amygdala which is hard to evaluate without quantitative evidence.

It is very useful to know that dexamethasone (an anti-inflammatory used by many labs) could improve stability, however, a more thorough explanation of these experiments is warranted. For example, it should be noted that the dexamethasone animals start with a much higher unit yield. Also, the decay in Figure 5e looks similar between dex and non-dex animals despite the claims in the text that the "decay of unit numbers was slower." Additional details about the curve fitting and statistical tests are needed for readers to evaluate this claim.

DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-05428-3

Resource: (BDSC Cat# 9108,RRID:BDSC_9108)

Curator: @maulamb

SciCrunch record: RRID:BDSC_9108

What is this?

DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-05428-3

Resource: (BDSC Cat# 35568,RRID:BDSC_35568)

Curator: @maulamb

SciCrunch record: RRID:BDSC_35568

What is this?

DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-05428-3

Resource: BDSC_15000

Curator: @maulamb

SciCrunch record: RRID:BDSC_15000

What is this?

DOI: 10.1038/s42003-023-05428-3

Resource: BDSC_24152

Curator: @maulamb

SciCrunch record: RRID:BDSC_24152

What is this?

DOI: 10.1038/s44318-024-00115-3

Resource: (Thermo Fisher Scientific Cat# A-11001, RRID:AB_2534069)

Curator: @evieth

SciCrunch record: RRID:AB_2534069

What is this?

DOI: 10.1038/s44318-024-00115-3

Resource: (Thermo Fisher Scientific Cat# A-11006, RRID:AB_2534074)

Curator: @evieth

SciCrunch record: RRID:AB_2534074

What is this?

DOI: 10.1038/s44318-024-00115-3

Resource: (Thermo Fisher Scientific Cat# A-11034, RRID:AB_2576217)

Curator: @evieth

SciCrunch record: RRID:AB_2576217

What is this?

DOI: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-4023897/v1

Resource: (Jackson ImmunoResearch Labs Cat# 109-136-170, RRID:AB_2337695)

Curator: @evieth

SciCrunch record: RRID:AB_2337695

What is this?

DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2024.110149

Resource: ZFIN_ZDB-GENO-180906-3

Curator: @scibot

SciCrunch record: RRID:ZFIN_ZDB-GENO-180906-3

What is this?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Lu et al. describe Vangl2 as a negative regulator of inflammation in myeloid cells. The primary mechanism appears to be through binding p65 and promoting its degradation, albeit in an unusual autolysosome/autophagy dependent manner. Overall, these findings are novel, valuable and the crosstalk of PCP pathway protein Vangl2 with NF-kappaB is of interest. While generally solid, some concerns still remain about the rigor and conclusions drawn.

Comments on the revised version:

Lu et al. address my comments through responses and new experimental data. However, some of the explanations provided are inadequate.

The new experimental data using phosphomutants indeed adds to their claim that this is a PCP-independent function of Vangl2.

The addition of statistics and testing JNK pathway is appreciated by this Reviewer.

However, in response to my enquiry regarding directly exploring PCP effects, the authors simply assert "Our study revealed that Vangl2 recruits the E3 ubiquitin ligase PDLIM2 to facilitate K63-linked ubiquitination of p65, which is subsequently recognized by autophagy receptor NDP52 and then promotes the autophagic degradation of p65. Our findings by using autophagy inhibitors and autophagic-deficient cells indicate that Vangl2 regulates NFkB signaling through a selective autophagic pathway, rather than affecting the PCP pathway, WNT, HH/GLI, Fat-Dachsous or even mechanical tension."

I do not agree that the use of autophagy inhibitors and autophagy-deficient cells can rule out the contributions of PCP or any other pathways. Only experimentally inhibiting the pathway(s) with adequate demonstration of target inhibition/abolition of well-known effector function and documenting unaltered p65 regulation under these conditions can be considered proof. Autophagy inhibitors and autophagy-deficient cells only prove that this particular pathway is necessary. Nonetheless, I do not want to dwell on proving a negative and agree that Vangl2 is a novel regulator of p65 through its role in promoting p65 degradation. The inclusion of a statement discussing the limitations of their approach would have sufficed. The response from the authors could have been better.

I am also not satisfied with the explanation that "immune cells represent a minor fraction of the lungs and liver". There are lots of resident immune cells in the lungs and liver (alveolar macrophages in the lung and Kuppfer cells in the liver). For example, it may be so that Vangl2 is important in monocytes and not in the resident population. This might be a potential explanation. But this is not explored. The restricted tissue-specificity of the interaction between two ubiquitously present proteins is still a challenge to understand. The response from the authors is not satisfactory. There is plenty of Vangl2 in the liver in their western blot.

I had also simply pointed out PMID: 34214490 with reference to the findings described in the manuscript. There were no suggestions of contradiction. In fact, I would refer to the publication in discussion to support the findings and stress the novelty. The response from the authors could have been better.

The response to my enquiry regarding homo- or heterozygosity is unsupported by any reference or data.

The listing of 8 patients and healthy controls are also appreciated. The body temperature of #6 doesn't fall in the <36 or >38 degree C SIRS criteria. The inclusion of CRP, PCT, heart rate and respiratory rate, and other lab values would have further improved the inclusion criteria. Moreover, it is difficult to understand why there are 16 value points for healthy and sepsis cohorts in Fig 1 when there are 8 patients.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

This is an interesting paper that defines E2 and E3 genes in Drosophila that can impact the accumulation of the Q72-GFP protein in the fly eye. The authors then focus on the eff gene, showing which human homolog can rescue fly knockdown. They extend to skeletal muscle during natural aging to show that eff by TMT mass spec decreases with age normally in the fly muscle and that there is a significant overlap of proteins that are disrupted with eff knockdown in young animals in muscle vs aged animals normally in muscle.

Overall these data suggest that eff decrease with age may contribute to the increase in ubiquitinated proteins in muscle with age, and that upregulation of eff activity might be of interest to extend lifespan. Because eff function can be performed by a human homologue the findings may also apply to human situations of aging.

These data are overall interesting and of relevance for those interested in neurodegenerative disease and aging.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, the authors report the first evidence of Nav1.5 regulation by a long noncoding RNA, LncRNA-DACH1, and suggest its implication in the reduction in sodium current observed in heart failure. Since no direct interaction is observed between Nav1.5 and the LncRNA, they propose that the regulation is via dystrophin and targeting of Nav1.5 to the plasma membrane.

Strengths:

(1) First evidence of Nav1.5 regulation by a long noncoding RNA.<br /> (2) Implication of LncRNA-DACH1 in heart failure and mechanisms of arrhythmias.<br /> (3) Demonstration of LncRNA-DACH1 binding to dystrophin.<br /> (4) Potential rescuing of dystrophin and Nav1.5 strategy.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

In the manuscript entitled "Embryonic Origins of Forebrain Oligodendrocytes Revisited by Combinatorial Genetic Fate Mapping," Cai et al. used an intersectional/subtractional strategy to genetically fate-map the oligodendrocyte populations (OLs) generated from medial ganglionic eminence (NKX2.1+), lateral ganglionic eminences, and dorsal progenitor cells (EMX1+). Specifically, they generated an OL-expressing reporter mouse line OpalinP2A-Flpo-T2A-tTA2 and bred with region-specific neural progenitor-expressing Cre lines EMX1-Cre for dOL and NKX2.1-Cre for MPOL. They used a subtractional strategy in the OpalinFlp::Emx1Cre::Nkx2.1Cre::RC::FLTG mouse line to predict the origins of OLs from lateral/caudal ganglionic eminences (LC). With their genetic tools, the authors concluded that neocortical OLs primarily consist of dOLs. Although the populations of OLs (dOLs or MP-OLs) from Emx1+ or Nkx2.1+ progenitors are largely consistent with previous findings, they observed that MP-OLs contribute minimally but persist into adulthood without elimination as in the previous report (PMID: 16388308).

Intriguingly, by using an indirect subtraction approach, they hypothesize that both Emx1-negative and Nkx2.1-negative cells represent the progenitors from lateral/caudal ganglionic eminences (LC), and conclude that neocortical OLs are not derived from the LC region. This is in contrast to the previous observation for the contribution of LC-expressing progenitors (marked by Gsx2-Cre) to neocortical OLs (PMID: 16388308). The authors claim that Gsh2 is not exclusive to progenitor cells in the LC region (PMID: 32234482). However, Gsh2 exhibits high enrichment in the LC during early embryonic development. The presence of a small population of Gsh2-positive cells in the late embryonic cortex could originate/migrate from Gsh2-positive cells in the LC at earlier stages (PMID: 32234482). Consequently, the possibility that cortical OLs derived from Gsh2+ progenitors in LC could not be conclusively ruled out. Notably, a population of OLs migrating from the ventral to the dorsal cortical region was detected after eliminating dorsal progenitor-derived OLs (PMID: 16436615).

The indirect subtraction data for LC progenitors drawn from the OpalinFlp-tdTOM reporter in Emx1-negative and Nkx2.1-negative cells in the OpalinFlp::Emx1Cre::Nkx2.1Cre::RC::FLTG mouse line present some caveats that could influence their conclusion. The extent of activity from the two Cre lines in the OpalinFlp::Emx1Cre::Nkx2.1Cre::RC::FLTG mice remains uncertain. The OpalinFlp-tdTOM expression could occur in the presence of either Emx1Cre or Nkx2.1Cre, raising questions about the contribution of the individual Cre lines. To clarify, the authors should compare the tdTOM expression from each individual Cre line, OpalinFlp::Emx1Cre::RC::FLTG or OpalinFlp::Nkx2.1Cre::RC::FLTG, with the combined OpalinFlp::Emx1Cre::Nkx2.1Cre::RC::FLTG mouse line. This comparison is crucial as the results from the combined Cre lines could appear similar to only one Cre line active.

Overall, the authors provided intriguing findings regarding the origin and fate of oligodendrocytes from different progenitor cells in embryonic brain regions. However, further analysis is necessary to substantiate their conclusion about the fate of LC-derived OLs convincingly.

Comments on latest version: The overall responses by the authors are satisfactory.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this work the authors start presenting a multi-strain SIR model in which viruses circulate in an heterogeneous population with different groups characterized by different cross-immunity structures. They argue that this model can be reformulated as a random walk characterized by new variants saturating at intermediate frequencies. Then they recast their microscopic description to an effective formalism in which viral strains lose fitness independently from one another. They study several features of this process numerically and analytically, such as the average variants frequency, the probability of fixation, and the coalescent time. They compare qualitatively the dynamics of this model to variants dynamics in RNA viruses such as flu and SARS-CoV-2

Strengths:

The idea that a vanishing fitness mechanisms that produce partial sweeps may explain important features of flu evolution is very interesting. Its simplicity and potential generality make it a powerful framework. As noted by the authors, this may have important implications for predictability of virus evolution and such a framework may be beneficial when trying to build predictive models for vaccine design. The vanishing fitness model is well analyzed and produces interesting structures in the strains coalescent. Even though the comparison with data is largely qualitative, this formalism would be helpful when developing more accurate microscopic ingredients that could reproduce viral dynamics quantitatively.<br /> This general framework has a potential to be more universal than human RNA viruses, in situations where invading mutants would saturate at intermediate frequencies.

Weaknesses:

The authors build the narrative around a multi-strain SIR model in which viruses circulate in an heterogeneous population, but the connection of this model to the rest of the paper is not well supported by the analysis.<br /> When presenting the random walk coarse-grained description in section 3 of the Results, there is no quantitative relation between the random walk ingredients - importantly P(\beta) - and the SIR model, just a qualitative reasoning that strains would initially grow exponentially and saturate at intermediate frequencies. So essentially any other microscopic description with these two features would give rise to the same random walk.

Currently it's unclear whether the specific choices for population heterogeneity and cross-immunity structure in the SIR model matter for the main results of the paper. In section 2, it seems that the main effect of these ingredients are reduced oscillations in variants frequencies and a rescaled initial growth rate. But ultimately a homogeneous population would also produce steady state coexistence between strains, and oscillation amplitude likely depends on parameters choices. Thus a homogeneous population may lead to a similar coarse-grained random walk.

Similarly, it's unclear how the SIR model relates to the vanishing fitness framework, other than on a qualitative level given by the fact that both descriptions produce variants saturating at intermediate frequencies. Other microscopic ingredients may lead to a similar description, yet with quantitative differences.

At the same time, from the current analysis the reader cannot appreciate the impact of such a mean field approximation where strains lose fitness independently from one another, and under what conditions such assumption may be valid.

In summary, the central and most thoroughly supported results in this paper refer to a vanishing fitness model for human RNA viruses. The current narrative, built around the SIR model as a general work on host-pathogen eco-evolution in the abstract, introduction, discussion and even title, does not seem to match the key results and may mislead readers. The SIR description rather seems one of the several possible models, featuring a negative frequency dependent selection, that would produce coarse-grained dynamics qualitatively similar to the vanishing fitness description analyzed here.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Although insulin release is essential in the control of metabolism, adjusted to nutritional state, and plays major roles in normal brain function as well as in aging and disease, our knowledge about the activity of insulin-producing (and releasing) cells (IPCs) in vivo is limited.

In this technically demanding study, IPC activity is studied in the Drosophila model system by fine in vivo patch clamp recordings with parallel behavioral analyses and optogenetic manipulation.

The data indicate that IPC activity is increased with a slow time course after feeding a high-glucose diet. By contrast, IPC activity is not directly affected by increasing blood glucose levels. This is reminiscent of the incretin effect known from vertebrates and points to a conserved mechanism in insulin production and release upon sugar feeding.

Moreover, the data confirm earlier studies that nutritional state strongly affects locomotion. Surprisingly, IPC activity makes only a negligible contribution to this. Instead, other modulatory neurons that are directly sensitive to blood glucose levels strongly affect modulation. Together, these data indicate a network of multiple parallel and interacting neuronal layers to orchestrate the physiological, metabolic, and behavioral responses to nutritional state. Together with the data from a previous study, this work sets the stage to dissect the architecture and function of this network.

Strengths:

State-of-the-art current clamp in situ patch clamp recordings in behaving animals are a demanding but powerful method to provide novel insight into the interplay of nutritional state, IPC activity, and locomotion. The patch clamp recordings and the parallel behavioral analyses are of high quality, as are the optogenetic manipulations. The data showing that starvation silences IPC activity in young flies (younger than 1 week) are compelling. The evidence for the claim that locomotor activity is not increased upon IPC activity but upon the activity of other blood glucose-sensitive modulatory neurons (Dh44) is strong. The study provides a great system to experimentally dissect the interplay of insulin production and release with metabolism, physiology, and behavior.

Weaknesses:

Neither the mechanisms underlying the incretin effect, nor the network to orchestrate physiological, metabolic, and behavioral responses to nutritional state have been fully uncovered. Without additional controls, some of the conclusions would require significant downtoning. Controls are required to exclude the possibility that IPCs sense other blood sugars than glucose. The claim that IPC activity is controlled by the nutritional state would require that starvation-induced IPC silencing in young animals can be recovered by feeding a normal diet. At current firing in starvation, silenced IPCs can only be induced by feeding a high-glucose diet that lacks other important ingredients and reduces vitality. Therefore, feasible controls are needed to exclude that diet-induced increases in IPC firing rate are caused by stress rather than nutritional changes in normal ranges. The finding that refeeding starved flies with a standard diet had no effect on IPC activity but a strong effect on the locomotor activity of starved flies contradicts the statement that locomotor activity is affected by the same dietary manipulations that affect IPC activity. The compelling finding that starvation induces IPC firing would benefit from determining the time course of the effect. The finding that IPCs are not active in fed animals older than 1 week is surprising and should be further validated.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

A survey of SERBP1-associated functions and their impact on the transcriptome upon gene depletion, as well as the identification of chemical inhibitors upon gene over-expression.

Strengths:

(1) Provides a valuable resource for the community, supported by statistical analyses.

(2) Offers a survey of different processes with correlation data, serving as a good starting point for the community to follow up.

Weaknesses:

(1) The authors provided numerous correlations on diverse topics, from cell division to RNA splicing and PARP1 association, but did not follow up their findings with experiments, offering little mechanistic insight into the actual role of SERBP1. The model in Figure 5D is entirely speculative and lacks data support in the manuscript.

(2) Following up with experiments to demonstrate that their findings are real (e.g., those related to splicing defects and the PARylation/PAR-binding association) would be beneficial. For example, whether the association between PARP1 and SERBP1 is sensitive to PAR-degrading enzymes is unclear.

(3) They did not clearly articulate how experiments were performed. For instance, the drug screen and even the initial experiment involving the pull-down were poorly described. Many in the community may not be familiar with vectors such as pSBP or pUltra without looking up details.

(4) The co-staining of SERBP1 with pTau, PARP1, and G3BP1 in the brain is interesting, but it would be beneficial to follow up with immunoprecipitation in normal and patient samples to confirm the increased physical association.

(5) The combination index of 0.7-0.9 for PJ34 + siSERBP1 is weak. Could this be due to the non-specific nature of the drug against other PARPs? Have the authors looked into this possibility?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This manuscript addresses an important and emerging area of research-the relationship between gut microbiota and age-related gout. The innovative aspect of this research is the demonstration that transplanting gut microbiota from young to aged mice can alleviate gout symptoms and modulate uric acid levels by increasing butyric acid levels. However, significant problems remain in the overall experimental design and manuscript writing.

Some critical comments are provided below:

(1) The data quality still needs to be improved. There are many outliers in the experimental data shown in some figures, e.g. Figure 2D-G. The presence of these outliers makes the results unreliable. The author should thoroughly review the data analysis in the manuscript. In addition, a couple of western blot bands, such as IL-1β in Figure 3C, are not clear enough, please provide clearer western blot results again to support the conclusion.

(2) As shown in Figure 1G-I, foot thickness and IL-1β content in foot tissues of the Aged+Abx group were significantly reduced, but there was no difference in serum uric acid level. In addition, the Abx-untreated group should be included at all ages.

(3) Since FMT (Figure 4) and butyrate supplementation (Figure 8) have different effects on uric acid synthesis enzyme and excretion, different mechanisms may lie behind these two interventions. Transplantation with significantly enriched single strains from young mice, such as Bifidobacterium and Akkermansia, is the more reliable approach to reveal the underlying mechanism between gut microbiota and gout.

(4) In Figure 2F, the results showed the IL-1β, IL-6, and TNF-α content in serum, which was inconsistent with the authors' manuscript description (Line 171).

(5) Figures 2F-H duplicate Supplementary Figures S1B-D. The authors should prepare the article more carefully to avoid such mistakes.

(6) In lines 202-206, the authors stated that the elevated serum uric acid levels in the Young+Old or Young+Aged groups, but there is no difference in the results shown in Figure 4A.

(7) Please visualize the results in Table 2 in a more intuitive manner.

(8) The heatmap in Figure 7A cannot strongly support the conclusion "the butyric acid content in the faeces of Young+PBS group was significantly higher than that in the Aged+PBS group". The author should re-represent the visual results and provide a reasonable explanation. In addition, please provide the ordinate unit of Supplementary Figure 7A-H.

(9) Uncropped original full-length western blot should be provided.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Tutak et al provide interesting data showing that RPS26 and relevant proteins such as TSR2 and RPS25 affect RAN translation from CGG repeat RNA in fragile X-associated conditions. They identified RPS26 as a potential regulator of RAN translation by RNA-tagging system and mass spectrometry-based screening for proteins binding to CGG repeat RNA and confirmed its regulatory effects on RAN translation by siRNA-based knockdown experiments in multiple cellular disease models and patient-derived fibroblasts. Quantitative mass spectrometry analysis found that the expressions of some ribosomal proteins are sensitive to RPS26 depletion while approximately 80% of proteins including FMRP were not influenced. Since the roles of ribosomal proteins in RAN translation regulation have not been fully examined, this study provides novel insights into this research field. However, some data presented in this manuscript are limited and preliminary, and their conclusions are not fully supported.

(1) While the authors emphasized the importance of ribosomal composition for RAN translation regulation in the title and the article body, the association between RAN translation and ribosomal composition is apparently not evaluated in this work. They found that specific ribosomal proteins (RPS26 and RPS25) can have regulatory effects on RAN translation（Figures 1C, 2B, 2C, 2E, 4A, 5A, and 5B), and that the expression levels of some ribosomal proteins can be changed by RPS26 knockdown (Figure 3B, however, the change of the ribosome compositions involved in the actual translation has not been elucidated). Therefore, their conclusive statement, that is, "ribosome composition affects RAN translation" is not fully supported by the presented data and is misleading.

(2) The study provides insufficient data on the mechanisms of how RPS26 regulates RAN translation. Although authors speculate that RPS26 may affect initiation codon fidelity and regulate RAN translation in a CGG repeat sequence-independent manner (Page 9 and Page 11), what they really have shown is just identification of this protein by the screening for proteins binding to CGG repeat RNA (Figure 1A, 1B), and effects of this protein on CGG repeat-RAN translation. It is essential to clarify whether the regulatory effect of RPS26 on RAN translation is dependent on CGG repeat sequence or near-cognate initiation codons like ACG and GUG in the 5' upstream sequence of the repeat. It would be better to validate the effects of RPS26 on translation from control constructs, such as one composed of the 5' upstream sequence of FMR1 with no CGG repeat, and one with an ATG substitution in the 5' upstream sequence of FMR1 instead of near-cognate initiation codons.

(3) The regulatory effects of RPS26 and other molecules on RAN translation have all been investigated as effects on the expression levels of FMRpolyG-GFP proteins in cellular models expressing CGG repeat sequences （Figures 1C, 2B, 2C, 2E, 4A, 5A, and 5B). In these cellular experiments, there are multiple confounding factors affecting the expression levels of FMRpolyG-GFP proteins other than RAN translation, including template RNA expression, template RNA distribution, and FMRpolyG-GFP protein degradation. Although authors evaluated the effect on the expression levels of template CGG repeat RNA, it would be better to confirm the effect of these regulators on RAN translation by other experiments such as in vitro translation assay that can directly evaluate RAN translation.

(4) While the authors state that RPS26 modulated the FMRpolyG-mediated toxicity, they presented limited data on apoptotic markers, not cellular viability (Figure 1E), not fully supporting this conclusion. Since previous work showed that FMRpolyG protein reduces cellular viability (Hoem G et al., Front Genet 2019), additional evaluations for cellular viability would strengthen this conclusion.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors note that negative ruminations can lead to pathological brain states and mood/anxiety dysregulation. They test this idea by using mouse engram-tagging technology to label dentate gyrus ensembles activated during a negative experience (fear conditioning). They show that chronic chemogenetic activation of these ensembles leads to behavioral (increased anxiety, increased fear generalization, reduced fear extinction) and neural (increases in neuroinflammation, microglia and astrocytes).

Strengths:

The question the authors ask here is an intriguing one, and the engram activation approach is a powerful way to address the question. Examination of a wide range of neural and behavioral dependent measures is also a strength.

Weaknesses:

The major weakness is that the authors have found a range of changes that are correlates of chronic negative engram reactivation. However, they do not manipulate these outcomes to test whether microglia, astrocytes, neuroinflammation are causally linked to the dysregulated behaviors.

Reviewer #4 (Public Review):

Summary:

Mason DE et al. have extended their previous study on continuous migration of cells regulated by a feedback loop that controls gene expression by YAP and TAZ. Time scale of the negative feedback loop is derived from the authors' adhesion-spreading-polarization-migration (ASPM) assay. Involvement of transcription-translation in the negative feedback loop is evidenced by the experiments using Actinomycin D. The time scale of mechanotransduction-dependent feedback demonstrated by cytoskeletal alteration in the actinomycin D-treated endothelial colony forming cells (ECFCs) and that shown in the ECFCs depleted of YAP/TAZ by siRNA. The authors examine the time scale when ECFCs are attached to MeHA matrics (soft, moderate, and stiff substrate) and show the conserved time scale among the conditions they use, although instantaneous migration, cell area, and circularity vary. Finally, they tried to confirm that the time scale of the feedback loop-dependent endothelial migration by the effect of washout of Actinomycin D (inhibition of gene transcription), Puromycin (translational inhibition), and Verteporfin (YAP/TAZ inhibitor) on ISV extension during sprouting angiogenesis. They conclude that endothelial motility required for vascular morphogenesis is regulated by mechanotransduction-mediated feedback loop that is dependent on YAP/TAZ-dependent transcriptional regulation.

Strengths:

The authors conduct ASPM assay to find the time scale of feedback when ECFCs attach to three different matrics. They observe the common time scale of feedback. Thus, under very specific conditions they use, the reproducibility is validated by their ASPM assay. The feedback loop mediated by inhibition of gene expression by Actinomycin D is similar to that obtained from YAP/TAZ-depleted cells, suggesting the mechanotranduction might be involved in the feedback loop. The time scale representing infection point might be interesting when considering the continuous motility in cultured endothelial cells, although it might not account for the migration of endothelial cells that is controlled by a wide variety of extracellular cues. In vivo, stiffness of extracellular matrix is merely one of the cues.

Weaknesses:

ASPM assay is based on attachment-dependent phenomenon. The time scale including the inflection point determined by ASPM experiments using cultured cells and the mechanotransduction-based theory do not seem to fit in vivo ISV elongation. Although it is challenging to find the conserved theory of continuous cell motility of endothelial cells, the data is preliminary and does not support the authors' claim. There is no evidence that mechanotransduction solely determines the feedback loop during elongation of ISVs. The points to be addressed are listed in recommendations for the authors.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In Okholm et al., the authors evaluate the functional impact of circHIPK3 in bladder cancer cells. By knocking it down and performing an RNA-seq analysis, the authors found a thousand deregulated genes which look unaffected by miRNAs sponging function and that are, instead, enriched for a 11-mer motif. Further investigations showed that the 11-mer motif is shared with the circHIPK3 and able to bind the IGF2BP2 protein. The authors validated the binding of IGF2BP2 and demonstrated that IGF2BP2 KD antagonizes the effect of circHIPK3 KD and leads to the upregulation of genes containing the 11-mer. Among the genes affected by circHIPK3 KD and IGF2BP2 KD, resulting in downregulation and upregulation respectively, the authors found STAT3 gene which also consistently leads to the concomitant upregulation of one of its targets TP53. The authors propose a mechanism of competition between circHIPK3 and IGF2BP2 triggered by IGF2BP2 nucleation, potentially via phase separation.

Strengths:

The number of circRNAs continues to drastically grow however the field lacks detailed molecular investigations. The presented work critically addresses some of the major pitfalls in the field of circRNAs and there has been a careful analysis of aspects frequently poorly investigated. The time-point KD followed by RNA-seq, investigation of miRNAs-sponge function of circHIPK3, identification of 11-mer motif, identification and validation of IGF2BP2, and the analysis of copy number ratio between circHIPK3 and IGF2BP2 in assessing the potential ceRNA mode of action has been extensively explored and, comprehensively convincing.

Weaknesses:

The authors addressed the majority of the weak points raised initially. However, the role played by the circHIPK3 in cancer remains elusive and not elucidated in full in this study.

Overall, the presented study surely adds some further knowledge in describing circHIPK3 function, its capability to regulate some downstream genes, and its interaction and competition for IGF2BP2. However, whereas the experimental part sounds technically logical, it remains unclear the overall goal of this study and the achieved final conclusions.

This study is a promising step forward in the comprehension of the functional role of circHIPK3. These data could possibly help to better understand the circHIPK3 role in cancer.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations nowadays are an essential element of structural biology investigations, complementing experiments and aiding their interpretation by revealing transient processes or details (such as the effects of glycosylation on the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, for example (Casalino et al. ACS Cent. Sci. 2020; 6, 10, 1722-1734 https://doi.org/10.1021/acscentsci.0c01056) that cannot be observed directly. MD simulations can allow for the calculation of thermodynamic, kinetic, and other properties and the prediction of biological or chemical activity. MD simulations can now serve as "computational assays" (Huggins et al. WIREs Comput Mol Sci. 2019; 9:e1393. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcms.1393). Conceptually, MD simulations have played a crucial role in developing the understanding that the dynamics and conformational behaviour of biological macromolecules are essential to their function, and are shaped by evolution. Atomistic simulations range up to the billion atom scale with exascale resources (e.g. simulations of SARS-CoV-2 in a respiratory aerosol. Dommer et al. The International Journal of High Performance Computing Applications. 2023; 37:28-44. doi:10.1177/10943420221128233), while coarse-grained models allow simulations on even larger length- and timescales. Simulations with combined quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics (QM/MM) methods can investigate biochemical reactivity, and overcome limitations of empirical forcefields (Cui et al. J. Phys. Chem. B 2021; 125, 689 https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcb.0c09898).

MD simulations generate large amounts of data (e.g. structures along the MD trajectory) and increasingly, e.g. because of funder mandates for open science, these data are deposited in publicly accessible repositories. There is real potential to learn from these data en masse, not only to understand biomolecular dynamics but also to explore methodological issues. Deposition of data is haphazard and lags far behind experimental structural biology, however, and it is also hard to answer the apparently simple question of "what is out there?". This is the question that Tiemann et al explore in this nice and important work, focusing on simulations run with the widely used GROMACS package. They develop a search strategy and identify almost 2,000 datasets from Zenodo, Figshare and Open Science Framework. This provides a very useful resource. For these datasets, they analyse features of the simulations (e.g. atomistic or coarse-grained), which provides a useful snapshot of current simulation approaches. The analysis is presented clearly and discussed insightfully. They also present a search engine to explore MD data, the MDverse data explorer, which promises to be a very useful tool.

As the authors state: "Eventually, front-end solutions such as the MDverse data explorer tool can evolve being more user-friendly by interfacing the structures and dynamics with interactive 3D molecular viewers". This will make MD simulations accessible to non-specialists and researchers in other areas. I would envisage that this will also include approaches using interactive virtual reality for an immersive exploration of structure and dynamics, and virtual collaboration (e.g. O'Connor et al., Sci. Adv.4, eaat2731 (2018). DOI:10.1126/sciadv.aat2731)

The need to share data effectively, and to compare simulations and test models, was illustrated clearly in the COVID-19 pandemic, which also demonstrated a willingness and commitment to data sharing across the international community (e.g. Amaro and Mulholland, J. Chem. Inf. Model. 2020, 60, 6, 2653-2656 https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jcim.0c00319; Computing in Science & Engineering 2020, 22, 30-36 doi: 10.1109/MCSE.2020.3024155). There are important lessons to learn here, for simulations to be reproducible and reliable, for rapid testing, for exploiting data with machine learning, and for linking to data from other approaches. Tiemann et al. discuss how to develop these links, providing good perspectives and suggestions.

I agree completely with the statement of the authors that "Even if MD data represents only 1 % of the total volume of data stored in Zenodo, we believe it is our responsibility, as a community, to develop a better sharing and reuse of MD simulation files - and it will neither have to be particularly cumbersome nor expensive. To this end, we are proposing two solutions. First, improve practices for sharing and depositing MD data in data repositories. Second, improve the FAIRness of already available MD data notably by improving the quality of the current metadata."

This nicely states the challenge to the biomolecular simulation community. There is a clear need for standards for MD data and associated metadata. This will also help with the development of standards of best practice in simulations. The authors provide useful and detailed recommendations for MD metadata. These recommendations should contribute to discussions on the development of standards by researchers, funders, and publishers. Community organizations (such as CCP-BioSim and HECBioSim in the UK, BioExcel, CECAM, MolSSI, learned societies etc) have an important part to play in these developments, which are vital for the future of biomolecular simulation.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary

The work represents progress in quantifying the number of Myo10 molecules present in the filopodia tip. It reveals that cells overexpressing fluorescently labeled Myo10 that the tip can accommodate a wide range of Myo10 motors, up to hundreds of molecules per tip.

The revised, expanded manuscript addresses all of this reviewer's original comments. The new data, analysis and writing strengthen the paper. Given the importance of filopodia in many cellular/developmental processes and the pivotal, as yet not fully understood role of Myo10 in their formation and extension, this work provides a new look at the nature of the filopodial tip and its ability to accommodate a large number of Myo10 motor proteins through interactions with the actin core and surrounding membrane.

Specific comments -

(1) One of the comments on the original work was that the analysis here is done using cells ectopically expressing HaloTag-Myo10. The author's response is that cells express a range of Myo10 levels and some metastatic cancer cells, such as breast cancer, have significantly increased levels of Myo10 compared to non-transformed cell lines. It is not really clear how much excess Myo10 is present in those cells compared to what is seen here for ectopic expression in U2OS cells, making a direct correspondence difficult.

In response to comments about the bulbous nature of many filopodia tips the authors point out that similar-looking tips are seen when cells are immunostained for Myo10, citing Berg & Cheney (2002). In looking at those images as well as images from papers examining Myo10 immunostaining in metastatic cancer cells (Arjonen et al, 2014, JCI; Summerbell et al, 2020, Sci Adv) the majority of the filopodia tips appear almost uniformly dot-like or circular. There is not too much evidence of the elongated, bulbous filopodial tips seen here.

However, in reconsidering the approach and results, it is the case that the finding here do establish the plasticity of filopodia tips that can accommodate a surprisingly (shockingly) large number of motors. The authors discuss that their results show that targeting molecules to the filopodia tip is a relatively permissive process (lines 262 - 274). That could be an important property that cells might be able to use to their advantage in certain contexts.

(2) The method for arriving at the intensity of an individual filopodium puncta (starting on line 532 and provided in the Response), and how this is corrected for transfection efficiency and the cell-to-cell variation in expression level is still not clear to this reviewer. The first part of the description makes sense - the authors obtain total molecules/cell based on the estimation on SDS-PAGE using the signal from bound Halo ligand. It then seems that the total fluorescence intensity of each expressing cell analyzed is measured, then summed to get the average intensity/cell. The 'total pool' is then arrived at by multiplying the number of molecules/cell (from SDS-PAGE) by the total number of cells analyzed. After that, then: 'to get the number of molecules within a Myo10 filopodium, the filopodium intensity was divided by the bioreplicate signal intensity and multiplied by 'total pool.' ' The meaning of this may seem simple or straightforward to the authors, but it's a bit confusing to understand what the 'bioreplicate signal intensity' is and then why it would be multiplied by the 'total pool'. This part is rather puzzling at first read.

Since the approach described here leads the authors to their numerical estimates every effort should be made to have it be readily understood by all readers. A flow chart or diagram might be helpful.

(3) The distribution of Myo10 punctae around the cell are analyzed (Fig 2E, F) and the authors state that they detect 'periodic stretches of higher Myo10 density along the plasma membrane' (line 123) and also that there is correlation and anti-correlation of molecules and punctae at opposite ends of the cells.

In the first case, it is hard to know what the authors really mean by the phrase 'periodic stretches'. It's not easy to see a periodicity in the distribution of the punctae in the many cells shown in Supp Fig 3. Also, the correlation/anti-correlation is not so easily seen in the quantification shown in Fig 2F. Can the authors provide some support or clarification for what they are stating?

(4) The authors are no doubt aware that a paper from the Tyska lab that employs a completely different method of counting molecules arrives at a much lower number of Myo10 molecules at the filopodial tip than is reported here was just posted (Fitz & Tyska, 2024, bioRxiv, DOI: 10.1101/2024.05.14.593924).

While it is not absolutely necessary for the authors to provide a detailed discussion of this new work given the timing, they may wish to consider adding a note briefly addressing it.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Baek and colleagues present important follow-up work on the role of serum glucose in the management of neonatal sepsis. The authors previously showed high glucose administration exacerbated neonatal sepsis, while strict glucose control improved outcomes but caused hypoglycemia. In the current report they examined the effect of a more tailored glucose management approach on outcomes and examined hepatic gene expression, plasma metabolome/proteome, blood transcriptome, as well as the the therapeutic impact of hIAIP. The authors leverage multiple powerful approaches to provide robust descriptive accounts of the physiologic changes that occur with this model of sepsis in these various conditions.

Strengths:

(1) Use of preterm piglet model.

(2) Robust, multi-pronged approach to address both hepatic and systemic implications of sepsis and glucose management.

(3) Trial of therapeutic intervention - glucose management (Figure 6), hIAIP (Figure 7).

Weaknesses:

(1) The translational role of the model is in question. CONS is rarely if ever a cause of EOS in preterm neonates. The model. uses preterm pigs exposed at 2 hours of age. This model most likely replicates EOS.

(2) Throughout the manuscript it is difficult to tell from which animals the data are derived. Given the ~90% mortality in the experimental CONS group, and 25% mortality in the intervention group, how are the data from animals "at euthanasia" considered? Meaning - are data from survivors and those euthanized grouped together? This should be clarified as biologically these may be very different populations (ie, natural survivor vs death).

(3) With limited time points (at euthanasia ) for hepatic transcriptomics (Figure 2), plasma metabolite (Figure 3) blood transcriptome (Figure 4), and plasma proteome (Figure 5) it is difficult to make conclusions regarding mechanisms preceding euthanasia. Per methods, animals were euthanized with acidosis or clinical decompensation. Are the reported findings demonstrative of end-organ failure and deterioration leading to death, or reflective of events prior?

(4) Data are descriptive without corresponding "omics" from interventions (glucose management and/or hIAIP) or at least targeted assessment of key differences.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The manuscript by Dajka and co-workers reports the application of a biophysical approach to analyse the dynamics of the LptB2FG-C ABC transporter, involved in LPS transport across the cell envelope in Escherichia coli. LptB2FG-C belongs to a new class of ABC transporters (type VI) and is essential and conserved in several Gram-negative pathogens. Since LPS is the major component of the outer membrane of the Gram-negative cell and is responsible for the low permeability of this membrane to several antibiotics, a deep understanding of the mechanism and function of the LptB2FG-C transporter is crucial for the development of new drugs targeting Gram-negative pathogens.

Several structural studies have been published so far on the LptB2FG-C transporter, disclosing important aspects of the transport mechanism; nevertheless, lack of resolution of some regions of the individual proteins as well as the dynamic nature of the transport mechanism per se (e.g. the insertion and removal of the TM helix of LptC from the TMDs of the transporter during the LPS transport cycle) has greatly limited the understanding of the mechanism that couples ATP binding and hydrolysis with LPS transport. This knowledge gap could be filled by applying an approach that allows the analysis of dynamic processes. The DEER/PELDOR technique applied in this work fits well with this requirement.

Strengths:

In this study, the authors provide some new pieces of information on the LptB2FG-C function and the role of LptC in the transporter. Notably, they show that:

-there is high heterogeneity in the conformational states of the entry gate of LPS in the transporter (gate-2) that are reduced by the insertion of LptC, and the heterogeneity observed is not altered by ATP binding or hydrolysis (as expected since LPS entry is ATP-independent).

-ATP binding induces an allosteric opening of LptF β-jellyroll domain that allows for LPS passage to the β-jellyroll of LptC, which is stably associated with the β-jellyroll of LptF throughout the cycle.

- the β-jellyroll of LptG is highly flexible, indicating an involvement in the LPS transport cycle.

The manuscript is timely and overall clear.

Weaknesses:

I list my concerns below and provide suggestions that, in my opinion, should be addressed to reinforce the findings of this study.

(1) Protein complex controls: the authors assess the ATPase activity of the spin-labelled variants of their protein complexes to rule out the possibility that engineering the proteins to enable spin labelling could affect their functionality (Figure S4). It has been reported that the association of LptC to LptB2FG complex inhibits its ATPase activity. However, in the ATPase assay data shown in Figure S4, the inhibitory effect of the LptC TM is not visible (please compare LptB2FG F-A45C G-I335C and F-L325C G-A52C with and without LptC). This can lead to suspect that the regulatory function of LptC is missing in the LptC-containing complexes used in this work. I suggest the authors include wt LptB2FGC in the assay to compare the ATPase activity of this complex with wt LptB2FG. The published inhibitory effect of TM LptC has been observed in proteoliposomes. Since it is not clear from the paper if the ATPase assay in Figure 4 has been conducted in DDM or proteoliposomes, the lack of inhibitory effect could be due to the assay conditions. A comparative test could answer this question.

(2) Figure 2: NBD closure upon ATP binding to LptB2FG is convincingly demonstrated both in DDM micelles and proteoliposomes, validating the experimental system. However, since under physiological conditions, ATP binding should take place before the displacement of the TM of LptC (Wilson and Ruiz, Mol microbiol 2022), I suggest the authors carry out the experiments with LptC-containing complexes to investigate conformational changes (if any) that are triggered when ATP binding occurs before the TM displacement.

(3) Proteoliposomes: in the experiments shown in Figures 3 and 4, unlike those in Figure 2, measurements in proteoliposomes give different results from the experiments in DDM, showing higher heterogeneity. Could this be related to the presence (or absence) of LPS in liposomes? It is not mentioned in the materials and methods section whether LPS is present. Could the authors please discuss this?

(4) The authors show large conformational heterogeneity in gate-2 (using the spin-labelled pair F-L325R1-G-A52R1) and suggest that deviation from the corresponding simulations could be due to the need for enhanced dynamics to allow for gate interaction with LPS or LptC. The effect of LptC is probed in the experiments shown in Figure 6, but I suggest the authors add LPS to the complexes to evaluate the possible stabilizing effect of LPS on the conformations shown in Figure 4.

(5) Figure 6: the measurement of lateral gate 1 and 2 dynamics in the LptC-containing complexes clearly supports the hypothesis, proposed based on the available structures, that TM LptC dissociates from LptB2FG upon ATP binding. However, direct evidence of this movement is still missing. Would it be possible to monitor the dynamics of the TM LptC by directly labelling this protein domain? This would give a conclusive demonstration of the displacement during the ATPase cycle.

(6) LPS release assay: Figure 6 panels H-I-J show the MS spectra relative to LPS-bound and free proteins obtained from wt LptB2FG upon ATP binding and ATP hydrolysis conditions. From these spectra the authors conclude that LPS is completely released only upon ATP hydrolysis. However, the current model predicts that LPS release into the Lpt bridge made by LptC-A-D is triggered by ATP binding. For this reason, I suggest the authors assess LPS release also from the LptB2FGC complex where, in the absence of LptA, LPS would be expected to be mostly retained by the complex under the same conditions.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This study elucidated the mechanism controlling the switch from parallel migration to radial migration during the development of cerebellar granule cells by analyzing the behavior of cell-type-specific JAM-mediated adhesion and the downstream factors that promote migration. The research represents a detailed analysis, employing probes to capture cell recognition events between different cell types, a co-culture system (monolayer culture and slice imaging), and imaging techniques, building upon the authors' prior research on JAM-Pard3 interactions. As a result, the authors found that:

(1) JAM-C-mediated interactions between granule cells (GCNs) are formed earlier and are more robust than JAM-C/JAM-B interactions between GCNs and glia;

(2) Recruitment of migration-promoting factors Pard3/Drebrin by JAM interactions is more efficient in GCN-GCN (JAM-C/JAM-C) interactions; and

(3) The distribution pattern of Pard3/Drebrin differs between GCN-GCN and GCN-Glia interactions, as revealed by detailed imaging analysis.

Consequently, the authors discovered that these differences contribute to a time lag between parallel and radial migration, which serves as a temporal checkpoint sorting mature cerebellar granule cells.

Strengths:

Cell migration is a commonly observed phenomenon in neural development. It is crucial for sorting specific cell populations and positioning them appropriately to develop proper neural circuits. While the regulation of these migrations is known to be mediated by secreted guidance factors, this study demonstrates that combinations of cell adhesion molecules (JAM) mediate cell type-specific interactions that contribute to the timing control of cell migration. This finding significantly advances our understanding of the mechanisms governing cell migration in neural development.

Weaknesses:

The author's hypothesis has been validated using in vitro systems. While in vitro systems allow for a more detailed design of experimental parameters, validation in vivo would still be necessary to demonstrate whether the temporal checkpoint of migration mediated by cell-cell interactions works. For example, knockout of JAM-C in cerebellar granule cells could be considered for such validation. Furthermore, the behavioral analysis of these mutant mice would be interesting.

Additionally, the author's observation that recruitment patterns of Pard3 and Drebrin at adhesive sites vary between interacting cell pairs is intriguing and suggests exciting implications. It would be highly informative if the relationship between these differences and ML entry timing could be demonstrated.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Orexin/hypocretin (OX/HT) neurons are implicated in food intake and there is evidence supporting OX/HT neurons' role in reward consumption potentially influenced by animal's metabolic state. Here, Mitchell, Mohammadkhani, et al. use fiber photometry to dissociate OX/HT neurons' role in reward-seeking by contrasting their role in reward consumption. Mice were given normal chow or palatable food in a fed or fasted state. The authors recorded GCAMP signals from OX/HT neurons during food approach and consumption. They observed heightened OX/HT GCAMP signals during the food approach; in contrast, they saw the signals decline during arrival at the food source and during food consumption. In a second set of experiments, the authors investigate upstream circuits that could potentially gate OX/HT neurons. They use optogenetics to directly stimulate inhibitory inputs arriving from either the ventral pallidum, the medial, or the lateral nucleus accumbens shell to OX/HT neurons. They investigated if these circuits impinge monosynaptically or polysynaptically onto OX/HT neurons to assess their functional role in inhibiting these neurons. The authors found that the ventral pallidum and the lateral but not medial nucleus accumbens shell exert inhibitory control over OX/HT neurons.

Strengths:

The manuscript is well-written, employs suitable statistical analyses, and the conclusions are generally supported by the results.

Weaknesses:

Larger group sizes in some instances and causal manipulation of the inhibitory circuits during reward approach vs consumption would enable the authors to make stronger assertions about these circuits' role in gating OX/HT neurons in these behaviors.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors present OpenNucleome, a computational tool for simulating the structure and dynamics of the human nucleus. The software models nuclear components, including chromosomes and nuclear bodies, and incorporates GPU acceleration for potential performance gains. The authors aim to advance the understanding of nuclear organization by providing a tool that aligns with experimental data and is accessible to the genome architecture research community.

Strengths:

OpenNucleome provides a model of the nucleus, contributing to the advancement of computational biology.<br /> Utilizing GPU acceleration with OpenMM may offer potential performance improvements.

Weaknesses:

It could still take advantage of clearer explanations regarding the generation and usage of input and output files and compatibility with other tools.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This paper aims to demonstrate the role of G-quadruplex DNA structures in the establishment of chromosome loops. The authors introduced an array of G4s spanning 275 bp, naturally found within a very well characterized promoter region of the hTERT promoter, in an ectopic region devoid of G-quadruplex and annotated gene. As a negative control, they used a mutant version of the same sequence in which G4 folding is impaired. Due to the complexity of the region, 3 G4s on the same strand and one on the opposite strand, 12 point mutations were made simultaneously (G to T and C to A). Analysis of the 3D genome organization shows that the WT array establishes more contact within the TAD and throughout the genome than the control array. Additionally, a slight enrichment of H3K4me1 and p300, both enhancer markers, was observed locally near the insertion site. The authors tested whether the expression of genes located either nearby or away up to 5 Mb were up-regulated based on this observation. They found that four genes were up-regulated from 1.5 to 3 fold. An increased interaction between the G4 array compared to the mutant was confirmed by the 3C assay. For in-depth analysis of the long-range changes, they also performed Hi-C experiments and showed a genome-wide increase in interactions of the WT array versus the mutated form.

Strengths:

The experiments were well-executed and the results indicate a statistical difference between the G4 array inserted cell line and the mutated modified cell line.

Weaknesses:

(1) It would have been nice to have an internal control corresponding to a region known to be folded in several cell lines to compare the level of pG4 signal within their construct with a well-characterised control (for example, the KRAS promoter region).<br /> (2) The mutations introduced into the G4 sequence may also affect Sp1 or other transcription factor binding sites present in this region, and some of the observations may depend on these sites rather than G4 structures. While this is acknowledged in the text, the conclusion in the title of the paper seems an overstatement.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

The lateral cortex of the inferior colliculus (LC) is a region of the auditory midbrain noted for receiving both auditory and somatosensory input. Anatomical studies have established that somatosensory input primarily impinges on "modular" regions of the LC, which are characterized by high densities of GABAergic neurons, while auditory input is more prominent in the "matrix" regions that surround the modules. However, how auditory and somatosensory stimuli shape activity, both individually and when combined, in the modular and matrix regions of the LC has remained unknown.

The major obstacle to progress has been the location of the LC on the lateral edge of the inferior colliculus where it cannot be accessed in vivo using conventional imaging approaches. The authors overcame this obstacle by developing methods to implant a microprism adjacent to the LC. By redirecting light from the lateral surface of the LC to the dorsal surface of the microprism, the microprism enabled two-photon imaging of the LC via a dorsal approach in anesthetized and awake mice. Then, by crossing GAD-67-GFP mice with Thy1-jRGECO1a mice, the authors showed that they could identify LC modules in vivo using GFP fluorescence while assessing neural responses to auditory, somatosensory, and multimodal stimuli using Ca2+ imaging. Critically, the authors also validated the accuracy of the microprism technique by directly comparing results obtained with a microprism to data collected using conventional imaging of the dorsal-most LC modules, which are directly visible on the dorsal IC surface, finding good correlations between the approaches.

Through this innovative combination of techniques, the authors found that matrix neurons were more sensitive to auditory stimuli than modular neurons, modular neurons were more sensitive to somatosensory stimuli than matrix neurons, and bimodal, auditory-somatosensory stimuli were more likely to suppress activity in matrix neurons and enhance activity in modular neurons. Interestingly, despite their higher sensitivity to somatosensory stimuli than matrix neurons, modular neurons in the anesthetized prep were overall more responsive to auditory stimuli than somatosensory stimuli (albeit with a tendency to have offset responses to sounds). This suggests that modular neurons should not be thought of as primarily representing somatosensory input, but rather as being more prone to having their auditory responses modified by somatosensory input. However, this trend was different in the awake prep, where modular neurons became more responsive to somatosensory stimuli. Thus, to this reviewer, one of the most intriguing results of the present study is the extent to which neural responses in the LC changed in the awake preparation. While this is not entirely unexpected, the magnitude and stimulus specificity of the changes caused by anesthesia highlight the extent to which higher-level sensory processing is affected by anesthesia and strongly suggests that future studies of LC function should be conducted in awake animals.

Together, the results of this study expand our understanding of the functional roles of matrix and module neurons by showing that responses in LC subregions are more complicated than might have been expected based on anatomy alone. The development of the microprism technique for imaging the LC will be a boon to the field, finally enabling much-needed studies of LC function in vivo. The experiments were well-designed and well-controlled, the limitations of two-photon imaging for tracking neural activity are acknowledged, and appropriate statistical tests were used.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The manuscript examined the role or large versus small prediction errors (PEs) in creating a state-based memory distinction between acquisition and extinction. The premise of the paper is based on theoretical claims and empirical findings that gradual changes between acquisition and extinction would lead to the potential overwriting of the acquisition memory with extinction, resulting in a more durable reduction in conditioned responding (i.e. more durable extinction effect). The paper tests the hypotheses in a series of elegant experiments in which the shock intensity is decreased across extinction sessions before non-reinforced CS presentations are given. Additional manipulations include context change, shock devaluation, controlling for lower shock intensity exposure. The critical comparison was standard non-reinforced extinction training. The critical tests were done in spontaneous recovery and reinstatement.

Strengths:

The findings are of tremendous importance in understanding how memories can be updated and reveal a well-defined role of PE in this process. It is well-established that PE is critical for learning, so delineating how PE is critical for generating memory states and the role it serves in keeping memories dissociable (or not) is exciting and clever. As such the paper addresses a fundamental question in the field.

The studies test clear and defined predictions derived from simulations of the state-belief model of Cochran & Cisler (2019). The designs are excellent: well-controlled and address the question.

The authors have done an excellent job at explaining the value of the latent state models.

The authors have studied both sexes in the studied presented, providing generality across the sexes in their findings. The figures depict the individual data points for males and females allowing the reader to see the responses for each sex.

The authors have addressed the previously raised weaknesses. They noted that procedurally it would be difficult to provide independent evidence that delivering a lower intensity shock will generate a smaller PE than say no shock. The differences in the data obtained based on error vs shock devaluation are convincing, although direct evidence for shock devaluation would have strengthened the argument.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The manuscript uses live imaging to study the role of microtubules in the movement of ribeye aggregates in neuromast hair cells in zebrafish. The main findings are that<br /> (1) Ribeye aggregates, assumed to be ribbon precursors, move in a directed motion toward the active zone;<br /> (2) Disruption of microtubules and kif1aa increases the number of ribeye aggregates and decreases the number of mature synapses.

The evidence for point 2 is compelling, while the evidence for point 1 is less convincing. In particular, the directed motion conclusion is dependent upon fitting of mean squared displacement that can be prone to error and variance to do stochasticity, which is not accounted for in the analysis. Only a small subset of the aggregates meet this criteria and one wonders whether the focus on this subset misses the bigger picture of what is happening with the majority of spots.

Strengths:

(1) The effects of Kif1aa removal and nocodozole on ribbon precursor number and size are convincing and novel.

(2) The live imaging of Ribeye aggregate dynamics provides interesting insight into ribbon formation. The movies showing the fusion of ribeye spots are convincing and the demonstrated effects of nocodozole and kif1aa removal on the frequency of these events is novel.

(3) The effect of nocodozole and kif1aa removal on precursor fusion is novel and interesting.

(4) The quality of the data is extremely high and the results are interesting.

Weaknesses:

(1) To image ribeye aggregates, the investigators overexpressed Ribeye-a TAGRFP under the control of a MyoVI promoter. While it is understandable why they chose to do the experiments this way, expression is not under the same transcriptional regulation as the native protein, and some caution is warranted in drawing some conclusions. For example, the reduction in the number of puncta with maturity may partially reflect the regulation of the MyoVI promoter with hair cell maturity. Similarly, it is unknown whether overexpression has the potential to saturate binding sites (for example motors), which could influence mobility.

(2) The examples of punctae colocalizing with microtubules look clear (Figures 1 F-G), but the presentation is anecdotal. It would be better and more informative, if quantified.

(3) It appears that any directed transport may be rare. Simply having an alpha >1 is not sufficient to declare movement to be directed (motor-driven transport typically has an alpha approaching 2). Due to the randomness of a random walk and errors in fits in imperfect data will yield some spread in movement driven by Brownian motion. Many of the tracks in Figure 3H look as though they might be reasonably fit by a straight line (i.e. alpha = 1).

(4) The "directed motion" shown here does not really resemble motor-driven transport observed in other systems (axonal transport, for example) even in the subset that has been picked out as examples here. While the role of microtubules and kif1aa in synapse maturation is strong, it seems likely that this role may be something non-canonical (which would be interesting).

(5) The effect of acute treatment with nocodozole on microtubules in movie 7 and Figure 6 is not obvious to me and it is clear that whatever effect it has on microtubules is incomplete.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Human cells deficient in delta-tubulin or epsilon-tubulin form unstable centrioles, which lack triplet microtubules and undergo a futile formation and disintegration cycle. In this study, the authors show that human cells lacking the associated proteins TEDC1 or TEDC2 have these identical phenotypes. They use genetics to knockout TEDC1 or TEDC2 in p53-negative RPE-1 cells and expansion microscopy to structurally characterize mutant centrioles. Biochemical methods and AlphaFold-multimer prediction software are used to investigate interactions between tubulins and TEDC1 and TEDC2.

The study shows that mutant centrioles are built only of A tubules, which elongate and extend their proximal region, fail to incorporate structural components, and finally disintegrate in mitosis. In addition, they demonstrate that delta-tubulin or epsilon-tubulin and TEDC1 and TEDC2 form one complex and that TEDC1 TEDC2 can interact independently of tubulins. Finally, they show that the localization of four proteins is mutually dependent.

Strengths:

The results presented here are mostly convincing, the study is exciting and important, and the manuscript is well-written. The study shows that delta-tubulin, epsilon-tubulin, TEDC1, and TEDC2 function together to build a stable and functional centriole, significantly contributing to the field and our understanding of the centriole assembly process.

Weaknesses:

The ultrastructural characterization of TEDC1 and TEDC2 obtained by U-ExM is inconclusive. Improving the quality of the signals is paramount for this manuscript.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Like many papers in the last 5-10 years, this work brings a computational approach to the study of promoters and transcription, but unfortunately disregards or misrepresents much of the existing literature and makes unwarranted claims of novelty. My main concerns with the current paper are outlined below although the problems are deeply embedded.

Strengths:

The data could be useful if interpreted properly, taking into account i) the role of translation ii) other promoter elements, and iii) the relevant literature.

Weaknesses:

(1) Incorrect assumptions and oversimplification of promoters.

- There is a critical error on line 68 and Figure 1A. It is well established that the -35 element consensus is TTGACA but the authors state TTGAAA, which is also the sequence represented by the sequence logo shown and so presumably the PWM used. It is essential that the authors use the correct -35 motif/PWM/consensus.

-Likely, the authors have made this mistake because they have looked at DNA sequence logos generated from promoter alignments anchored by either the position of the -10 element or transcription start site (TSS), most likely the latter. The distance between the TSS and -10 varies. Fewer than half of E. coli promoters have the optimal 7 bp separation with distances of 8, 6, and 5 bp not being uncommon (PMID: 35241653). Furthermore, the distance between the -10 and -35 elements is also variable (16,17, and 18 bp spacings are all frequently found, PMID: 6310517). This means that alignments, used to generate sequence logos, have misaligned -35 hexamers. Consequently, the true consensus is not represented. If the alignment discrepancies are corrected, the true consensus emerges. This problem seems to permeate the whole study since this obviously incorrect consensus/motif has been used throughout to identify sequences that resemble -35 hexamers.

- An uninformed person reading this paper would be led to believe that prokaryotic promoters have only two sequence elements: the -10 and -35 hexamers. This is because the authors completely ignore the role of the TG motif, UP element, and spacer region sequence. All of these can compensate for the lack of a strong -35 hexamer and it's known that appending such elements to a lone -10 sequence can create an active promoter (e.g. PMIDs 15118087, 21398630, 12907708, 16626282, 32297955). Very likely, some of the mutations, classified as not corresponding to a -10 or -35 element in Figure 2, target some of these other promoter motifs.

- The model in Figure 4C is highly unlikely. There is no evidence in the literature that RNAP can hang on with one "arm" in this way. In particular, structural work has shown that sequence-specific interactions with the -10 element can only occur after the DNA has been unwound (PMID: 22136875). Further, -10 elements alone, even if a perfect match to the consensus, are non-functional for transcription. This is because RNAP needs to be directed to the -10 by other promoter elements, or transcription factors. Only once correctly positioned, can RNAP stabilise DNA opening and make sequence-specific contacts with the -10 hexamer. This makes the notion that RNAP may interact with the -10 alone, using only domain 2 of sigma, extremely unlikely.

(2) Reinventing the language used to describe promoters and binding sites for regulators.

- The authors needlessly complicate the narrative by using non-standard language. For example, On page 1 they define a motif as "a DNA sequence computationally predicted to be compatible with TF binding". They distinguish this from a binding site "because binding sites refer to a location where a TF binds the genome, rather than a DNA sequence". First, these definitions are needlessly complicated, why not just say "putative binding sites" and "known binding sites" respectively? Second, there is an obvious problem with the definitions; many "motifs" with also be "bindings sites". In fact, by the time the authors state their definitions, they have already fallen foul of this conflation; in the prior paragraph they stated: "controlled by DNA sequences that encode motifs for TFs to bind". The same issue reappears throughout the paper.

- The authors also use the terms "regulatory" and non-regulatory" DNA. These terms are not defined by the authors and make little sense. For instance, I assume the authors would describe promoter islands lacking transcriptional activity (itself an incorrect assumption, see below)as non-regulatory. However, as horizontally acquired sections of AT-rich DNA these will all be bound by H-NS and subject to gene silencing, both promoters for mRNA synthesis and spurious promoters inside genes that create untranslated RNAs. Hence, regulation is occurring.

- Line 63: "In prokaryotes, the primary regulatory sequences are called promoters". Promoters are not generally considered regulatory. Rather, it is adjacent or overlapping sites for TFs that are regulatory. There is a good discussion of the topic here (PMID: 32665585).

(3) The authors ignore the role of translation.

- The authors' assay does not measure promoter activity alone, this can only be tested by measuring the amount of RNA produced. Rather, the assay used measures the combined outputs of transcription and translation. If the DNA fragments they have cloned contain promoters with no appropriately positioned Shine-Dalgarno sequence then the authors will not detect GFP or RFP production, even though the promoter could be making an RNA (likely to be prematurely terminated by Rho, due to a lack of translation). This is known for promoters in promoter islands (e.g. Figure 1 in PMID: 33958766).

- In Figure S6 it appears that the is a strong bias for mutations resulting in RFP expression to be close to the 3' end of the fragment. Very likely, this occurs because this places the promoter closer to RFP and there are fewer opportunities for premature termination by Rho

(4) Ignoring or misrepresenting the literature.

- As eluded to above, promoter islands are large sections of horizontally acquired, high AT-content, DNA. It is well known that such sequences are i) packed with promoters driving the expression on RNAs that aren't translated ii) silenced, albeit incompletely, by H-NS and iii) targeted by Rho which terminates untranslated RNA synthesis (PMIDs: 24449106, 28067866, 18487194). None of this is taken into account anywhere in the paper and it is highly likely that most, if not all, of the DNA sequences the authors have used contain promoters generating untranslated RNAs.

- The authors state that GC content does not correlate with the emergence of new promoters. It is known that GC content does correlate to the emergence of new promoters because promoters are themselves AT-rich DNA sequences (e.g. see Figure 1 of PMID: 32297955). There are two reasons the authors see no correlation in this work. First, the DNA sequences they have used are already very AT-rich (between 65 % and 78 % AT-content). Second, they have only examined a small range of different AT-content DNA (i.e. between 65 % and 78 %). The effect of AT-content on promoter emerge is most clearly seen between AT-content of between around 40 % and 60 %. Above that level, the strong positive correlation plateaus.

- Once these authors better include and connect their results to the previous literature, they can also add some discussion of how previous papers in recent years may have also missed some of this important context.

(5) Lack of information about sequences used and mutations.

- To properly assess the work any reader will need access to the sequences cloned at the start of the work, where known TSSs are within these sequences (ideally +/- H-NS, which will silence transcription in the chromosomal context but may not when the sequences are removed from their natural context and placed in a plasmid). Without this information, it is impossible to assess the validity of the authors' work.

- The authors do not account for the possibility that DNA sequences in the plasmid, on either side of the cloned DNA fragment, could resemble promoter elements. If this is the case, then mutations in the cloned DNA will create promoters by "pairing up" with the plasmid sequences. There is insufficient information about the DNA sequences cloned, the mutations identified, or the plasmid, to determine if this is the case. It is possible that this also accounts for mutational hotspots described in the paper.

(6) Overselling the conclusions.

Line 420: The paper claims to have generated important new insights into promoters. At the same time, the main conclusion is that "Our study demonstrates that mutations to -10 and -35 boxes motifs are the primary paths to create new promoters and to modulate the activity of existing promoters". This isn't new or unexpected. People have been doing experiments showing this for decades. Of course, mutations that make or destroy promoter elements create and destroy promoters. How could it be any other way?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This article uses a subset of data from the SEER cancer registry to develop nomograms, a patient-facing risk prediction tool, for predicting overall and cancer-specific survival in elderly patients who underwent colectomy for the treatment of non-metastatic colon cancer. A unique contribution is the intent to provide conditional predictions, i.e. given that you have survived for x years from your diagnosis, what is your probability of survival for an additional y years? Although the goal is a useful one, the approach is unfortunately hampered by some important weaknesses.

Strengths:

Predicting conditional overall survival is a useful, patient-oriented goal.

The data source is the high-quality SEER cancer registry.

Weaknesses:

Using Kaplan-Meier methodology to estimate the survival distribution for a time-to-event in the presence of another competing time-to-event (in this case: estimating colon-specific survival in the presence of death from other causes) will generally over-estimate the event rate. The reported colon-specific survival probabilities are probably biased downwards from their true values. See https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10204198/

A similar concern would apply to the use of the cause-specific Cox model, and thus also the nomogram, to predict absolute (conditional) survival.

The p-value-based methodology for determining which predictors should be included in the nomogram is rudimentary. More modern variable selection methods, e.g. the Lasso, would have been preferred.

Related to the above comment, some predictors are present for the conditional survival nomogram for time t, then absent for time t+1, then present again for time t+2. A cancer site is an example of such a predictor. From a face validity perspective, this doesn't really make sense. Ideally, predictors would not enter, then leave, and then re-enter a model.

Many observations were excluded due to missingness in predictors, e.g. >10000 were excluded to due unknown CEA (Supplementary Figure 1). Given the number of observations dropped due to missingness in the predictors, ideally an attempt would have been made to incorporate the partial information available in these data.

Details are lacking on how the AUCs and Brier scores were calculated in the presence of censoring / competing events, which limits the reader's understanding of the results.

It is not clear why a nomogram would be preferred to an online risk prediction calculator.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, Qin and colleagues study the role of Malat1 in bone biology. This topic is interesting given the role of lncRNAs in multiple physiologic processes. A previous study (PMID 38493144) suggested a role for Malat1 in osteoclast maturation. However, the role of this lncRNA in osteoblast biology was previously not explored. Here, the authors note osteopenia with increased bone resorption in mice lacking Malat1 globally and in osteoblast lineage cells. At the mechanistic level, the authors suggest that Malat1 controls beta-catenin activity. These results advance the field regarding the role of this lncRNA in bone biology.

Strengths:

The manuscript is well-written and data are presented in a clear and easily understandable manner. The bone phenotype of osteoblast-specific Malat1 knockout mice is of high interest. The role of Malat1 in controlling beta-catenin activity and OPG expression is interesting and novel.

Weaknesses:

The lack of a bone phenotype when Malat1 is deleted with LysM-Cre is of interest given the previous report suggesting a role for this lncRNA in osteoclasts. However, to interpret the findings here, the authors should investigate the deletion efficiency of Malat1 in osteoclast lineage cells in their model. The data in the fracture model in Figure 8 seems incomplete in the absence of a more complete characterization of callus histology and a thorough time course. The role of Malat1 and OPG in chondrocytes is unclear since the osteocalcin-Cre mice (which should retain normal Malat1 levels in chondrocytes) have similar bone loss as the global mutants.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

NPRL2/TUSC4 is a tumor suppressor gene whose expression is reduced in many cancers including NSCLC. This study presents a novel finding on NPRL2 gene therapy, which induces antitumor activity on aPD1-resistant tumors. Since KRAS/STK11 mutant tumors were reported to be less benefited from ICIs, this study has potential clinical application value.

Strengths:

This work uncovers the advantage of NPRL2 gene therapy by using humanized models and multiple cell lines. Moreover, via immune cell depletion studies, the mechanism of NPRL2 gene therapy has focused on dendritic cells and CD8+T cells.

Weaknesses:

A major concern would be the lack of systematic, and logical rigor. This work did not present a link between apoptosis and antigen presenting induced by NPRL2 restoration. There is no evidence proving that the PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling pathway is related to antigen presenting, which is the major reason of NPRL2 induced antitumor response. Therefore, the two parts may not support each other logically.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This manuscript by Tao et al. reports on an effort to better specify the underlying interactions driving the effects of biodiversity on productivity in biodiversity experiments. The authors are especially concerned with the potential for competitive interactions to drive positive biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships by driving down the biomass of subdominant species. The authors suggest a new partitioning schema that utilizes a suite of partial density treatments to capture so-called competitive ability. While I agree with the authors that understanding the underlying drivers of biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships is valuable - I am unsure of the added value of this specific approach for several reasons.

Strengths:

I can find a lot of value in endeavouring to improve our understanding of how biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships arise. I agree with the authors that competition is not well integrated into the complementarity and selection effect and interrogating this is important.

Weaknesses:

(1) The authors start the introduction very narrowly and do not make clear why it is so important to understand the underlying mechanisms driving biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships until the end of the discussion.

(2) The authors criticize the existing framework for only incorporating positive interactions but this is an oversimplification of the existing framework in several ways:<br /> a. The existing partitioning scheme incorporates resource partitioning which is an effect of competition.<br /> b. The authors neglect the potential that negative feedback from species-specific pests and pathogens can also drive positive BEF and complementarity effects but is not a positive interaction, necessarily. This is discussed in Schnitzer et al. 2011, Maron et al. 2011, Hendriks et al. 2013, Barry et al. 2019, etc.<br /> c. Hector and Loreau (and many of the other citations listed) do not limit competition to SE because resource partitioning is a byproduct of competition.

(3) It is unclear how this new measure relates to the selection effect, in particular. I would suggest that the authors add a conceptual figure that shows some scenarios in which this metric would give a different answer than the traditional additive partition. The example that the authors use where a dominant species increases in biomass and the amount that it increases in biomass is greater than the amount of loss from it outcompeting a subdominant species is a general example often used for a selection effect when exactly would you see a difference between the two? :<br /> a. Just a note - I do think you should see a difference between the two if the species suffers from strong intraspecific competition and has therefore low monoculture biomass but this would tend to also be a very low-density monoculture in practice so there would potentially be little difference between a low density and high-density monoculture because the individuals in a high-density monoculture would die anyway. So I am not sure that in practice you would really see this difference even if partial density plots were incorporated.

(4) One of the tricky things about these endeavors is that they often pull on theory from two different subfields and use similar terminology to refer to different things. For example - in competition theory, facilitation often refers to a positive relative interaction index (this seems to be how the authors are interpreting this) while in the BEF world facilitation often refers to a set of concrete physical mechanisms like microclimate amelioration. The truth is that both of these subfields use net effects. The relative interaction index is also a net outcome as is the complementarity effect even if it is only a piece of the net biodiversity effect. Trying to combine these two subfields to come up with a new partitioning mechanism requires interrogating the underlying assumptions of both subfields which I do not see in this paper.

(5) The partial density treatment does not isolate competition in the way that the authors indicate. All of the interactions that the authors discuss are density-dependent including the mechanism that is not discussed (negative feedback from species-specific pests and pathogens). These partial density treatment effects therefore cannot simply be equated to competition as the authors indicate.:<br /> a. Additionally - the authors use mixture biomass as a stand-in for competitive ability in some cases but mixture biomass could also be determined by the degree to which a plant is facilitated in the mixture (for example).

(6) I found the literature citation to be a bit loose. For example, the authors state that the additive partition is used to separate positive interactions from competition (lines 70-76) and cite many papers but several of these (e.g. Barry et al. 2019) explicitly do not say this.

(7) The natural take-home message from this study is that it would be valuable for biodiversity experiments to include partial density treatments but I have a hard time seeing this as a valuable addition to the field for two reasons:<br /> a. In practice - adding in partial density treatments would not be feasible for the vast majority of experiments which are already often unfeasibly large to maintain.<br /> b. The density effect would likely only be valuable during the establishment phase of the experiment because species that are strongly limited by intraspecific competition will die in the full-density plots resulting in low-density monocultures. You can see this in many biodiversity experiments after the first years. Even though they are seeded (or rarely planted) at a certain density, the density after several years in many monocultures is quite low.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript by Haggerty and Atwood, the authors use a repeated binge drinking paradigm to assess how water and ethanol intake changes in male in female mice as well as measure changes in anterior insular cortex to dorsolateral striatum terminal activity using fiber photometry. They find that overall, males and females have similar overall water and ethanol intake, but females appear to be more efficient alcohol drinkers. Using fiber photometry, they show that the anterior insular cortex (AIC) to dorsolateral striatum projections (DLS) projections have sex, fluid, and lateralization differences. The male left circuit was most robust when aligned to ethanol drinking, and water was somewhat less robust. Male right, and female and left and right, had essentially no change in photometry activity. To some degree, the changes in terminal activity appear to be related to fluid exposure over time, as well as within-session differences in trial-by-trial intake. Overall, the authors provide an exhaustive analysis of the behavioral and photometric data, thus providing the scientific community with a rich information set to continue to study this interesting circuit. However, although the analysis is impressive, there are a few inconsistencies regarding specific measures (e.g., AUC, duration of licking) that do not quite fit together across analytic domains. This does not reduce the rigor of the work, but it does somewhat limit the interpretability of the data, at least within the scope of this single manuscript.

Strengths:

- The authors use high-resolution licking data to characterize ingestive behaviors.<br /> - The authors account for a variety of important variables, such as fluid type, brain lateralization, and sex.<br /> - The authors provide a nice discussion on how this data fits with other data, both from their laboratory and others'.<br /> - The lateralization discovery is particularly novel.

Weaknesses:

- The volume of data and number of variables provided makes it difficult to find a cohesive link between data sets. This limits interpretability.<br /> - The authors describe a clear sex difference in the photometry circuit activity. However, I am curious about whether female mice that drink more similarly to males (e.g., less efficiently?) also show increased activity in the left circuit, similar to males. Oppositely, do very efficient males show weaker calcium activity in the circuit? Ultimately, I am curious about how the circuit activity maps to the behaviors described in Figures 1 and 2.<br /> - What does the change in water-drinking calcium imaging across time in males mean? Especially considering that alcohol-related signals do not seem to change much over time, I am not sure what it means to have water drinking change.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

With ever-growing datasets, it becomes more challenging to extract useful information from such a large amount of data. For that, developing better dimensionality reduction/clustering methods can be very important to make sense of analyzed data. This is especially true for neuroscience where new experimental advances allow the recording of an unprecedented number of neurons. Here the authors make a step to help with neuronal analyses by proposing a new method to identify groups of neurons with similar activity dynamics. I did not notice any obvious problems with data analyses here, however, the presented manuscript has a few weaknesses:

(1) Because this manuscript is written as an extension of previous work by the same authors (van der Plas et al., eLife, 2023), thus to fully understand this paper it is required to read first the previous paper, as authors often refer to their previous work for details. Similarly, to understand the functional significance of identified here neuronal assemblies, it is needed to go to look at the previous paper.

(2) The problem of discovering clusters in data with temporal dynamics is not unique to neuroscience. Therefore, the authors should also discuss other previously proposed methods and how they compare to the presented here RTRBM method. Similarly, there are other methods using neural networks for discovering clusters (assemblies) (e.g. t-SNE: van der Maaten & Hinton 2008, Hippocluster: Chalmers et al. 2023, etc), which should be discussed to give better background information for the readers.

(3) The above point to better describe other methods is especially important because the performance of the presented here method is not that much better than previous work. For example, RTRBM outperforms the cRBM only on ~4 out of 8 fish datasets. Moreover, as the authors nicely described in the Limitations section this method currently can only work on a single time scale and clusters have to be estimated first with the previous cRBM method. Thus, having an overview of other methods which could be used for similar analyses would be helpful.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

[Editors' note: This review contains many criticisms that apply to the whole sub-field of slow/fast gamma oscillations in the hippocampus, as opposed to this particular paper. In the editors' view, these comments are beyond the scope of any single paper. However, they represent a view that, if true, should contextualise the interpretation of this paper and all papers in the sub-field. In doing so, they highlight an ongoing debate within the broader field.]

Summary:

The authors aimed to elucidate the role of dynamic gamma modulation in the development of hippocampal theta sequences, utilizing the traditional framework of "two gammas," a slow and a fast rhythm. This framework is currently being challenged, necessitating further analyses to establish and secure the assumed premises before substantiating the claims made in the present article.

The results are too preliminary and need to integrate contemporary literature. New analyses are required to address these concerns. However, by addressing these issues, it may be possible to produce an impactful manuscript.

I. Introduction<br /> Within the introduction, multiple broad assertions are conveyed that serve as the premise for the research. However, equally important citations that are not mentioned potentially contradict the ideas that serve as the foundation. Instances of these are described below:

(1) Are there multiple gammas? The authors launched the study on the premise that two different gamma bands are communicated from CA3 and the entorhinal cortex. However, recent literature suggests otherwise, offering that the slow gamma component may be related to theta harmonics:

From a review by Etter, Carmichael and Williams (2023)<br /> "Gamma-based coherence has been a prominent model for communication across the hippocampal-entorhinal circuit and has classically focused on slow and fast gamma oscillations originating in CA3 and medial entorhinal cortex, respectively. These two distinct gammas are then hypothesized to be integrated into hippocampal CA1 with theta oscillations on a cycle-to-cycle basis (Colgin et al., 2009; Schomburg et al., 2014). This would suggest that theta oscillations in CA1 could serve to partition temporal windows that enable the integration of inputs from these upstream regions using alternating gamma waves (Vinck et al., 2023). However, these models have largely been based on correlations between shifting CA3 and medial entorhinal cortex to CA1 coherence in theta and gamma bands. In vivo, excitatory inputs from the entorhinal cortex to the dentate gyrus are most coherent in the theta band, while gamma oscillations would be generated locally from presumed local inhibitory inputs (Pernía-Andrade and Jonas, 2014). This predominance of theta over gamma coherence has also been reported between hippocampal CA1 and the medial entorhinal cortex (Zhou et al., 2022). Another potential pitfall in the communication-through-coherence hypothesis is that theta oscillations harmonics could overlap with higher frequency bands (Czurkó et al., 1999; Terrazas et al., 2005), including slow gamma (Petersen and Buzsáki, 2020). The asymmetry of theta oscillations (Belluscio et al., 2012) can lead to harmonics that extend into the slow gamma range (Scheffer-Teixeira and Tort, 2016), which may lead to a misattribution as to the origin of slow-gamma coherence and the degree of spike modulation in the gamma range during movement (Zhou et al., 2019)."

And from Benjamin Griffiths and Ole Jensen (2023)<br /> "That said, in both rodent and human studies, measurements of 'slow' gamma oscillations may be susceptible to distortion by theta harmonics [53], meaning open questions remain about what can be attributed to 'slow' gamma oscillations and what is attributable to theta."

This second statement should be heavily considered as it is from one of the original authors who reported the existence of slow gamma.

Yet another instance from Schomburg, Fernández-Ruiz, Mizuseki, Berényi, Anastassiou, Christof Koch, and Buzsáki (2014):<br /> "Note that modulation from 20-30 Hz may not be related to gamma activity but, instead, reflect timing relationships with non-sinusoidal features of theta waves (Belluscio et al., 2012) and/or the 3rd theta harmonic."

One of this manuscript's authors is Fernández-Ruiz, a contemporary proponent of the multiple gamma theory. Thus, the modulation to slow gamma offered in the present manuscript may actually be related to theta harmonics.

With the above emphasis from proponents of the slow/fast gamma theory on disambiguating harmonics from slow gamma, our first suggestion to the authors is that they A) address these statements (citing the work of these authors in their manuscript) and B) demonstrably quantify theta harmonics in relation to slow gamma prior to making assertions of phase relationships (methodological suggestions below). As the frequency of theta harmonics can extend as high as 56 Hz (PMID: 32297752), overlapping with the slow gamma range defined here (25-45 Hz), it will be important to establish an approach that decouples the two phenomena using an approach other than an arbitrary frequency boundary.

(2) Can gammas be segregated into different lamina of the hippocampus? This idea appears to be foundational in the premise of the research but is also undergoing revision.

As discussed by Etter et al. above, the initial theory of gamma routing was launched on coherence values. However, the values reported by Colgin et al. (2009) lean more towards incoherence (a value of 0) rather than coherence (1), suggesting a weak to negligible interaction. Nevertheless, this theory is coupled with the idea that the different gamma frequencies are exclusive to the specific lamina of the hippocampus.

Recently, Deschamps et al. (2024) suggested a broader, more nuanced understanding of gamma oscillations than previously thought, emphasizing their wide range and variability across hippocampal layers. This perspective challenges the traditional dichotomy of gamma sub-bands (e.g., slow vs. medium gamma) and their associated cognitive functions based on a more rigid classification according to frequency and phase relative to the theta rhythm. Moreover, they observed all frequencies across all layers.

Similarly, the current source density plots from Belluscio et al. (2012) suggest that SG and FG can be observed in both the radiatum and lacunosum-moleculare.

Therefore, if the initial coherence values are weak to negligible and both slow and fast gamma are observed in all layers of the hippocampus, can the different gammas be exclusively related to either anatomical inputs or psychological functions (as done in the present manuscript)? Do these observations challenge the authors' premise of their research? At the least, please discuss.

(3) Do place cells, phase precession, and theta sequences require input from afferent regions? It is offered in the introduction that "Fast gamma (~65-100Hz), associated with the input from the medial entorhinal cortex, is thought to rapidly encode ongoing novel information in the context (Fernandez-Ruiz et al., 2021; Kemere, Carr, Karlsson, & Frank, 2013; Zheng et al., 2016)".

CA1 place fields remain fairly intact following MEC inactivation include Ipshita Zutshi, Manuel Valero, Antonio Fernández-Ruiz , and György Buzsáki (2022)- "CA1 place cells and assemblies persist despite combined mEC and CA3 silencing" and from Hadas E Sloin, Lidor Spivak, Amir Levi, Roni Gattegno, Shirly Someck, Eran Stark (2024) - "These findings are incompatible with precession models based on inheritance, dual-input, spreading activation, inhibition-excitation summation, or somato-dendritic competition. Thus, a precession generator resides locally within CA1."

These publications, at the least, challenge the inheritance model by which the afferent input controls CA1 place field spike timing. The research premise offered by the authors is couched in the logic of inheritance, when the effect that the authors are observing could be governed by local intrinsic activity (e.g., phase precession and gamma are locally generated, and the attribution to routed input is perhaps erroneous). Certainly, it is worth discussing these manuscripts in the context of the present manuscript.

II. Results

(1) Figure 2-<br /> a. There is a bit of a puzzle here that should be discussed. If slow and fast frequencies modulate 25% of neurons, how can these rhythms serve as mechanisms of communication/support psychological functions? For instance, if fast gamma is engaged in rapid encoding (line 72) and slow gamma is related to the integration processing of learned information (line 84), and these are functions of the hippocampus, then why do these rhythms modulate so few cells? Is this to say 75% of CA1 neurons do not listen to CA3 or MEC input?

b. Figure 2. It is hard to know if the mean vector lengths presented are large or small. Moreover, one can expect to find significance due to chance. For instance, it is challenging to find a frequency in which modulation strength is zero (please see Figure 4 of PMID: 30428340 or Figure 7 of PMID: 31324673).

i. Please construct the histograms of Mean Vector Length as in the above papers, using 1 Hz filter steps from 1-120Hz and include it as part of Figure 2 (i.e., calculate the mean vector length for the filtered LFP in steps of 1-2 Hz, 2-3 Hz, 3-4 Hz,... etc). This should help the authors portray the amount of modulation these neurons have relative to the theta rhythm and other frequencies. If the theta mean vector length is higher, should it be considered the primary modulatory influence of these neurons (with slow and fast gammas as a minor influence)?

ii. It is possible to infer a neuron's degree of oscillatory modulation without using the LFP. For instance, one can create an ISI histogram as done in Figure 1 here (https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.09.20.461152v3.full.pdf+html; "Distinct ground state and activated state modes of firing in forebrain neurons"). The reciprocal of the ISI values would be "instantaneous spike frequency". In favor of the Douchamps et al. (2024) results, the figure of the BioRXiV paper implies that there is a single gamma frequency modulate as there is only a single bump in the ISIs in the 10^-1.5 to 10^-2 range. Therefore, to vet the slow gamma results and the premise of two gammas offered in the introduction, it would be worth including this analysis as part of Figure 2.

c. There are some things generally concerning about Figure 2.

i. First, the raw trace does not seem to have clear theta epochs (it is challenging to ascertain the start and end of a theta cycle). Certainly, it would be worth highlighting the relationship between theta and the gammas and picking a nice theta epoch.

ii. Also, in panel A, there looks to be a declining amplitude relationship between the raw, fast, and slow gamma traces, assuming that the scale bars represent 100uV in all three traces. The raw trace is significantly larger than the fast gamma. However, this relationship does not seem to be the case in panel B (in which both the raw and unfiltered examples of slow and fast gamma appear to be equal; the right panels of B suggest that fast gamma is larger than slow, appearing to contradict the A= 1/f organization of the power spectral density). Please explain as to why this occurs. Including the power spectral density (see below) should resolve some of this.

iii. Within the example of spiking to phase in the left side of Panel B (fast gamma example)- the neuron appears to fire near the trough twice, near the peak twice, and somewhere in between once. A similar relationship is observed for the slow gamma epoch. One would conclude from these plots that the interaction of the neuron with the two rhythms is the same. However, the mean vector lengths and histograms below these plots suggest a different story in which the neuron is modulated by FG but not SG. Please reconcile this.

iv. For calculating the MVL, it seems that the number of spikes that the neuron fires would play a significant role. Working towards our next point, there may be a bias of finding a relationship if there are too few spikes (spurious clustering due to sparse data) and/or higher coupling values for higher firing rate cells (cells with higher firing rates will clearly show a relationship), forming a sort of inverse Yerkes-Dodson curve. Also, without understanding the magnitude of the MVL relative to other frequencies, it may be that these values are indeed larger than zero, but not biologically significant.

- Please provide a scatter plot of Neuron MVL versus the Neuron's Firing Rate for 1) theta (7-9 Hz), 2) slow gamma, and 3) fast gamma, along with their line of best fit.

- Please run a shuffle control where the LFP trace is shifted by random values between 125-1000ms and recalculate the MVL for theta, slow, and fast gamma. Often, these shuffle controls are done between 100-1000 times (see cross-correlation analyses of Fujisawa, Buzsaki et al.).

- To establish that firing rate does not play a role in uncovering modulation, it would be worth conducting a spike number control, reducing the number of spikes per cell so that they are all equal before calculating the phase plots/MVL.

(2) Something that I anticipated to see addressed in the manuscript was the study from Grosmark and Buzsaki (2016): "Cell assembly sequences during learning are "replayed" during hippocampal ripples and contribute to the consolidation of episodic memories. However, neuronal sequences may also reflect preexisting dynamics. We report that sequences of place-cell firing in a novel environment are formed from a combination of the contributions of a rigid, predominantly fast-firing subset of pyramidal neurons with low spatial specificity and limited change across sleep-experience-sleep and a slow-firing plastic subset. Slow-firing cells, rather than fast-firing cells, gained high place specificity during exploration, elevated their association with ripples, and showed increased bursting and temporal coactivation during postexperience sleep. Thus, slow- and fast-firing neurons, although forming a continuous distribution, have different coding and plastic properties."

My concern is that much of the reported results in the present manuscript appear to recapitulate the observations of Grosmark and Buzsaki, but without accounting for differences in firing rate. A parsimonious alternative explanation for what is observed in the present manuscript is that high firing rate neurons, more integrated into the local network and orchestrating local gamma activity (PING), exhibit more coupling to theta and gamma. In this alternative perspective, it's not something special about how the neurons are entrained to the routed fast gamma, but that the higher firing rate neurons are better able to engage and entrain their local interneurons and, thus modulate local gamma. However, this interpretation challenges the discussion around the importance of fast gamma routed from the MEC.

a. Please integrate the Grosmark & Buzsaki paper into the discussion.

b. Also, please provide data that refutes or supports the alternative hypothesis in which the high firing rate cells are just more gamma modulated as they orchestrate local gamma activity through monosynaptic connections with local interneurons (e.g., Marshall et al., 2002, Hippocampal pyramidal cell-interneuron spike transmission is frequency dependent and responsible for place modulation of interneuron discharge). Otherwise, the attribution to a MEC routed fast gamma routing seems tenuous.<br /> c. It is mentioned that fast-spiking interneurons were removed from the analysis. It would be worth including these cells, calculating the MVL in 1 Hz increments as well as the reciprocal of their ISIs (described above).

(3) Methods - Spectral decomposition and Theta Harmonics.

a. It is challenging to interpret the exact parameters that the authors used for their multi-taper analysis in the methods (lines 516-526). Tallon-Baudry et al., (1997; Oscillatory γ-Band (30-70 Hz) Activity Induced by a Visual Search Task in Humans) discuss a time-frequency trade-off where frequency resolution changes with different temporal windows of analysis. This trade-off between time and frequency resolution is well known as the uncertainty principle of signal analysis, transcending all decomposition methods. It is not only a function of wavelet or FFT, and multi-tapers do not directly address this. (The multitaper method, by using multiple specially designed tapers -like the Slepian sequences- smooths the spectrum. This smoothing doesn't eliminate leakage but distributes its impact across multiple estimates). Given the brevity of methods and the issues of theta harmonics as offered above, it is worth including some benchmark trace testing for the multi-taper as part of the supplemental figures.

i. Please spectrally decompose an asymmetric 8 Hz sawtooth wave showing the trace and the related power spectral density using the multiple taper method discussed in the methods.

ii. Please also do the same for an elliptical oscillation (perfectly symmetrical waves, but also capable of casting harmonics). Matlab code on how to generate this time series is provided below:<br /> A = 1; % Amplitude<br /> T = 1/8; % Period corresponding to 8 Hz frequency<br /> omega = 2*pi/T; % Angular frequency<br /> C = 1; % Wave speed<br /> m = 0.9; % Modulus for the elliptic function (0<br /> x = linspace(0, 2*pi, 1000); % temporal domain<br /> t = 0; % Time instant

% Calculate B based on frequency and speed<br /> B = sqrt(omega/C);

% Cnoidal wave equation using the Jacobi elliptic function<br /> u = A .* ellipj(B.*(x - C*t), m).^2;

% Plotting the cnoidal wave<br /> figure;<br /> plot(x./max(x), u);<br /> title('8 Hz Cnoidal Wave');<br /> xlabel('time (x)');<br /> ylabel('Wave amplitude (u)');<br /> grid on;

The Symbolic Math Toolbox needs to be installed and accessible in your MATLAB environment to use ellipj. Otherwise, I trust that, rather than plotting a periodic orbit around a circle (sin wave) the authors can trace the movement around an ellipse with significant eccentricity (the distance between the two foci should be twice the distance between the co-vertices).

iii. Line 522: "The power spectra across running speeds and absolute power spectrum (both results were not shown)...". Given the potential complications of multi-taper discussed above, and as each convolution further removes one from the raw data, it would be the most transparent, simple, and straightforward to provide power spectra using the simple fft.m code in Matlab (We imagine that the authors will agree that the results should be robust against different spectral decomposition methods. Otherwise, it is concerning that the results depend on the algorithm implemented and should be discussed. If gamma transience is a concern, the authors should trigger to 2-second epochs in which slow/fast gamma exceeds 3-7 std. dev. above the mean, comparing those resulting power spectra to 2-second epochs with ripples - also a transient event). The time series should be at least 2 seconds in length (to avoid spectral leakage issues and the issues discussed in Talon-Baudry et al., 1997 above).

Please show the unmolested power spectra (Y-axis units in mV2/Hz, X-axis units as Hz) as a function of running speed (increments of 5 cm/s) for each animal. I imagine three of these PSDs for 3 of the animals will appear in supplemental methods while one will serve as a nice manuscript figure. With this plot, please highlight the regions that the authors are describing as theta, slow, and fast gamma. Also, any issues should be addressed should there be notable differences in power across animals or tetrodes (issues with locations along proximal-distal CA1 in terms of MEC/LEC input and using a local reference electrode are discussed below).

iv. Schomberg and colleagues (2014) suggested that the modulation of neurons in the slow gamma range could be related to theta harmonics (see above). Harmonics can often extend in a near infinite as they regress into the 1/f background (contributing to power, but without a peak above the power spectral density slope), making arbitrary frequency limits inappropriate. Therefore, in order to support the analyses and assertions regarding slow gamma, it seems necessary to calculate a "theta harmonic/slow gamma ratio". Aru et al. (2015; Untangling cross-frequency coupling in neuroscience) offer that: " The presence of harmonics in the signal should be tested by a bicoherence analysis and its contribution to CFC should be discussed." Please test both the synthetic signals above and the raw LFP, using temporal windows of greater than 4 seconds (again, the large window optimizes for frequency resolution in the time-frequency trade-off) to calculate the bicoherence. As harmonics are integers of theta coupled to itself and slow gamma is also coupled to theta, a nice illustration and contribution to the field would be a method that uses the bispectrum to isolate and create a "slow gamma/harmonic" ratio.

(4) I appreciate the inclusion of the histology for the 4 animals. Knerim and colleagues describe a difference in MEC projection along the proximal-distal axis of the CA1 region (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3866456/)- "There are also differences in their direct projections along the transverse axis of CA1, as the LEC innervates the region of CA1 closer to the subiculum (distal CA1), whereas the MEC innervates the region of CA1 closer to CA2 and CA3 (proximal CA1)" From the histology, it looks like some of the electrodes are in the part of CA1 that would be dominated by LEC input while a few are closer to where the MEC would project.

a. How do the authors control for these differences in projections? Wouldn't this change whether or not fast gamma is observed in CA1?

b. I am only aware of one manuscript that describes slow gamma in the LEC which appeared in contrast to fast gamma from the MEC (https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abf3119). One would surmise that the authors in the present manuscript would have varying levels of fast gamma in their CA1 recordings depending on the location of the electrodes in the Proximal-distal axis, to the extent that some of the more medial tetrodes may need to be excluded (as they should not have fast gamma, rather they should be exclusively dominated by slow gamma). Alternatively, the authors may find that there is equal fast gamma power across the entire proximal-distal axis. However, this would pose a significant challenge to the LEC/slow gamma and MEC/fast gamma routing story of Fernandez-Ruiz et al. and require reconciliation/discussion.

c. Is there a difference in neuron modulation to these frequencies based on electrode location in CA1?

(5) Given a comment in the discussion (see below), it will be worth exploring changes in theta, theta harmonic, slow gamma, and fast gamma power with running speed as no changes were observed with theta sequences or lap number versus. Notably, Czurko et al., report an increase in theta and harmonic power with running speed (1999) while Ahmed and Mehta (2012) report a similar effect for gamma.

a. Please determine if the oscillations change in power and frequency of the rhythms discussed above change with running speed using the same parameters applied in the present manuscript. The specific concern is that how the authors calculate running speed is not sensitive enough to evaluate changes.

b. It is astounding that animals ran as fast as they did in what appears to be the first lap (Figure 3F), especially as rats' natural proclivity is thigmotaxis and inquisitive exploration in novel environments. Can the authors expand on why they believe their rats ran so quickly on the first lap in a novel environment and how to replicate this? Also, please include the individual values for each animal on the same plot.

c. Can the authors explain how the statistics on line 169 (F(4,44)) work? Specifically, it is challenging to determine how the degrees of freedom were calculated in this case and throughout if there were only 4 animals (reported in methods) over 5 laps (depicted in Figure 3F. Given line 439, it looks like trials and laps are used synonymously). Four animals over 5 laps should have a DOF of 16.

(6) Throughout the manuscript, I am concerned about an inflation of statistical power. For example on line 162, F(2,4844). The large degrees of freedom indicate that the sample size was theta sequences or a number of cells. Since multiple observations were obtained from the same animal, the statistical assumption of independence is violated. Therefore, the stats need to be conducted using a nested model as described in Aarts et al. (2014; https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24671065/). A statistical consult may be warranted.

(7) It is stated that one tetrode served as a quiet recording reference. The "quiet" part is an assumption when often, theta and gamma can be volume conducted to the cortex (e.g., Sirota et al., 2008; This is often why laboratories that study hippocampal rhythms use the cerebellum for the differential recording electrode and not an electrode in the corpus callosum). Generally, high frequencies propagate as well as low frequencies in the extracellular milieu (https://www.eneuro.org/content/4/1/ENEURO.0291-16.2016). For transparency, the authors should include a limitation paragraph in their discussion that describes how their local tetrode reference may be inadvertently diminishing and/or distorting the signal that they are trying to isolate. Otherwise, it would be worth hearing an explanation as to how the author's approach avoids this issue.

Apologetically, this review is already getting long. Moreover, I have substantial concerns that should be resolved prior to delving into the remainder of the analyses. e.g., the analyses related to Figure 3-5 assert that FG cells are important for sequences. However, the relationship to gamma may be secondary to either their relationship to theta or, based on the Grosmark and Buzsaki paper, it may just be a phenomenon coupled to the fast-firing cells (fast-firing cells showing higher gamma modulation due to a local PING dynamic). Moreover, the observation of slow gamma is being challenged as theta harmonics, even by the major proponents of the slow/fast gamma theory. Therefore, the report of slow gamma precession would come as an unsurprising extension should they be revealed to be theta harmonics (however, no control for harmonics was implemented; suggestions were made above). Following these amendments, I would be grateful for the opportunity to provide further feedback.

III. Discussion.

a. Line 330- it was offered that fast gamma encodes information while slow gamma integrates in the introduction. However, in a task such as circular track running (from the methods, it appears that there is no new information to be acquired within a trial), one would guess that after the first few laps, slow gamma would be the dominant rhythm. Therefore, one must wonder why there are so few neurons modulated by slow gamma (~3.7%).

b. Line 375: The authors contend that: "...slow gamma, related to information compression, was also required to modulate fast gamma phase-locked cells during sequence development. We replicated the results of slow gamma phase precession at the ensemble level (Zheng et al., 2016), and furthermore observed it at late development, but not early development, of theta sequences." In relation to the idea that slow gamma may be coupled to - if not a distorted representation of - theta harmonics, it has been observed that there are changes in theta relative to novelty.

i. A. Jeewajee, C. Lever, S. Burton, J. O'Keefe, and N. Burgess (2008) report a decrease in theta frequency in novel circumstances that disappears with increasing familiarity.

ii. One could surmise that this change in frequency is associated with alterations in theta harmonics (observed here as slow gamma), challenging the author's interpretation.

iii. Therefore, the authors have a compelling opportunity to replicate the results of Jeewajee et al., characterizing changes of theta along with the development of slow gamma precession, as the environment becomes familiar. It will become important to demonstrate, using bicoherence as offered by Aru et al., how slow gamma can be disambiguated from theta harmonics. Specifically, we anticipate that the authors will be able to quantify A) theta harmonics (the number, and their respective frequencies and amplitudes), B) the frequency and amplitude of slow gamma, and C) how they can be quantitatively decoupled. Through this, their discussion of oscillatory changes with novelty-familiarity will garner a significant impact.

c. Broadly, it is interesting that the authors emphasize the gamma frequency throughout the discussion. Given that the power spectral density of the Local Field Potential (LFP) exhibits a log-log relationship between amplitude and frequency, as described by Buzsáki (2005) in "Rhythms of the Brain," and considering that the LFP is primarily generated through synaptic transmembrane currents (Buzsáki et al., 2012), it seems parsimonious to consider that the bulk of synaptic activity occurs at lower frequencies (e.g., theta). Since synaptic transmission represents the most direct form of inter-regional communication, one might wonder why gamma (characterized by lower amplitude rhythms) is esteemed so highly compared to the higher amplitude theta rhythm. Why isn't the theta rhythm, instead, regarded as the primary mode of communication across brain regions? A discussion exploring this question would be beneficial.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary

In this study, the authors addressed the question of how synaptic ribbons-specialized, electron-dense presynaptic structures-are formed from ribbon precursors in sensory hair cells. Specifically, the authors evaluated whether molecular motor-driven, microtubule-based transport plays a role in the directed transport of ribbon precursors to the active zone of cochlear hair cells and assessed whether there was a specific role for the microtubule motor Kinesin Family Member 1A (Kif1a). Using live imaging of cochlear explants and fixed images of both mature and developing cochlea, they provide evidence that ribbon precursors are actively transported on microtubules, that ribbon precursor volume is dynamically modified by fission and fusion events on microtubules, and that Kif1a plays a role in synaptic ribbon maturation.

Strengths

Overall, the data presented in this study support that the fission and fusion of ribbon precursors are dependent on microtubule-based translocation, and this dynamic assembly of precursors may involve Kif1a. Live-imaging data and analysis provide strong evidence for microtubule-based transport contributing to dynamic fission-fusion events of ribbon precursors. Further, fixed image analysis of Kif1a mutants supports that it plays a key role in synaptic ribbon maturation.

Weaknesses

While the authors clearly established the polarity and stability of microtubules in hair cells, they did not assess the net direction of putative slow microtubule-based movement (i.e. the ratios of plus to minus end-directed travel) in their analysis of ribbon precursor displacement. This information is critical in establishing a role for microtubule-based transport in localizing ribbon precursors to the active zones in the basolateral region of hair cells to form presynaptic ribbons. In addition, the discussion section did not elaborate on what is known about the coordination of molecular motor proteins during microtubule-based transport nor did it effectively incorporate the interpretation of the results with what has been described in previous studies on intracellular transport and the roles of Kif1a in synaptic vesicle precursor trafficking.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this experiment, the authors use a probe method along with time-frequency analyses to ascertain the attentional priority map prior to a visual search display in which one location is more likely to contain a salient distractor.  The main finding is that neural responses to the probe indicate that the high probability location is attended, rather than suppressed, prior to the search display onset.  The authors conclude that suppression of distractors at high-probability locations is a result of reactive, rather than proactive, suppression.

Strengths:

This was a creative approach to a difficult and important question about attention.  The use of this "pinging" method to assess the attentional priority map has a lot of potential value for a number of questions related to attention and visual search. Here as well, the authors have used it to address a question about distractor suppression that has been the subject of competing theories for many years in the field. The paper is well-written, and the authors have done a good job placing their data in the larger context of recent findings in the field.

Weaknesses:

The link between the memory task and the search task could be explored in greater detail. For example, how might attentional priority maps change because of the need to hold a location in working memory? This might limit the generalizability of these findings. There could be more analysis of behavioral data to address this question. In addition, the authors could explore the role that intertrial repetition plays in the attentional priority map as these factors necessarily differ between conditions in the current design. Finally, the explanation of the CTF analyses in the results could be written more clearly for readers who are less familiar with this specific approach (which has not been used in this field much previously).

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The manuscript by Witten et al., titled "Sub-cone visual resolution by active, adaptive sampling in the human foveola," aims to investigate the link between acuity thresholds (and hyperacuity) and retinal sampling. Specifically, using in vivo foveal cone-resolved imaging and simultaneous microscopic photostimulation, the researchers examined visual acuity thresholds in 16 volunteers and correlated them with each individual's retinal sampling capacity and the characteristics of ocular drift.

First, the authors found that although visual acuity was highly correlated with the individual spatial arrangement of cones, for all participants, visual resolution exceeded the Nyquist sampling limit - a well-known phenomenon in the literature called hyperacuity.

Thus, the researchers hypothesized that this increase in acuity, which could not be explained in terms of spatial encoding mechanisms, might result from exploiting the spatiotemporal characteristics of visual input, which is continuously modulated over time by eye movements even during so-called fixations (e.g., ocular drift).

Authors reported a correlation between subjects, between acuity threshold and drift amplitude, suggesting that the visual system benefits from transforming spatial input into a spatiotemporal flow. Finally, they showed that drift, contrary to the traditional view of it as random involuntary movement, appears to exhibit directionality: drift tends to move stimuli to higher cone density areas, therefore enhancing visual resolution.

Strengths:

The work is of broad interest, the methods are clear, and the results are solid.

Weaknesses:

Literature (1/2): The authors do not appear to be aware of an important paper published in 2023 by Lin et al. (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2023.03.026), which nicely demonstrates that (i) ocular drifts are under cognitive influence, and (ii) specific task knowledge influences the dominant orientation of these ocular drifts even in the absence of visual information. The results of this article are particularly relevant and should be discussed in light of the findings of the current experiment.

Literature (2/2): The hypothesis that hyperacuity is attributable to ocular movements has been proposed by other authors and should be cited and discussed (e.g., https://doi.org/10.3389/fncom.2012.00089, https://doi.org/10.1016/s0896-6273(01)00466-4).

Drift Dynamic Characterization: The drift is primarily characterized as the "concatenated vector sum of all frame-wise motion vectors within the 500 ms stimulus duration.". To better compare with other studies investigating the link between drift dynamics and visual acuity (e.g., Clark et al., 2022), it would be interesting to analyze the drift-diffusion constant, which might be the parameter most capable of describing the dynamic characteristics of drift.

Possible inconsistencies: Binocular differences are not expected based on the hypothesis; the authors may speculate a bit more about this. Additionally, the fact that hyperacuity does not occur with longer infrared wavelengths but the drift dynamics do not vary between the two conditions is interesting and should be discussed more thoroughly.

As a Suggestion: can the authors predict the accuracy of individual participants in single trials just by looking at the drift dynamics?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

miniML as a novel supervised deep learning-based method for detecting and analyzing spontaneous synaptic events. The authors demonstrate the advantages of using their methods in comparison with previous approaches. The possibility to train the architecture on different tasks using transfer learning approaches is also an added value of the work. There are some technical aspects that would be worth clarifying in the manuscript:

(1) LSTM Layer Justification: Please provide a detailed explanation for the inclusion of the LSTM layer in the miniML architecture. What specific benefits does the LSTM layer offer in the context of synaptic event detection?

(2) Temporal Resolution: Can you elaborate on the reasons behind the lower temporal resolution of the output? Understanding whether this is due to specific design choices in the model, data preprocessing, or post-processing will clarify the nature of this limitation and its impact on the analysis.

(3) Architecture optimization: how was the architecture CNN+LSTM optimized in terms of a number of CNN layers and size?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This manuscript aims to unravel the mechanisms behind Aquaporin-0 (AQP0) tetramer array formation within lens membranes. The authors utilized electron crystallography and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to shed light on the role of cholesterol in shaping the structural organization of AQP0. The evidence suggests that cholesterol not only defines the positions and orientations of associated molecules but also plays a crucial role in stabilizing AQP0 tetramer arrays. This study provides valuable insights into the potential principles driving protein clustering within lipid rafts, advancing our understanding of membrane biology.

In this review, I will focus on the MD simulations part, since this is my area of expertise. The authors conducted an impressive set of MD simulations aiming at understanding the role of cholesterol in structural organization of AQP0 arrays. These simulations clearly demonstrate the well-defined localization of cholesterol molecules around a single AQP0 tetramer, aligning with previous computational studies and the crystallographic structures presented in this manuscript. Interestingly, the authors identified an unusual position for one cholesterol molecule, located near the center of the lipid bilayer, which was stabilized by the adjacent AQP0 tetramers. The authors showed that these adjacent tetramers can withstand a larger lateral detachment force when deep cholesterol molecules are present at the interface compared to scenarios with sphingomyelin (SM) molecules at the interface between two AQP0 tetramers. Authors interpret that result as evidence that deep cholesterol molecules mechanically stabilize the interface of the AQP0 tetramers.

The simple steered MD simulations are typically employed to either identify pathways for subsequent free energy calculations, such as umbrella sampling or perform numerous non-equilibrium simulations, utilizing the Jarzynski equation to extract free energy. In this paper, the authors conducted steered MD simulations to examine the maximum force required to separate tetramers, and they did not carry out the more rigorous but challenging free energy calculations. The observation that the maximum force needed to separate tetramers in the presence of cholesterol (compared to the SM case) suggests a positive direction in the authors' work, however, free energy calculations would be needed to fully support the cholesterol stabilization effect.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, Devakinandan and colleagues have undertaken a thorough characterization of the cell types of the mouse vomeronasal organ, focusing on the vomeronasal sensory neurons (VSNs). VSNs are known to arise from a common pool of progenitors that differentiate into two distinct populations characterized by the expression of either the G protein subunit Gnao1 or Gnai2. Using single-cell RNA sequencing followed by unsupervised clustering of the transcriptome data, the authors identified three Gnai2+ VSN subtypes and a single Gnao1+ VSN type. To study VSN developmental trajectories, Devakinandan and colleagues took advantage of the constant renewal of the neuronal VSN pool, which allowed them to harvest all maturation states. All neurons were re-clustered and a pseudotime analysis was performed. The analysis revealed the emergence of two pools of Gap43+ clusters from a common lineage, which differentiate into many subclusters of mature Gnao1+ and Gnai2+ VSNs. By comparing the transcriptomes of these two pools of immature VSNs, the authors identified a number of differentially expressed transcription factors in addition to known markers. Next, by comparing the transcriptomes of mature Gnao1+ and Gnai2+ VSNs, the authors report the enrichment of ER-related genes in Gnao1+ VSNs. Using electron microscopy, they found that this enrichment was associated with specific ER morphology in Gnao1+ neurons. Finally, the authors characterized chemosensory receptor expression and co-expression (as well as H2-Mv proteins) in mature VSNs, which recapitulated known patterns.

Strengths:

The data presented here provide new and interesting perspectives on the distinguishing features between Gnao1+ and Gnai2+ VSNs. These features include newly identified markers, such as transcription factors, as well as an unsuspected ER-related peculiarity in Gnao1+ neurons, consisting of a hypertrophic ER and an enrichment in ER-related genes. In addition, the authors provide a comprehensive picture of specific co-expression patterns of V2R chemoreceptors and H2-Mv genes.

Importantly, the authors provide a browser (scVNOexplorer) for anyone to explore the data, including gene expression and co-expression, number and proportion of cells, with a variety of graphical tools (violin plots, feature plots, dot plots, ...).

Weaknesses:

The study still requires refined analyses of the data and rigorous quantification to support the main claims.

The method description for filtering and clustering single-cell RNA-sequencing data is incomplete. The Seurat package has many available pipelines for single-cell RNA-seq analysis, with a significant impact on the output data. How did the authors pre-process and normalize the data? Was the pipeline used with default settings? What batch correction method was applied to the data to mitigate possible sampling or technical effects? Moreover, the authors do not describe how cell and gene filtering was performed. The data in Figure 7-Supplement 3 show that one-sixth of the V1Rs do not express any chemoreceptor, while over a hundred cells express more than one chemoreceptor. Do these cells have unusually high or low numbers of genes or counts? To exclude the possibility of a technical artifact in these observations, the authors should describe how they dealt with putative doublet cells or debris. Surprisingly, some clusters are characterized by the expression of specific chemoreceptors (VRs). Have these been used for clustering? If so, clustering should be repeated after excluding these receptors.

The identification of the VSN types should be consistent across the different analyses and validated. The data presented in Figure 1 lists four mature VSN types, whereas the re-clustering of neurons presented in Figure 3 leads to a different subdivision. At present, it remains unclear whether these clusters reflect the biology of the system or are due to over-clustering of the data, and therefore correspond to either noise or arbitrary splitting of continua. Clusters should be merged if they do not correspond to discrete categories of cells, and correspondence should be established between the different clustering analyses. To validate the detected clusters as cell types, markers characteristic of each of these populations can be evaluated by ISH or IHC.

There is a lack of quantification of imaging data, which provides little support for the ER-related main claim. Quantification of co-expression and statistics on labeling intensity or coverage would greatly strengthen the conclusions and the title of the paper.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

The claustrum is one of the most enigmatic regions of the cerebral cortex, with a potential role in consciousness and integrating multisensory information. Despite extensive connections with almost all cortical areas, its functions and mechanisms are not well understood. In an attempt to unravel these complexities, Shelton et al. employed advanced circuit mapping technologies to examine specific neurons within the claustrum. They focused on how these neurons integrate incoming information and manage the output. Their findings suggest that claustrum neurons selectively communicate based on cortical projection targets and that their responsiveness to cortical inputs varies by cell type.

Imaging studies demonstrated that claustrum axons respond to both single and multiple sensory stimuli. Extended inhibition of the claustrum significantly reduced animals' responsiveness to multisensory stimuli, highlighting its critical role as an integrative hub in the cortex.

However, the study's conclusions at times rely on assumptions that may undermine their validity. For instance, the comparison between RSC-projecting and non-RSC-projecting neurons is problematic due to potential false negatives in the cell labeling process, which might not capture the entire neuron population projecting to a brain area. This issue casts doubt on the findings related to neuron interconnectivity and projections, suggesting that the results should be interpreted with caution. The study's approach to defining neuron types based on projection could benefit from a more critical evaluation or a broader methodological perspective.

Nevertheless, the study sets the stage for many promising future research directions. Future work could particularly focus on exploring the functional and molecular differences between E1 and E2 neurons and further assess the implications of the distinct responses of excitatory and inhibitory claustrum neurons for internal computations. Additionally, adopting a different behavioral paradigm that more directly tes2ts the integration of sensory information for purposeful behavior could also prove valuable.

When the apricots represent Oliver's deepest and most hidden fragments of identity, and Oliver "trying to learn all he could about Anchise's grafts" shows his determination in understanding his contradictory bits of himself, that don't meet his confident, tan caubois mannerisms. Furthermore, the apricots were "larger, fleshier, jucier than most apricots in the region". Indicating his understanding of his identity allowed him to mature into such a beautiful fruit.

Couple things: Elio ties the transition between immature to mature as the acceptance of a elongated, convoluted, and contradictory identity that cannot be condensed into words. Elio also displays this immaturity through one key behaviour: His "smuggling"of as much information into the fewest possible words, indicating his desire to condense his identity. Thirdly, in the next line, what that gives him in terms of appearance, he is unconfident and that juxtaposes him with Oliver

Can this characterise Oliver as someone who doesn't believe in the constructed identities of individuals, seeing as he says to all, "Later!" without naming? Or characterise him as someone who has no respect for societal obligations and is simply true to himself in such way?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

This study presents a detailed examination of the molecular and cellular organization of the mouse VNO, unveiling new cell types, receptor co-expression patterns, lineage specification regulation, and potential associations between transcription factors, guidance molecules, and receptor types crucial for vomeronasal circuitry wiring specificity. The study identifies a novel type of VSN molecularly different from classic VSNs, which may serve as an accessory to other VSNs by secreting olfactory binding proteins and mucins in response to VNO activation. They also describe a previously undetected co-expression of multiple VRs in individual VSNs, providing an interesting view of the ongoing discussion on how receptor choice occurs in VSNs, either stochastic or deterministic. Finally, the study correlates the expression of axon guidance molecules associated with individual VRs, providing a putative molecular mechanism that specifies VSN axon projections and their connection with postsynaptic cells in the accessory olfactory bulb.

The conclusions of this paper are well supported by data, but some aspects of data analysis and acquisition need to be clarified and extended.

(1) The authors claim that they have identified two new classes of sensory neurons, one being a class of canonical olfactory sensory neurons (OSNs) within the VNO. This classification as canonical OSNs is based on expression data of neurons lacking the V1R or V2R markers but instead expressing ORs and signal transduction molecules, such as Gnal and Cnga2. Since OR-expressing neurons in the VNO have been previously described in many studies, it remains unclear to me why these OR-expressing cells are considered here a "new class of OSNs." Moreover, morphological features, including the presence of cilia, and functional data demonstrating the recognition of chemosignals by these neurons, are still lacking to classify these cells as OSNs akin to those present in the MOE. While these cells do express canonical markers of OSNs, they also appear to express other VSN-typical markers, such as Gnao1 and Gnai2 (Figure 2B), which are less commonly expressed by OSNs in the MOE. Therefore, it would be more precise to characterize this population as atypical VSNs that express ORs, rather than canonical OSNs.

(2) The second new class of sensory neurons identified corresponds to a group of VSNs expressing prototypical VSN markers (including V1Rs, V2Rs, and ORs), but exhibiting lower ribosomal gene expression. Clustering analysis reveals that this cell group is relatively isolated from V1R- and V2R-expressing clusters, particularly those comprising immature VSNs. The question then arises: where do these cells originate? Considering their fewer overall genes and lower total counts compared to mature VSNs, I wonder if these cells might represent regular VSNs in a later developmental stage, i.e., senescent VSNs. While the secretory cell hypothesis is compelling and supported by solid data, it could also align with a late developmental stage scenario. Further data supporting or excluding these hypotheses would aid in understanding the nature of this new cell cluster, with a comparison between juvenile and adult subjects appearing particularly relevant in this context.

(3) The authors' decision not to segregate the samples according to sex is understandable, especially considering previous bulk transcriptomic and functional studies supporting this approach. However, many of the highly expressed VR genes identified have been implicated in detecting sex-specific pheromones and triggering dimorphic behavior. It would be intriguing to investigate whether this lack of sex differences in VR expression persists at the single-cell level. Regardless of the outcome, understanding the presence or absence of major dimorphic changes would hold broad interest in the chemosensory field, offering insights into the regulation of dimorphic pheromone-induced behavior. Additionally, it could provide further support for proposed mechanisms of VR receptor choice in VSNs.

(4) The expression analysis of VRs and ORs seems to have been restricted to the cell clusters associated with the neuronal lineage. Are VRs/ORs expressed in other cell types, i.e. sustentacular, HBC, or other cells?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

In this manuscript, the authors aim to enhance AlphaFold2 for protein conformation-selective drug discovery through the integration of AlphaFold2 and physics-based methods, focusing on improving the accuracy of predicting protein structures ensemble and small molecule binding of metastable protein conformations to facilitate targeted drug design.

The major strength of the paper lies in the methodology, which includes the innovative integration of AlphaFold2 with all-atom enhanced sampling molecular dynamics and induced fit docking to produce protein ensembles with structural diversity. Moreover, the generated structures can be used as reliable crystal-like decoys to enrich metastable conformations of holo-like structures. The authors demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach in producing metastable structures of three different protein kinases and perform docking with their type I and II inhibitors. The paper provides strong evidence supporting the potential impact of this technology in drug discovery. However, limitations may exist in the generalizability of the approach across other structures, especially complex structures such as protein-protein or DNA-protein complexes.

The authors largely achieved their aims by demonstrating that the AF2RAVE-Glide workflow can generate holo-like structure candidates with a 50% successful docking rate for known type II inhibitors. This work is likely to have a significant impact on the field by offering a more precise and efficient method for predicting protein structure ensemble, which is essential for designing targeted drugs. The utility of the integrated AF2RAVE-Glide approach may streamline the drug discovery process, potentially leading to the development of more effective and specific medications for various diseases.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The study claims to investigate trunk representations in elephant trigeminal nuclei located in the brainstem. The researchers identify large protrusions visible from the ventral surface of the brainstem, which they examined using a range of histological methods. However, this ventral location is usually where the inferior olivary complex is found, which challenges the author's assertions about the nucleus under analysis. They find that this brainstem nucleus of elephants contains repeating modules, with a focus on the anterior and largest unit which they define as the putative nucleus principalis trunk module of the trigeminal. The nucleus exhibits low neuron density, with glia outnumbering neurons significantly. The study also utilizes synchrotron X-ray phase contrast tomography to suggest that myelin-stripe-axons traverse this module. The analysis maps myelin-rich stripes in several specimens and concludes that based on their number and patterning that they likely correspond with trunk folds; however this conclusion is not well supported if the nucleus has been misidentified.

Strengths:

The strength of this research lies in its comprehensive use of various anatomical methods, including Nissl staining, myelin staining, Golgi staining, cytochrome oxidase labeling, and synchrotron X-ray phase contrast tomography. The inclusion of quantitative data on cell numbers and sizes, dendritic orientation and morphology, and blood vessel density across the nucleus adds a quantitative dimension. Furthermore, the research is commendable for its high-quality and abundant images and figures, effectively illustrating the anatomy under investigation.

Weaknesses:

While the research provides potentially valuable insights if revised to focus on the structure that appears to be inferior olivary nucleus, there are certain additional weaknesses that warrant further consideration. First, the suggestion that myelin stripes solely serve to separate sensory or motor modules rather than functioning as an "axonal supply system" lacks substantial support due to the absence of information about the neuronal origins and the termination targets of the axons. Postmortem fixed brain tissue limits the ability to trace full axon projections. While the study acknowledges these limitations, it is important to exercise caution in drawing conclusions about the precise role of myelin stripes without a more comprehensive understanding of their neural connections.

Second, the quantification presented in the study lacks comparison to other species or other relevant variables within the elephant specimens (i.e., whole brain or brainstem volume). The absence of comparative data to different species limits the ability to fully evaluate the significance of the findings. Comparative analyses could provide a broader context for understanding whether the observed features are unique to elephants or more common across species. This limitation in comparative data hinders a more comprehensive assessment of the implications of the research within the broader field of neuroanatomy. Furthermore, the quantitative comparisons between African and Asian elephant specimens should include some measure of overall brain size as a covariate in the analyses. Addressing these weaknesses would enable a richer interpretation of the study's findings.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In the submitted manuscript by Go et al, the authors evaluated the tumor microenvironment in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) and made a number of interesting observations, including the following: 1) CCL5 expression within the tumor microenvironment negatively correlated with clinical outcomes in human patients with PDAC; 2) there were both positive and negative correlations between CCL5 expression and the expression of specific genes (e.g. those encoding CD56 and CD16, respectively) included among gene signature lists for Treg, MDSC, TAM, and NK cells; 3) CCR5 inhibition with the inhibitor, maraviroc, reduced Treg infiltration but not that of other immune cell types in an orthotopic murine model of PDAC; 4) CCR5 inhibition augmented anti-PD1 immunotherapy when combined with ionizing radiation (IR) therapy in the murine model; 5) the above therapy resulted in increased infiltration of CD8+ cytotoxic T cells as well as of a subset of NKG2D-negative, tissue-residency (tr) marker expressing NK cells (deemed Cluster 1 NK in their data sets) that inversely correlated with the number of E-cadherin+ cells (i.e. tumor cells) and showed predicted interactions with cDC1 dendritic cells (including XCL1/XCL2 expressed by the NK and XCR1 expressed by the cDC1); 6) the authors identified a number of putative signals stemming from the trNK (e.g. IL-16, TNFSF14, FASLG, CSF, MIF) as well as incoming from cDC1s to NK (e.g. BAG6-NKp30); 7) these trNK cells positively correlated with good outcomes and with CD8+ T cell infiltrations in human PDAC as well as in many other solid tumor types; and 8) importantly, the benefit of IR therapy was specific to the subset of PDAC patients (represented in the TCGA dataset) that were predicted to have low amounts of trNK cells. The authors used murine experimental models, multi-plexed imaging analyses, and a number of publicly available sequencing data sets from human tumor samples to perform their investigations. Based on their findings, the authors proposed that combining IR with CCR5 inhibition and anti-PD1 immunotherapy is a promising strategy to treat solid cancers.

Strengths:

Overall, the collective analyses and conclusions appear to be novel and could be of high and rapid impact on the field, particularly in terms of directing clinical trials to incorporate IR with CCR5 inhibition and immunotherapy. The manuscript is well written; the figures are for the most part clear; and the Discussion is very thoughtful.

Weaknesses:

In the revised manuscript, the authors addressed my original concerns. I have no new major concerns with the study. One of the limitations is that the authors did not perform functional in vivo or ex vivo assays to address some of the major hypotheses that arose from the descriptive, correlative data; but overall, this does not detract from the enthusiasm for the work or the potential significance and impact of the study.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Drougard et al. explore microglial detection of a switch to high-fat diet and a subsequent metabolic response that benefits memory. The findings are both surprising and novel in the context of acute high-fat intake, with convincing evidence of increased CSF palmitate after 3 days of HFD. While the authors demonstrate compelling signs of microglial activation in multiple brain regions and unique metabolite release in tracing studies, they should address the following areas.

Major Points:

(1) It appears that the authors perform key metabolic assays in vitro/ex vivo using primary microglia from either neonatal or adult mice, which should be more clearly delineated especially for the 13C-palmitate tracing. In the case of experiments using primary microglia derived from mixed glial cultures stimulated with M-CSF, this system relies on neonatal mice. This is understandable given the greater potential yield from neonatal mice, but the metabolic state and energetic demands of neonatal and adult microglia differ as their functional roles change across the lifespan. The authors should either show that the metabolic pathways they implicate in neonatal microglia are also representative of adult microglia or perform additional experiments using microglia pooled from adult mice, especially because they link metabolites derived from neonatal microglia (presumably not under the effects of acute HFD) to improved performance in behavioral assays that utilize adult mice.

(2) The authors demonstrate that 3 days of HFD increases circulating palmitate by CSF metabolomics and that microglia can readily metabolize palmitate, but the causal link between palmitate metabolism specifically by microglia and improved performance in behavioral paradigms remains unclear. A previous body of research, alluded to by the authors, suggests that astrocyte shuttling of lactate to neurons improves long-term and spatial memory. The authors should account for palmitate that also could be derived from astrocyte secretion into CSF, and the relative contribution compared to microglia-derived palmitate. Specifically, although microglia can metabolize the palmitate in circulation, there is no direct evidence that the palmitate from the HFD is directly shuttled to microglia and not, for example, to astrocytes (which also express CX3CR1). Thus, the Barnes Maze results could be attributed to multiple cell types. Furthermore, the evidence provided in Figure 5J is insufficient to claim a microglia-dependent mechanism without showing data from mice on HFD with and without microglia depletion (analogous to the third and fourth bars in panel K).

(3) Given the emphasis on improved cognitive function, there is minimal discussion of the actual behavioral outcomes in both the results and discussion sections. The data that HFD-treated animals outperform controls should be presented in more detail both in the figure and in the text. For example, data from all days/trials of the Barnes Maze should be shown, including the day(s) HFD mice outperform controls. Furthermore, the authors should either cite additional literature or provide experimental evidence supporting the notion that microglia release of TCA-associated substrates into the extracellular milieu after HFD specifically benefits neuronal function cellularly or regionally in the brain, which could translate to improved performance in classical behavioral paradigms. The single reference included is a bit obscure, given the study found that increased lactate enhances fear memory which is a neural circuit not studied in the current manuscript. Are there no additional studies on more relevant metabolites (e.g., itaconate, succinate)?

Reviewer #4 (Public Review):

Summary:

Although previous research suggested that noradrenergic glutamatergic signaling could influence respiratory control, the work performed by Chang and colleagues reveals that excitatory (specifically Vglut2) neurons is dynamically and widely expressed throughout the central noradrenergic system, but it is not significantly crucial to change baseline breathing as well the hypercapnia and hypoxia ventilatory responses. The central point that will make a significant change in the field is how NA-glutamate transmission may influence breathing control and the dysfunction of NA neurons in respiratory disorders.

Strengths:

There are several strengths such as the comprehensive analysis of Vglut1, Vglut2, and Vglut3 expression in the central noradrenergic system and the combined measurements of breathing parameters in conscious unrestrained mice.

Other considerations :

These results strongly suggest that glutamate may not be necessary for modulating breathing under normal conditions or even when faced with high levels of carbon dioxide (hypercapnia) or low oxygen levels (hypoxia). This finding is unexpected, considering many studies have underscored glutamate's vital role in respiratory regulation, more so than catecholamines. This leads us to question the significance of catecholamines in controlling respiration. Moreover, if glutamate is not essential for this function, we need to explore its role in other physiological processes such as sympathetic nerve activity (SNA), thermoregulation, and sensory physiology.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

ISR contributes to the pathogenesis of multiple neurodegenerative diseases, such as ALS, FTD, VWMD, etc. Targeting ISR is a promising avenue for therapeutic intervention. However, all previously identified ways to target ISR have problems. PERK inhibitors suppress ISR by inhibiting eIF2alpha phosphorylation and cause pancreatic toxicity in mice. In order to bypass eIF2alpha, previous studies have identified ISR suppressors that target eIF2B, such as ISRIB and 2BAct. These molecules suppress neurodegeneration but do not cause detrimental effects in mouse models. However, ISRIB is water-insoluble, and 2BAct causes cardiovascular complications in dogs, preventing their use in clinics. Here, the authors showed that DNL343, a new ISR inhibitor targeting eIF2B, suppresses features that can be related to neurodegeneration in mouse models. Combined with their previous results of a clinical phase I trial showing the safety of DNL343, these findings suggest the promise of DNL343 as a potential drug for neurodegenerative diseases in which ISR contributes to pathogenesis.

Strengths:

The finding is important and has disease implications.

Weakness:

The authors did not provide evidence that DNL343 suppresses the demise of nervous systems in their VWMD model.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Gil et al provide novel evidence that the chromatin regulator KDM6B is important for establishing and maintaining the neural stem cell (NSC) pool within the dentate gyrus in development and adulthood. They show compelling evidence that loss of KDM6B promotes precocious neuronal differentiation, resulting in a failure to establish and maintain the dentate gyrus NSC pool. The strongest evidence they provide is their immunohistochemistry analysis, in which they observed precocious expression of later differentiation markers from cells marked by BrdU. However, given that KDM6B is ubiquitously expressed, it is difficult to ascertain if their dysregulation is due to a direct loss of KDM6B within NSCs or caused by dysregulation of other glial cells impacted by KDM6B loss through the hGFAP-Cre. Characterization of mature glia would strengthen the work.

They additionally provide evidence of precocious differentiation through scRNA-seq by highlighting key genes that are dysregulated with KDM6B loss. It appears the clustering analysis into cell types was done with WT and KDM6b-depleted cells together. The evidence for precocious differentiation would be greatly strengthened if they instead determined cell-type specific clusters using their WT samples and then observed if fewer cells are characterized as NSCs and more cells align to later developmental stage clusters with KDM6B depletion.

Gil et al propose that KDM6B loss leads to hippocampus-specific impairments in learning and memory. While KDM6B-depleted mice do show a significant decrease in freezing time in contextual fear conditioning, Figure 2 Supplement 1 shows KDM6B-depleted mice are hyperactive compared to WT in the open field test. Thus, the reduction in freezing could be due to hyperactivity. Plotting freezing time in short bins throughout the duration of the test can help clarify this. It would be additionally helpful to plot the training baseline and the test on the same graph and compare their freezing from baseline to clarify if they completely fail to freeze or show a reduction in freezing compared to the wild-type.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The goal of this study was to carry out an in-depth granular and unbiased phenotyping of peripheral blood circulating Tfh specific to two malaria vaccine candidates, PfSEA-1A and PfGARP, and correlate these with age (children vs adults) and protection from malaria (antibody titers against Plasmodium antigens.). The authors further attempted to identify any specific differences in the Tfh responses to these two distinct malaria antigens.

Strengths:

The authors had access to peripheral blood samples from children and adults living in a malaria-endemic region of Kenya. The authors studied these samples using in vitro restimulation in the presence of specific malaria antigens. The authors generated a very rich data set from these valuable samples using cutting-edge spectral flow cytometry and a 21-plex panel that included a variety of surface markers, cytokines, and transcription factors.

Weaknesses:

- Quantifying antigen-specific T cells by flow cytometry requires the use of either 1- tetramers or 2- in vitro restimulation with specific antigens followed by identification of TCR-activated cells based on de-novo expression of activation markers (e.g. intracellular cytokine staining and/or surface marker staining). Although authors use an in vitro restimulation strategy, they do not focus their study on cells de-novo expressing activation markers as a result of restimulation; therefore, their study is not really on antigen-specific cTfh. Moreover, the authors report no changes in the expression of activation markers commonly used to identify antigen-specific T cells upon in vitro restimulation (including IFNg and CD40L); therefore, it is not clear if their in vitro restimulation with malaria antigens actually worked.

- CXCR5+CD4+ memory T cells have been shown to present multi-potency and plasticity, capable of differentiating to non-Tfh subsets upon re-challenge. Although authors included in their flow panel a good number of markers commonly used in combination to identify Tfh (CXCR5, PD-1, ICOS, Bcl-6, IL-21), they only used one single marker (CXCR5) as their basis to define Tfh, thus providing a weak definition for Tfh cells and follow up downstream analysis.

- Previous works have used FACS-sorting and in vitro assays for cytokine production and B cell help to study the functional capacity of different cTfh subsets in blood from Plasmodium-infected individuals. In this study, authors do not carry out any such assays to isolate and evaluate the functional capacity of the different Tfh subsets identified. Thus, all the suggestions for the role that these different cTfh subsets may have in vivo in the context of malaria remain highly hypothetical.

- The authors have not included malaria unexposed control groups in their study, and experimental groups are relatively small (n=13).

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Das et al. discovered a maternal role for Caspar (Casp), the Drosophila orthologue of human Fas-associated factor-1 (FAF1), in embryonic development and germ cell formation. They find that Casp interacts with Transitional endoplasmic reticulum 94 (TER94). Loss of Casp or TER94 leads to partial embryonic lethality, correlated with aberrant centrosome behavior and cytoskeletal abnormalities. This suggests that Casp, along with TER94, promotes embryonic development through a still unidentified mechanism. They also find that Casp regulates germ cell number by controlling a key determinant of germ cell formation, Oskar, through its negative regulator, Smaug.

Strengths:

Overall, the experiments are well-conducted, and the conclusions of this paper are mostly well-supported by data.

Weaknesses:

Some additional controls could be included, and the language could be clarified for accuracy.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, Nagarajan et al. study the impact of early damage to the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) on the vocal development of marmoset monkeys. AAC lesions were performed on neonatal marmosets and their vocal patterns and the spectrotemporal features of their calls were analyzed compared to control groups during the first six weeks of life. While the vocal repertoire was not significantly affected by ACC lesions, the authors described notable differences in the social contact call, the phee call. Marmosets with ACC damage made fewer social contact calls, and when they did, these calls were shorter, louder, and monotonic. Additionally, the study revealed that ACC damage in infancy led to permanent alterations in downstream brain areas involved in social vocalizations, such as the amygdala and periaqueductal gray.

Strengths:

This study suggests that the ACC plays a crucial role in the normal development of social vocal behavior in infant marmosets. Studying vocal behavior in marmosets can provide insights into the neural mechanisms underlying human speech and communication disorders due to their similarity in brain structure and social behavior.

The methods are robust and reliable with precise localization of the lesions with neuroimaging and histological examination.

Weaknesses:

It is striking to find that the vocal repertoire of infant marmosets was not significantly affected by ACC lesions. During development, the neural circuits are still maturing and the role of different brain regions may evolve over time. While the ACC likely contributes to vocalizations across the lifespan, its relative importance may vary depending on the developmental stage. In neonates, vocalizations may be more reflexive or driven by physiological needs. At this stage, the ACC may play a role in basic socioemotional regulation but may not be as critical for vocal production. Since the animals lived for two years, further analysis might be helpful to elucidate the precise role of ACC in the vocal behavior of marmosets.

- Figure 3D. According to the Introduction "...infant ACC lesions abolish the characteristic cries that infants normally issue when separated from its mother". Are the present results in marmosets showing the opposite effect? Please discuss.

- Figure 3E and Discussion. Phees are mature contact calls and cries immature contact calls (Zhang et al, 2019, Nat Commun). Therefore, I would rather say that the proportion of immature (cries) contact calls increases vs the mature (phee, trill, twitters) contact calls in the ACC group. Cries are also "isolated-induced contact calls" to attract the attention of the caregivers.

- Figure 4D. Animal location and head direction within the recording incubator can have significant effects on the perceived amplitude of a call. Were these factors taken into account?

- Figure 4E. When a phee call has a higher amplitude, as is the case for the ACC group (Figure 4D), the energy of the signal will be concentrated more strongly at the phee call frequency ~8KHz. This concentration of the energy reduces the variability in the frequency distribution, leading to lower entropy. The interpretation of the results should be reconsidered. A faint call (control group) can exhibit more variability in the frequency content since the energy is distributed across a wider range of frequencies contributing to higher entropy. It can still be "fixed, regular, and stereotyped" if the behavior is consistent or predictable with little variation. Also, to define ACC calls as "monotonic" I would rather search for the lack of frequency modulation, amplitude variation, or narrower bandwidth.

- Apart from the changes in the vocal behavior, did the AAC lesions manifest in any other observable cognitive, emotional, or social behavior? ACC plays a role in processing pain and modulating pain perception. Could that be the reason for the observed increase in the proportion of cries in the ACC group and the increase in the phee call amplitude? Did the cries in the ACC group also display a higher amplitude than the cries in the control group?

- Discussion. Louder calls have the potential to travel longer distances compared to fainter calls, possess higher energy levels, and can propagate through the environment more effectively. If the ACC group produced louder phee syllables, how could be the message conveyed over long distances "deficient, limited, and/or indiscriminate"?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Petty and Bruno ask whether activity in secondary thalamic nuclei depends on the behavioral relevance of stimulus modality. They recorded from POm and LP, but the weight of the paper is skewed toward POm. They use two cohorts of mice (N=11 and 12), recorded in both nuclei using multi-electrode arrays, while being trained to lick to either a tactile stimulus (air puff against whiskers, first cohort) or a visual stimulus (drifting grating, second cohort), and ignore the respective other. They find that both nuclei, while primarily responsive to their 'home' modality, are more responsive to the relevant modality (i.e. the modality predicting reward).

Strengths:

The paper asks an important question, it is timely and is very well executed. The behavioral method using a delayed lick index (excluding impulsive responses) is well worked out. Electrophysiology methods are state-of-the-art with information about spike quality in Figure S1. The main result is novel and important, convincingly conveying the point that encoding of secondary thalamic nuclei is flexible and clearly includes aspects of the behavioral relevance of a stimulus. The paper explores the mapping of responses within POm, pointing to a complex functional structure, something that has been reported/suggested in earlier studies.

Weaknesses:

Coding: It does not become clear to which aspect of the task POm/LP is responding. There is a motor-related response (whisking, licking, pupil), which, however, after regressing it out leaves a remaining response that the authors speculate could be sensory.

Learning: The paper talks a lot about 'learning', although it is only indirectly addressed. The authors use two differently (over-)trained mice cohorts rather than studying e.g. a rule switch in one and the same mouse, which would allow us to directly assess whether it is the same neurons that undergo rule-dependent encoding.

Mapping: The authors treat and interpret the two nuclei very much in the same vein, although there are clear differences. I would think these differences are mentioned in passing but could be discussed in more depth. Mapping using responses on electrode tracks is done in POm but not LP.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This paper uses a new chemogenetic tool to investigate the role of cerebellar Purkinje cells in postural control. Using a high-throughput behavioral assay, they show that activation or ablation of Purkinje cells affects various aspects of postural control in zebrafish larvae during spontaneous swimming and that the effects are more pronounced at later developmental time points, where the Purkinje cell number is much greater. Using a sophisticated imaging assay, they record Purkinje cell activity in response to the tilt of the fish and show that some Purkinje cells are tuned to tilt direction and that the direction can even be decoded from untuned neurons.

Strengths:

Overall the study is nice, using a range of tools to address a fundamental question about the role of the cerebellum in postural control in fish.

Weaknesses:

(1) The data in Figure 1 that establishes the method seems to be based on a very small number of experiments and lacks some statistical analysis.

(2) The choice and presentation of the statistical and analysis methods used in Figures 2-5 could be improved.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Li et al. describe an audiovisual temporal recalibration experiment in which participants perform baseline sessions of ternary order judgments about audiovisual stimulus pairs with various stimulus-onset asynchronies (SOAs). These are followed by adaptation at several adapting SOAs (each on a different day), followed by post-adaptation sessions to assess changes in psychometric functions. The key novelty is the formal specification and application/fit of a causal-inference model for the perception of relative timing, providing simulated predictions for the complete set of psychometric functions both pre and post-adaptation.

Strengths:

(1) Formal models are preferable to vague theoretical statements about a process, and prior to this work, certain accounts of temporal recalibration (specifically those that do not rely on a population code) had only qualitative theoretical statements to explain how/why the magnitude of recalibration changes non-linearly with the stimulus-onset asynchrony of the adaptor.

(2) The experiment is appropriate, the methods are well described, and the average model prediction is a fairly good match to the average data (Figure 4). Conclusions may be overstated slightly, but seem to be essentially supported by the data and modelling.

(3) The work should be impactful. There seems a good chance that this will become the go-to modelling framework for those exploring non-population-code accounts of temporal recalibration (or comparing them with population-code accounts).

(4) A key issue for the generality of the model, specifically in terms of recalibration asymmetries reported by other authors that are inconsistent with those reported here, is properly acknowledged in the discussion.

Weaknesses:

(1) The evidence for the model comes in two forms. First, two trends in the data (non-linearity and asymmetry) are illustrated, and the model is shown to be capable of delivering patterns like these. Second, the model is compared, via AIC, to three other models. However, the main comparison models are clearly not going to fit the data very well, so the fact that the new model fits better does not seem all that compelling. I would suggest that the authors consider a comparison with the atheoretical model they use to first illustrate the data (in Figure 2). This model fits all sessions but with complete freedom to move the bias around (whereas the new model constrains the way bias changes via a principled account). The atheoretical model will obviously fit better, but will have many more free parameters, so a comparison via AIC/BIC or similar should be informative.

(2) It does not appear that some key comparisons have been subjected to appropriate inferential statistical tests. Specifically, lines 196-207 - presumably this is the mean (and SD or SE) change in AIC between models across the group of 9 observers. So are these differences actually significant, for example via t-test?

(3) The manuscript tends to gloss over the population-code account of temporal recalibration, which can already provide a quantitative account of how the magnitude of recalibration varies with adaptor SOA. This could be better acknowledged, and the features a population code may struggle with (asymmetry?) are considered.

(4) The engagement with relevant past literature seems a little thin. Firstly, papers that have applied causal inference modelling to judgments of relative timing are overlooked (see references below). There should be greater clarity regarding how the modelling here builds on or differs from these previous papers (most obviously in terms of additionally modelling the recalibration process, but other details may vary too). Secondly, there is no discussion of previous findings like that in Fujisaki et al.'s seminal work on recalibration, where the spatial overlap of the audio and visual events didn't seem to matter (although admittedly this was an N = 2 control experiment). This kind of finding would seem relevant to a causal inference account.

References:<br /> Magnotti JF, Ma WJ and Beauchamp MS (2013) Causal inference of asynchronous audiovisual speech. Front. Psychol. 4:798. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00798<br /> Sato, Y. (2021). Comparing Bayesian models for simultaneity judgement with different causal assumptions. J. Math. Psychol., 102, 102521.

(5) As a minor point, the model relies on simulation, which may limit its take-up/application by others in the field.

(6) There is little in the way of reassurance regarding the model's identifiability and recoverability. The authors might for example consider some parameter recovery simulations or similar.

(7) I don't recall any statements about open science and the availability of code and data.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The burst fraction neural code has conceptual interest but has been little examined in vivo. This study examines and compares the burst fraction, the standard firing rate (firing rate) code, and the related event fraction (event rate) code using published data from an experiment where rats learned to lick after detecting electrical microstimulation in the somatosensory (barrel) cortex. Analyzing single-neuron spiking responses, the study reports that the burst fraction identifies more and different neurons showing the effects of training than the firing rate. The study further claims that the burst fraction (1) most promptly responded to false-negative detection errors, (2) during further training of trained animals (from 80% to 90% accuracy, over five days), correlates with behavioral accuracy, and (3) by shifting earlier to align with the (relatively constant) event rate modulation, leads to the observed sharpened firing rate response during this further training. The study concludes that 'a fine-grained separation of spike timing patterns [into burst fraction, firing rate, and event rate] reveals two signals,' an error signal and a sharpening signal.

Strengths:

The burst fraction is shown to discern more (and somewhat different) cells showing significant responses in trained animals and also to reveal a larger absolute difference in the fraction of responsive cells between naïve and trained animals. The Poisson model analysis particularly convincingly shows that the firing rate alone cannot explain either the spiking pattern or the prevalence of burst fraction-ON cells, thereby furnishing strong evidence that the burst fraction conveys independent information from the firing rate. The demonstration of error signals on miss trials in all three neural codes (burst fraction, firing rate, event rate) is interesting. It is also interesting to see that neural responses broadly shift earlier for animals even during further training in an already 'expert' stage and that the burst fraction correlates with further accuracy increases.

Weaknesses:

The evidence is inadequate for the burst fraction as responding more promptly to missed trials.

This key claim seems to rest solely on the timing of the first bins in Figure 3B showing statistically significant differences. This reasoning implicitly draws inferences from the lack of statistical differences, which cannot support a positive claim in general. Specifically, here, the burst fraction is calculated with a division, which can magnify small differences and impact the power of statistical tests. If I trace back from the first bin showing significant differences to the first bin the signal starts rising, the timing seems to be comparable for all three neural codes (~1.6 s).

Pertinently, what is the statistical test used in Figure 3B? A parametric test may be inappropriate for the burst fraction, a ratio that like does not fulfill the normality assumption. An inappropriate test would compound the problem of concluding from the lack of (early) significant differences.

The evidence that burst fraction is responsible for sharpening is opaque due to insufficient statistical reporting. Specifically, it seems there is a correlation between firing rate and accuracy that is reported as non-significant.

Changes in the reaction times (or other movement parameters) over-training may confound the correlation of the burst fraction to the accuracy and firing rate sharpening during further training. Lack of control for changes in movement over training weakens the results.

The claim of independence of burst fraction and event rate/firing rate information is too strong. The authors show a significant negative correlation between burst fraction and firing rate (2D).

The claim that there is no 'functional reorganization' beyond day two is too strong. Although this claim is not a core one to the study, it derives from an absence of statistical significance, especially problematic here as the effect sizes are large. For example, the Spearman correlation is 0.67/0.87 for the analyses with burst fraction. With only five data points, even strong effects may not achieve statistical significance, making negative conclusions problematic. Further, how are the p-values calculated (if using a parametric test, are the assumptions met), and why should these analyses use Spearman's correlation when analogous analyses in Figure 4E, F use Pearson's r?

Does the burst fraction correlate with accuracy in cross-training?

If the burst fraction correlates with accuracy, it should be expected to do so also when the animals progress from the naïve to the trained stage. Moreover, the correlation in Figure 4E can benefit from strengthening as it is now supported by only five points, is driven by only three 'clusters,' and only represents a narrow range of accuracies. If the data is available for this analysis, it should be done to test and potentially strengthen the main claim of the study.

The text and figures contain numerous ambiguities that need to be clarified. These do not include obvious typos, only elements that affect conceptual understanding.

- Some key terms in the main claims are never defined. For example, in the title, it is unclear what 'fast' and 'transients' mean. The abstract uses, but the main text never defines, 'demultiplexing,' 'a *conjunctive* burst code,' 'sparse and succinct [sic],' and 'correlated more *globally*.'

- Some paper components are un(der)explained and, sometimes, apparently internally inconsistent. For example, in Figure 1I, the fraction of firing rate-ON cells does not look like the 6% shown in Figure 1J, left. In Figure 2E-G, what is the total cell number, 279, in Figure 2G legend, why is it different from the 153 total cells in Figure 2E legend, and what is the 'n = 5' within Figure 2G? All n numbers should be explained in general; more examples include the 245 in Figure 3C and the 49 in Figure 3B. In Figure 3C, what is the top horizontal bar (I assume significant differences)? About catch trials, the Figure 3D legend says rewards are given on licks, but the text says licking was not rewarded; which is the case? Figure 4B legend says 'firing rate (left), burst fraction (middle) and event rate (right),' but the plot colors imply a different order.

- The abstract states, 'The alignment of bursting and event rate modulation [...] was strongly associated [sic] behavioral accuracy.' It seems to me it is not the alignment of burst fraction and event rate but rather burst fraction per se that correlates with behavioral accuracy (Figure 4E right). At least, the latter correlation is the only one tested.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors aimed to determine the mechanism by which seizures emerge in Developmental and Epileptic Encephalopathies caused by variants in the gene FGF13. Loss of FGF13 in excitatory neurons had no effect on seizure phenotype as compared to the loss of FGF13 in GABAergic interneurons, which in contrast caused a dramatic proseizure phenotype and early death in these animals. They were able to show that Fgf13 ablation and consequent loss of FGF13-S and FGF13-VY reduced overall inhibitory input from Fgf13-expressing interneurons onto hippocampal pyramidal neurons. This was shown to occur not via disruption to voltage-gated sodium channels but rather by reducing potassium currents and action potential repolarisation in these interneurons.

Strengths:

The authors employed multiple well-validated, novel mouse lines with FGF13 knocked out in specific cell types including all neurons, all excitatory cells, all GABAergic interneurons, or a subset of MGE-derived interneurons, including axo-axonic chandelier cells. The phenotypes of each of these four mouse lines were carefully characterised to reveal clear differences with the most fundamental being that Interneuron-targeted deletion of FGF13 led to perinatal mortality associated with extensive seizures and impaired the hippocampal inhibitory/excitatory balance while deletion of FGF13 in excitatory neurons caused no detectable seizures and no survival deficits.

The authors made excellent use of western blotting and in situ hybridisation of the different FGF13 isoforms to determine which isoforms are expressed in which cell types, with FGF3-S predominantly in excitatory neurons and FGF13-VY and FGF13-V predominantly in GABAergic neurons.

The authors performed a highly detailed electrophysiological analysis of excitatory neurons and GABAergic interneurons with FGF13 deficits using whole-cell patch clamp. This enabled them to show that FGF13 removal did not affect voltage-gated sodium channels in interneurons, but rather reduced the action of potassium channels, with the resultant effect of making it more likely that interneurons enter depolarisation block. These findings were strengthened by the demonstration that viral re-expression of different Fgf13 splice isoforms could partially rescue deficits in interneuron action potential output and restore K+ channel current size.

Additionally, the discussion was nuanced and demonstrated how the current findings resolved previous apparent contradictions in the field involving the function of FGF13.

These findings will have a significant impact on our understanding of how FGF13 causes seizures and death in DEEs, and the action of different FGF13 isoforms within different neuronal cell types, particularly GABAergic interneurons.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This study presented a valuable inventory of scoring a neuropsychological test, ROCFT, with constructing an artificial intelligence model.

Strengths:

They constructed huge samples collected among multi-center international researchers and tested the model precisely using internet data.<br /> The model scored the test with excellent ability, surpassing even experts. The product can run an application on a tablet, which helps clinicians and patients.<br /> Their method of building the model of deep learning and testing will apply to tests in all fields, not just the psychological field.

Weaknesses:

The considerable effort and cost to make the model only for an existing neuropsychological test.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, Last and colleagues describe Ais, an open-source software package for the semi-automated segmentation of cryo-electron tomography (cryo-ET) maps. Specifically, Ais provides a graphical user interface (GUI) for the manual segmentation and annotation of specific features of interest. These manual annotations are then used as input ground-truth data for training a convolutional neural network (CNN) model, which can then be used for automatic segmentation. Ais provides the option of several CNNs so that users can compare their performance on their structures of interest in order to determine the CNN that best suits their needs. Additionally, pre-trained models can be uploaded and shared to an online database.

Algorithms are also provided to characterize "model interactions" which allows users to define heuristic rules on how the different segmentations interact. For instance, a membrane-adjacent protein can have rules where it must colocalize a certain distance away from a membrane segmentation. Such rules can help reduce false positives; as in the case above, false negatives predicted away from membranes are eliminated.

The authors then show how Ais can be used for particle picking and subsequent subtomogram averaging and for the segmentation of cellular tomograms for visual analysis. For subtomogram averaging, they used a previously published dataset and compared the averages of their automated picking with the published manual picking. Analysis of cellular tomogram segmentation was primarily visual.

Strengths:

CNN-based segmentation of cryo-ET data is a rapidly developing area of research, as it promises substantially faster results than manual segmentation as well as the possibility for higher accuracy. However, this field is still very much in the development and the overall performance of these approaches, even across different algorithms, still leaves much to be desired. In this context, I think Ais is an interesting package, as it aims to provide both new and experienced users with streamlined approaches for manual annotation, access to a number of CNNs, and methods to refine the outputs of CNN models against each other. I think this can be quite useful for users, particularly as these methods develop.

Weaknesses:

Whilst overall I am enthusiastic about this manuscript, I still have a number of comments:

On page 5, paragraph 1, there is a discussion on human judgement of these results. I think a more detailed discussion is required here, as from looking at the figures, I don't know that I agree with the authors' statement that Pix2pix is better. I acknowledge that this is extremely subjective, which is the problem. I think that a manual segmentation should also be shown in a figure so that the reader has a better way to gauge the performance of the automated segmentation.

On page 7, the authors mention terms such as "emit" and "absorb" but never properly define them, such that I feel like I'm guessing at their meaning. Precise definitions of these terms should be provided.

For Figure 3, it's unclear if the parent models shown (particularly the carbon model) are binary or not. The figure looks to be grey values, which would imply that it's the visualization of some prediction score. If so, how is this thresholded? This can also be made clearer in the text.

Figure 3D was produced in ChimeraX using the hide dust function. I think some discussion on the nature of this "dust" is in order, e.g. how much is there and how large does it need to be to be considered dust? Given that these segmentations can be used for particle picking, this seems like it may be a major contributor to false positives.

Page 9 contains the following sentence: "After selecting these values, we then launched a batch particle picking process to determine lists of particle coordinates based on the segmented volumes." Given how important this is, I feel like this requires significant description, e.g. how are densities thresholded, how are centers determined, and what if there are overlapping segmentations?

The FSC shown in Figure S6 for the auto-picked maps is concerning. First, a horizontal line at FSC = 0 should be added. It seems that starting at a frequency of ~0.045, the FSC of the autopicked map increases above zero and stays there. Since this is not present in the FSC of the manually picked averages, this suggests the automatic approach is also finding some sort of consistent features. This needs to be discussed.

Page 11 contains the statement "the segmented volumes found no immediately apparent false positive predictions of these pores". This is quite subjective and I don't know that I agree with this assessment. Unless the authors decide to quantify this through subtomogram classification, I don't think this statement is appropriate.

In the methods, the authors note that particle picking is explained in detail in the online documentation. Given that this is a key feature of this software, such an explanation should be in the manuscript.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Using protein degradation approach, Eaton et al show that INST11 can terminate the sense and anti-sense transcription but higher activity of CDK9 in sense direction protects it from INS11-dependent termination. They developed sPOINT-seq that detects nascent 5'-capped RNA. The technique allowed them to reveal robust transcription initiation of sense-RNA as compared to anti-sense.

Strengths:

The strength of paper is acute degradation of proteins, eliminating the off-target effects. Further, the paper uses elegant approaches such as POINT and sPOINT-seq to measure nascent RNA and 5'-capped short RNA. Together, the combination of these three allowed the authors to make clean interpretations of data.

Weaknesses:

While manuscript is well written, the details on panel is not sufficient. The methods can be more elaborate for better understanding. Additional discussion on how authors findings contradict the existing model of anti-sense transcription termination should be added.

in the revised manuscript, authors have added details on panels and elaborated method and other sections for better understanding.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary

The high heterogeneity nature of α-synuclein (α-syn) fibrils posed significant challenges in structural reconstruction of the ex vivo conformation. A deeper understanding of the factors influencing the formation of various α-syn polymorphs remains elusive. The manuscript by Frey et al. provides a comprehensive exploration of how pH variations (ranging from 5.8 to 7.4) affect the selection of α-syn polymorphs (specifically, Type1, 2 and 3) in vitro by using cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) and helical reconstruction techniques. Crucially, the authors identify two novel polymorphs at pH 7.0 in PBS. These polymorphs bear resemblance to the structure of patient-derived juvenile-onset synucleinopathy (JOS) polymorph and diseased tissue amplified α-syn fibrils. The revised manuscript more strongly supports the notion that seeding is a non-polymorph-specific in the context of secondary nucleation-dominated aggregation, underscoring the irreplaceable role of pH in polymorph formation.

Strengths

This study systematically investigates the effects of environmental conditions and seeding on the structure of α-syn fibrils. It emphasizes the significant influence of environmental factors, especially pH, in determining the selection of α-syn polymorphs. The high-resolution structures obtained through cryo-EM enable a clear characterization of the composition and proportion of each polymorph in the sample. Collectively, this work provides a strong support for the pronounced sensitivity of α-syn fibril structures to the environmental conditions, and systematically categorizes previously reported α-syn fibril structures. Furthermore, the identification of JOS-like polymorph also demonstrates the possibility of in vitro reconstruction of brain-derived α-syn fibril structures.

Weaknesses

There are two minor points I recommend the authors to address:

(1) In the response to Weakness 1, point (3), the authors state that "the Type 5 represented only 10-20% of the fibrils in the sample." However, this information is not labeled in the corresponding Figure 4. I suggest the authors verify and label all relevant percentages in the figures to prevent misunderstandings.

(2) While the authors have detailed the helical reconstruction procedure in the Methods section, it is necessary to indicate the scale bar or box size in the figure legend of the 2D representative classes to ensure clarity and reproducibility.

Comments on the revised manuscript:

The authors have responded adequately to these critiques in the revised version of the manuscript.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors harnessed the potential of mammalian endogenous virus-like proteins to encapsulate virus-like particles (VLPs), enabling the precise delivery of tumor neoantigens. Through meticulous optimization of the VLP component ratios, they achieved remarkable stability and efficiency in delivering these crucial payloads. Moreover, the incorporation of CpG-ODN further heightened the targeted delivery efficiency and immunogenicity of the VLPs, solidifying their role as a potent tumor vaccine. In a diverse array of tumor mouse models, this novel tumor vaccine, termed ePAC, exhibited profound efficacy in activating the murine immune system. This activation manifested through the stimulation of dendritic cells in lymph nodes, the generation of effector memory T cells within the spleen, and the infiltration of neoantigen-specific T cells into tumors, resulting in robust anti-tumor responses.

Strengths:

This study delivered tumor neoantigens using VLPs, pioneering a new method for neoantigen delivery. Additionally, the gag protein of VLP is derived from mammalian endogenous virus-like protein, which offers greater safety compared to virus-derived gag proteins, thereby presenting a strong potential for clinical translation. The study also utilized a humanized mouse model to further validate the vaccine's efficacy and safety. Therefore, the anti-tumor vaccine designed in this study possesses both innovation and practicality.

Weaknesses:

(1) CpG-ODN is an FDA-approved adjuvant with various sequence structures. Why was CpG-ODN 1826 directly chosen in this study instead of other types of CpG-ODN? Additionally, how does DEC-205 recognize CpG-ODN 1826, and can DEC-205 recognize other types of CpG-ODN?

(2) Why was it necessary to treat DCs with virus-like particles three times during the in vitro activation of T cells? Can this in vitro activation method effectively obtain neoantigen-responsive T cells?

(3) In the humanized mouse model, the authors used Hepa1-6 cells to construct the tumor model. To achieve the vaccine's anti-tumor function, these Hepa1-6 cells were additionally engineered to express HLA-A0201. However, in the in vitro experiments, the authors used the HepG2 cell line, which naturally expresses HLA-A0201. Why did the authors not continue to use HepG2 cells to construct the tumor model, instead of Hepa1-6 cells?

(4) The advantages of low immunogenicity viruses as vaccines compared with conventional adenovirus and lentivirus, etc. should be discussed.

(5) In Figure 6B, the authors should provide statistical results.

(6.) The entire article demonstrates a clear logical structure and substantial content in its writing. However, there are still some minor errors, such as the misspelling of "Spleenic" in Figure 3B, and the sentence from line 234 should be revised.

(7) The authors demonstrated the efficiency of CpG-ODN membrane modification by varying the concentration of DBCO, ultimately determining the optimal modification scheme for eVLP as 3.5 nmol of DBCO. However, in Figure 2B, the author did not provide the modification efficiency when the DBCO concentration is lower than 3.5 nmol. These results should be provided.

(8) In Figure 3, the authors presented a series of data demonstrating that ePAC can activate mouse DC2.4 cells and BMDCs in vitro. However, in Figure 7, there is no evidence showing whether human DC cells can be activated by ePAC in vitro. This data should be provided.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors investigate the kinase activity of IKK2, a crucial regulator of inflammatory cell signaling. They describe a novel tyrosine kinase activity of this well-studied enzyme and a highly unusual phosphotransfer from phosphorylated IKK2 onto substrate proteins in the absence of ATP as a substrate.

Strengths:

The authors provide an extensive biochemical characterization of the processes with recombinant protein, western blot, autoradiography, and protein engineering.

Weaknesses:

The identity and purity of the used proteins is not clear. Since the findings are so unexpected and potentially of wide-reaching interest - this is a weakness. Similar specific detection of phospho-Ser/Thr vs phospho-Tyr relies largely on antibodies which can have varying degrees of specificity.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

In this manuscript, Park and colleagues describe a series of experiments that investigate the role of R-loops in HIV-1 genome integration. The authors show that during HIV-1 infection, R-loops levels on the host genome accumulate. Using a synthetic R-loop prone gene construct, they show that HIV-1 integration sites target sites with high R-loop levels. They further show that integration sites on the endogenous host genome are correlated with sites prone to R-loops. Using biochemical approaches, as well as in vivo co-IP and proximity ligation experiments, the authors show that HIV-1 integrase physically interacts with R-loop structures.

My primary concern with the paper is with the interpretations the authors make about their genome-wide analyses. I think that including some additional analyses of the genome-wide data, as well as some textual changes can help make these interpretations more congruent with what the data demonstrate. Here are a few specific comments and questions:

(1) I think Figure 1 makes a good case for the conclusion that R-loops are more easily detected HIV-1 infected cells by multiple approaches (all using the S9.6 antibody). The authors show that their signals are RNase H sensitive, which is a critical control. For the DRIPc-Seq, I think including an analysis of biological replicates would greatly strengthen the manuscript. The authors state in the methods that the DRIPc pulldown experiments were done in biological replicates for each condition. Are the increases in DRIPc peaks similar across biological replicates? Are genomic locations of HIV-1-dependent peaks similar across biological replicates? Measuring and reporting the biological variation between replicate experiments is crucial for making conclusions about increases in R-loop peak frequency. This is partially alleviated by the locus-specific data in Figure S3A. However, a better understanding of how the genome-wide data varies across biological replicates will greatly enhance the quality of Figure 1.

(2) I think that the conclusion that R-loops "accumulate" in infected cells is acceptable, given the data presented. However, in line 134 the authors state that "HIV-1 infection induced host genomic R-loop formation". I suggest being very specific about the observation. Accumulation can happen by (a) inducing a higher frequency of the occurrence of individual R-loops and/or (b) stabilizing existing R-loops. I'm not convinced the authors present enough evidence to claim one over the other. It is altogether possible that HIV-1 infection stabilizes R-loops such that they are more persistent (perhaps by interactions with integrase?), and therefore more easily detected. I think rephrasing the conclusions to include this possibility would alleviate my concerns.

(3) A technical problem with using the S9.6 antibody for the detection of R-loops via microscopy is that it cross-reacts with double-stranded RNA. This has been addressed by the work of Chedin and colleagues (as well as others). It is absolutely essential to treat these samples with an RNA:RNA hybrid-specific RNase, which the authors did not include, as far as their methods section states. Therefore, it is difficult to interpret all of the immunofluorescence experiments that depend on S9.6 binding.

(4) Given that there is no clear correlation between expression levels and R-loop peak detection, combined with the data that show increased detection of R-loop frequency in non-genic regions, I think it will be important to show that the R-loop forming regions are indeed transcribed above background levels. This will help alleviate possible concerns that there are technical errors in R-loop peak detection.

(5) In Figures 4C and D the hashed lines are not defined. It is also interesting that the integration sites do not line up with R-loop peaks. This does not necessarily directly refute the conclusions (especially given the scale of the genomic region displayed), but should be addressed in the manuscript. Additionally, it would greatly improve Figure 4 to have some idea about the biological variation across replicates of the data presented 4A.

(6) The authors do not adequately describe the Integrase mutant that they use in their biochemical experiments in Figure 5A. Could this impact the activity of the protein in such a way that interferes with the interpretation of the experiment? The mutant is not used in subsequent experiments for Figure 5 and so even though the data are consistent with each other (and the conclusion that Integrase interacts with R-loops) a more thorough explanation of why that mutant was used and how it impacts the biochemical activity of the protein will help the interpretation of the data presented in Figure 5.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, the authors explore the contribution of metabolism to the response of two subpopulations of macrophages to bacterial pathogens commonly encountered in the human lung, as well as the influence of priming signals typically produced at a site of inflammation. The two subpopulations are resident airway macrophages (AM) isolated via bronchoalveolar lavage and monocyte-derived macrophages (MDM) isolated from human blood and differentiated using human serum. The two cell types were primed using IFNγ and Il-4, which are produced at sites of inflammation as part of initiation and resolution of inflammation respectively, followed by stimulation with either irradiated Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) or LPS to simulate interaction with a bacterial pathogen. The authors use human cells for this work, which makes use of widely reported and thoroughly described priming signals, as well as model antigens. This makes the observations on the functional response of these two subpopulations relevant to human health and disease. To examine the relationship between metabolism and functional response, the authors measure rates of oxidative phosphorylation and glycolysis under baseline conditions, primed using IFNγ or IL-4, and primed and stimulated with Mtb or LPS.

Strengths:

• The data indicate that both populations of macrophages increase metabolic rates when primed, but MDMs decrease their rates of oxidative phosphorylation after IL-4 priming and bacterial exposure while AMs do not.<br /> • It is demonstrated that glycolysis rates are directly linked to the expression of surface molecules involved in T-cell stimulation and while secretion of TNFα in AM is dependent on glycolysis, in MDM this is not the case. IL-1β is regulated by glycolysis only after IFN-γ priming in both MDM and AM populations. It is also demonstrated that Mtb and LPS stimulation produces responses that are not metabolically consistent across the two macrophage populations. The Mtb-induced response in MDMs differed from the LPS response, in that it relies on glycolysis, while this relationship is reversed in AMs. The difference in metabolic contributions to functional outcomes between these two macrophage populations is significant, despite acknowledgement of the reductive nature of the system by the authors.<br /> • The observations that AM and MDM rely on glycolysis for the production of cytokines during a response to bacterial pathogens in the lung, but that only MDM shift to Warburg Metabolism, though this shift is blocked following exposure to IL-4, are supported by the data and a significant contribution the study of the innate immune response.

Weaknesses:

• It is unclear whether changes in glycolysis and oxidative phosphorylation in primed cells are due to priming or subsequent treatments. ECAR and OCR analyses were therefore difficult to interpret.<br /> • The data may not support a claim that AM has greater "functional plasticity" without a direct comparison of antigen presentation. Moreover, MDM secrete more IL-1β than AM. The claim that AM "have increased ability to produce all cytokines assayed in response to Mtb stimulation" does not appear to be supported by the data.<br /> • The claim that AM are better for "innate training" via IFNγ may not be consistent with increased IL-1β and a later claim that MDM have increased production and are "associated with optimal training."<br /> • Statistical analyses may not appropriately support some of the conclusions.<br /> • AM populations would benefit from further definition-presumably this is a heterogenous, mixed population.<br /> • The term "functional plasticity" could also be more stringently defined for the purposes of this study.

Conclusion:

Overall, the authors succeed in their goals of investigating how inflammatory and anti-inflammatory cytokine priming contributes to the metabolic reprogramming of AM and MDM populations. Their conclusions regarding the relationship between cytokine secretion and inflammatory molecule expression in response to bacterial stimuli are supported by the data. The involvement of metabolism in innate immune cell function is relevant when devising treatment strategies that target the innate immune response during infection. The data presented in this paper further our understanding of that relationship and advance the field of innate immune cell biology.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, Krause and colleagues identify miR-182 as diabetes-associated microRNA: miR-182 is increased in bariatric surgery patients with versus without T2D; miR-182 was the only microRNA associated with three metabolic traits; miR-182 levels were associated with increased body weight in mice under different dietary manipulations; overexpression in Hep-G2 led to a decrease in LRP6; and overexpression in HFD fed mice led to increased insulin and liver TG. The manuscript provides a potentially useful resource of microRNA expression in human livers, though the functional importance of miR-182 remains unclear.

Strengths:

The use of human tissues and good sample sizes is strong.

Weaknesses:

The study remains primarily correlative; the in vivo overexpression is non-physiological; and the mechanisms by which miR-182 exerts its effects are not rigorously tested.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Bing et al. attempt to address fundamental mechanisms of TAD formation in Drosophila by analyzing gene expression and 3D conformation within the vicinity of the eve TAD after insertion of a transgene harboring a Homie insulator sequence 142 kb away in different orientations. These transgenes along with spatial gene expression analysis were previously published in Fujioka et al. 2016, and the underlying interpretations regarding resulting DNA configuration in this genomic region were also previously published. This manuscript repeats the expression analysis using smFISH probes in order to achieve more quantitative analysis, but the main results are the same as previously published. The only new data are the Micro-C and an additional modeling/analysis of what they refer to as the 'Z3' orientation of the transgenes. The rest of the manuscript merely synthesizes further interpretation with the goal of addressing whether loop extrusion may be occurring or if boundary:boundary pairing without loop extrusion is responsible for TAD formation. The authors conclude that their results are more consistent with boundary:boundary pairing and not loop extrusion; however, most of this imaging data seems to support both loop extrusion and the boundary:boundary models. This manuscript lacks support, especially new data, for its conclusions. Furthermore, there are many parts of the manuscript that are difficult to follow. There are some minor errors in the labelling of the figures that if fixed would help elevate understanding. Lastly, there are several major points that if elaborated on, would potentially be helpful for the clarity of the manuscript.

Major Points:

(1) The authors suggest and attempt to visualize in the supplemental figures, that loop extrusion mechanisms would appear during crosslinking and show as vertical stripes in the micro-C data. In order to see stripes, a majority of the nuclei would need to undergo loop extrusion at the same rate, starting from exactly the same spots, and the loops would also have to be released and restarted at the same rate. If these patterns truly result from loop extrusion, the authors should provide experimental evidence from another organism undergoing loop extrusion.<br /> (2) On lines 311-314, the authors discuss that stem-loops generated by cohesin extrusion would possibly be expected to have more next-next-door neighbor contacts than next-door neighbor contacts and site their models in Figure 1. Based on the boundary:boundary pairing models in the same figure would the stem-loops created by head-to-tail pairing also have the same phenotype? Making possible enrichment of next-next-door neighbor contacts possible in both situations? The concepts in the text are not clear, and the diagrams are not well-labeled relative to the two models.<br /> (3) The authors appear to cite Chen et al., 2018 as a reference for the location of these transgenes being 700nM away in a majority of the nuclei. However, the exact transgenes in this manuscript do not appear to have been measured for distance. The authors could do this experiment and include expression measurements.<br /> (4) The authors discuss the possible importance of CTCF orientation in forming the roadblock to cohesin extrusion and discuss that Homie orientation in the transgene may impact Homie function as an effective roadblock. However, the Homie region inserted in the transgene does not contain the CTCF motif. Can the authors elaborate on why they feel the orientation of Homie is important in its ability to function as a roadblock if the CTCF motif is not present? Trans-acting factors responsible for Homie function have not been identified and this point is not discussed in the manuscript.<br /> (5) The imaging results seem to be consistent with both boundary:boundary interaction and loop extrusion stem looping.<br /> (6) The authors suggest that the eveMa TAD could only be formed by extrusion after the breakthrough of Nhomie and several other roadblocks. Additionally, the overall long-range interactions with Nhomie appear to be less than the interactions with endogenous Homie (Figures 7, 8, and supplemental 5). Is it possible that in some cases boundary:boundary pairing is occurring between only the transgenic Homie and endogenous Homie and not including Nhomie?<br /> (7) In Figure 4E, the GFP hebe expression shown in the LhomieG Z5 transgenic embryo does not appear in the same locations as the LlambdaG Z5 control. Is this actually hebe expression or just a background signal?<br /> (8) Figure 6- The LhomieG Z3 late-stage embryo appears to be showing the ventral orientation of the embryo rather than the lateral side of the embryo as was shown in the previous figure. Is this for a reason? Additionally, there are no statistics shown for the Z3 transgenic images. Were these images analyzed in the same way as the Z5 line images?<br /> (9) Do the Micro-C data align with the developmental time points used in the smFISH probe assays?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

In this study, Prochera, et al. identify PLP1+ cells as the glia that most closely interact with the gut epithelium and show that genetic depletion of these PLP1+ glia in mice does not have major effects on the intestinal transcriptome or the cellular composition of the epithelium. Enteric glial loss, however, causes dysregulation of Paneth cell gene expression that is associated with morphological disruption of Paneth cells, diminished lysozyme secretion, and altered gut microbial composition. Overall, the authors need to first prove whether the Plp1CreER Rosa26DTA/+ mice system is viable. Also, most experimental systems have been evaluated by immunohistochemistry, scRNAseq, and electron microscopy, but need quantitative statistical processing. In addition, the value of the paper would be enhanced if the significance of why the phenotype appeared in the large intestine rather than the small intestine when PLP1 is deficient for Paneth cells is clarified.

Weaknesses:

Major:

(1) Supplementary Figure 2; Cannot be evaluated without quantification.

(2) Figure 2A; Is Plp1CreER Rosa26DTA/+ mice system established correctly? S100B immunohistology picture is not clear. A similar study is needed for female Plp1CreER Rosa26DTA/+ mice. What is the justification for setting 5 dpt, 11 dpt? Any consideration of changes to organs other than the intestine? Wouldn't it be clearer to introduce Organoid technology?

3) Figure 2B; Need an explanation for the 5 genes that were altered in the colon. Five genes should be evaluated by RT-qPCR. Why was there a lack of change in the duodenum and ileum?

(4) Supplementary Figure 3; Top 3 genes should be evaluated by RT-qPCR.

(5) Supplementary Figure 4B, C, and D; Why not show analysis in the small intestine?

(6) Supplementary Figure 4D; Cannot be evaluated without quantification.

(7) Figure 3D; Cannot be evaluated without quantification.

(8) Supplementary Figure 5B and C; Top 3 genes should be evaluated by RT-qPCR.

(9) Supplementary Figure 6; Top 3 genes should be evaluated by RT-qPCR.

(10) Figure 4A; Cannot be evaluated without quantification.

(11) Figure 4D; Cannot be evaluated without quantification.

(12) Additional experiments on in vivo infection systems comparing Plp1CreER Rosa26DTA/+ mice and controls would be great.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

In this manuscript, Wu et al. investigate active H3K27ac and H3K4me1 marks in term pregnant nonlabor myometrial biopsies, linking putative-enhancers and super-enhancers to gene expression levels. Through their findings, they reveal the PGR-dependent regulation of the PLCL2 gene in human myometrial cells via a cis-acting element located 35-kilobases upstream of the PLCL2 gene. By targeting this region using a CRISPR activation system, they were able to elevate the endogenous PLCL2 mRNA levels in immortalized human myometrial cells.

This research offers novel insights into the molecular mechanisms governing gene expression in myometrial tissues, advancing our understanding of pregnancy-related processes.

Major comments:

(1) A more comprehensive analysis of the epigenetic and transcriptomic data would have strengthened the paper, moving beyond basic association studies. Currently, it is challenging to assess the quality and significance of the data as much of the information is lacking.

(2) The rationale for and connections between experiments, as well as results, could be bolstered to underscore the significance of this research.

Strengths:

- The combination of ChIP-Seq, RNA-Seq, and CRISPRa Perturb-Seq approaches to investigate gene regulation and expression in myometrial cells.

- The use of CRISPR activation system to specifically target cis-acting elements.

Weaknesses:

- The manuscript would strongly benefit from a deeper analysis of the Omic datasets. Furthermore, expanding figures/graphs to effectively contextualize these datasets would be greatly beneficial and would add more value to this research. Currently, it is difficult for us to assess and appreciate the quality of these data sets across the manuscript, which is mostly correlative.

- Limited sample size, coupled with variability in results and overall lack of details, compromises the robustness of result interpretation.

- For most parts of the results section, a better description is needed, including rationale, approach, and presentation of data. As it stands, it is challenging to assess the quality of the data and appreciate the results.

- Additional efforts are needed to dissect the proposed regulatory mechanisms.

- While the discussion provided helpful context for understanding some of the experiments performed, it lacked interpretation of the results in relation to the existing literature.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

During meiosis in sexually reproducing organisms, double-strand breaks are induced by a topoisomerase-related enzyme, Spo11, which is essential for homologous recombination, which in turn is required for accurate chromosome segregation. Additional factors control the number and genome-wide distribution of breaks, but the mechanisms that determine both the frequency and preferred location of meiotic DSBs remain only partially understood in any organism.

The manuscript presents a variety of different analyses that include variable subsets of putative DSB factors. It would be much easier to follow if the analyses had been more systematically applied. It is perplexing that several factors known to be essential for DSB formation (e.g., cohesins, HORMA proteins) are excluded from this analysis, while it includes several others that probably do not directly contribute to DSB formation (XND-1, HIM-17, CEP-1, and PARG-1). The strongest claims seem to be that "HIM-5 is the determinant of X-chromosome-specific crossovers" and "HIM-5 coordinates the actions of the different accessory factors sub-groups." Prior work had already shown that mutations in him-5 preferentially reduce meiotic DSBs on the X chromosome. While it is possible that HIM-5 plays a direct role in DSB induction on the X chromosome, the evidence presented here does not strongly support this conclusion. It is also difficult to reconcile this idea with evidence from prior studies that him-5 mutations predominantly prevent DSB formation on the sex chromosomes, while the protein localizes to autosomes. The one experiment that seems to elicit the conclusion that HIM-5 expression is sufficient for breaks on the X chromosome is flawed (see below). The conclusion that HIM-5 "coordinates the activities of the different accessory sub-groups" is not supported by data presented here or elsewhere.

Like most other studies that have examined DSB formation in C. elegans, this work relies on indirect assays, here limited to the cytological appearance of RAD-51 foci and bivalent chromosomes, as evidence of break formation or lack thereof. Unfortunately, neither of these assays has the power to reveal the genome-wide distribution or number of breaks. These assays have additional caveats, due to the fact that RAD-51 association with recombination intermediates and successful crossover formation both require multiple steps downstream of DSB induction, some of which are likely impaired in some of the mutants analyzed here. This severely limits the conclusions that can be drawn. Given that the goal of the work is to understand the effects of individual factors on DSB induction, direct physical assays for DSBs should be applied; many such assays have been developed and used successfully in other organisms.

Throughout the manuscript, the writing conflates the roles played by different factors that affect DSB formation in very different ways. XND-1 and HIM-17 have previously been shown to be transcription factors that promote the expression of many germline genes, including genes encoding proteins that directly promote DSBs. Mutations in either xnd-1 or him-17 result in dysregulation of germline gene expression and pleiotropic defects in meiosis and fertility, including changes in chromatin structure, dysregulation of meiotic progression, and (for xnd-1) progressive loss of germline immortality. It is thus misleading to refer to HIM-17 and XND-1 as DSB "accessory factors" or to lump their activities with those of other proteins that are likely to play more direct roles in DSB induction. For example, statements such as the following sentence in the Introduction should be omitted or explained more clearly: "xnd-1 is also unique among the accessory factors in influencing the timing of DSBs; in the absence of xnd-1, there is precocious and rapid accumulation of DSBs as monitored by the accumulation of the HR strand-exchange protein RAD-51." The evidence that HIM-17 promotes the expression of him-5 presented here corroborates data from other publications, notably the recent work of Carelli et al. (2022), but this conclusion should not be presented as novel here. The other factors also fall into several different functional classes, some of which are relatively well understood, based largely on studies in other organisms. The roles of RAD-50 and MRE-11 in DSB induction have been investigated in yeast and other organisms as well as in several prior studies in C. elegans. DSB-1, DSB-2, and DSB-3 are homologs of relatively well-studied meiotic proteins in other organisms (Rec114 and Mei4) that directly promote the activity of Spo11, although the mechanism by which they do so is still unclear. Mutations in PARG-1 (a Poly-ADP ribose glycohydrolase) likely affect the regulation of poly-ADP-ribose addition and removal at sites of DSBs, which in turn are thought to regulate chromatin structure and recruitment of repair factors; however, there is no convincing evidence that PARG-1 directly affects break formation. CEP-1 is a homolog of p53 and is involved in the DNA damage response in the germline, but again is unlikely to directly contribute to DSB induction. HIM-5 and REC-1 do not have apparent homologs in other organisms and play poorly understood roles in promoting DSB induction. A mechanistic understanding of their functions would be of value to the field, but the current work does not shed light on this. A previous paper (Chung et al. G&D 2015) concluded that HIM-5 and REC-1 are paralogs arising from a recent gene duplication, based on genetic evidence for a partially overlapping role in DSB induction, as well as an argument based on the genomic location of these genes in different species; however, these proteins lack any detectable sequence homology and their predicted structures are also dissimilar (both are largely unstructured but REC-1 contains a predicted helical bundle lacking in HIM-5). Moreover, the data presented here do not reveal overlapping sets of genetic or physical interactions for the two genes/proteins. Thus, this earlier conclusion was likely incorrect, and this idea should not be restated uncritically here or used as a basis to interpret phenotypes.

DSB-1 was previously reported to be strictly required for all DSB and CO formation in C. elegans. Here the authors test whether the expression of HIM-5 from the pie-1 promoter can rescue DSB formation in dsb-1 mutants, and claim to see some rescue, based on an increase in the number of nuclei with one apparent bivalent (Figure 2C). This result seems to be the basis for the claim that HIM-5 coordinates the activities of other DSB proteins. However, this assay is not informative, and the conclusion is almost certainly incorrect. Notably, a substantial number of nuclei in the dsb-1 mutant (without Ppie-1::him-5) are reported as displaying a single bivalent (11 DAPI staining bodies) despite prior evidence that DSBs are absent in dsb-1 mutants; this suggests that the way the assay was performed resulted in false positives (bivalents that are not actually bivalents), likely due to inclusion of nuclei in which univalents could not be unambiguously resolved in the microscope. A slightly higher level of nuclei with a single unresolved pair of chromosomes in the dsb-1; Ppie-1::him-5 strain is thus not convincing evidence for rescue of DSBs/CO formation, and no evidence is presented that these putative COs are X-specific. The authors should provide additional experimental evidence - e.g., detection of RAD-51 and/or COSA-1 foci or genetic evidence of recombination - or remove this claim. The evidence that expression of Ppie-1::him-5 may partially rescue DSB abundance in dsb-2 mutants is hard to interpret since it is currently unknown why C. elegans expresses 2 paralogs of Rec114 (DSB-1 and DSB-2), and the age-dependent reduction of DSBs in dsb-2 mutants is not understood.

Several of the factors analyzed here, including XND-1, HIM-17, HIM-5, DSB-1, DSB-2, and DSB-3, have been shown to localize broadly to chromatin in meiotic cells. Co-immunoprecipitation of pairs of these factors, even following benzonase digestion, is not strong evidence to support a direct physical interaction between proteins. Similarly, the super-resolution analysis of XND-1 and HIM-17 (Figure 1EF) does not reveal whether these proteins physically interact with each other, and does not add to our understanding of these proteins' functions, since they are already known to bind to many of the same promoters. Promoters are also likely to be located in chromatin loops away from the chromosome axis, so in this respect, the localization data are also confirmatory rather than novel.

The phenotypic analysis of double mutant combinations does not seem informative. A major problem is that these different strains were only assayed for bivalent formation, which (as mentioned above) requires several steps downstream of DSB induction. Additionally, the basis for many of the single mutant phenotypes is not well understood, making it particularly challenging to interpret the effects of double mutants. Further, some of the interactions described as "synergistic" appear to be additive, not synergistic. While additive effects can be used as evidence that two genes work in different pathways, this can also be very misleading, especially when the function of individual proteins is unknown. I find that the classification of genes into "epistastasis groups" based on this analysis does not shed light on their functions and indeed seems in some cases to contradict what is known about their functions.

The yeast two-hybrid (Y2H) data are only presented as a single colony. While it is understandable to use a 'representative' colony, it is ideal to include a dilution series for the various interactions, which is how Y2H data are typically shown.

Additional (relatively minor) concerns about these data:

(1) Several interactions reported here seem to be detected in only one direction - e.g., MRE-11-AD/HIM-5-BD, REC-1-AD/XND-1-BD, and XND-1-AD/HIM-17-BD - while no interactions are seen with the reciprocal pairs of fusion proteins. I'm not sure if some of this is due to pasting "positive" colony images into the wrong position in the grid, but this should be addressed.

(2) DSB-3 was only assayed in pairwise combinations with a subset of other proteins; this should be explained; it is also unclear why the interaction grids are not symmetrical about the diagonal.

(3) I don't understand why the graphic summaries of Y2H data are split among 3 different figures (1, 2, and 3).

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

This is a very ordinary research paper. The horizontal of endosymbionts, including Wolbachia, Rickettsia etc. has been reported in detail in the last 10 years, and parasitoid vectored as well as plant vectored horizontal transmission is the mainstream of research. For example, Ahmed et al. 2013 PLoS One, 2015 PLoS Pathogens, Chiel et al. 2014 Enviromental Entomology, Ahmed et al. 2016 BMC Evolution Biology, Qi et al. 2019 JEE, Liu et al. 2023 Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology, all of these reported the parasitoid vectored horizontal transmission of endosymbiont. While Caspi-Fluger et al. 2012 Proc Roy Soc B, Chrostek et al. 2017 Frontiers in Microbiology, Li et al. 2017 ISME Journal, Li et al. 2017 FEMS, Shi et al. 2024 mBio, all of these reported the plant vectored horizontal transmission of endosymbiont. For the effects of endosymbiont on the biology of the host, Ahmed et al. 2015 PLoS Pathogens explained the effects in detail.

Weaknesses:

In the current study, the authors downloaded the MLST or wsp genes from a public database and analyzed the data using other methods, and I think the authors may not be familiar with the research progress in the field of insect symbiont transmission, and the current stage of this manuscript lacking sufficient novelty.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

The paper by Le Roy and colleagues seeks to ask whether wing morphology or wing kinematics enable miniaturization in an interesting clade of agile flying insects. Isometry argues that insects cannot maintain both the same kinematics and the same wing morphology as body size changes. This raises a long-standing question of which varies allometrically. The authors do a deep dive into the morphology and kinematics of eight specific species across the hoverfly phylogeny. They show broadly that wing kinematics do not scale strongly with body size, but several parameters of wing morphology do in a manner different from isometry leading to the conclusion that these species have changed wing shape and size more than kinematics. The authors find no phylogenetic signal in the specific traits they analyze and conclude that they can therefore ignore phylogeny in the later analyses. They use both a quasi-steady simplification of flight aerodynamics and a series of CFD analyses to attribute specific components of wing shape and size to the variation in body size observed. However, the link to specific correlated evolution, and especially the suggestion of enabling or promoting miniaturization, is fraught and not as strongly supported by the available evidence.

The aerodynamic and morphological data collection, modeling, and interpretation are very strong. The authors do an excellent job combining a highly interpretable quasi-steady model with CFD and geometric morphometrics. This allows them to directly parse out the effects of size, shape, and kinematics.

Despite the lack of a relationship between wing kinematics and size, there is a large amount of kinematic variation across the species and individual wing strokes. The absolute differences in Figure 3F - I could have a very large impact on force production but they do indeed not seem to change with body size. This is quite interesting and is supported by aerodynamic analyses.

The authors switch between analyzing their data based on individuals and based on species. This creates some pseudoreplication concerns in Figures 4 and S2 and it is confusing why the analysis approach is not consistent between Figures 4 and 5. In general, the trends appear to be robust to this, although the presence of one much larger species weighs the regressions heavily. Care should be taken in interpreting the statistical results that mix intra- and inter-specific variation in the same trend.

The authors based much of their analyses on the lack of a statistically significant phylogenetic signal. The statistical power for detecting such a signal is likely very weak with 8 species. Even if there is no phylogenetic signal in specific traits, that does not necessarily mean that there is no phylogenetic impact on the covariation between traits. Many comparative methods can test the association of two traits across a phylogeny (e.g. a phylogenetic GLM) and a phylogenetic PCA would test if the patterns of variation in shape are robust to phylogeny.

The analysis of miniaturization on the broader phylogeny is incomplete. The conclusion that hoverflies tend towards smaller sizes is based on an ancestral state reconstruction. This is difficult to assess because of some important missing information. Specifically, such reconstructions depend on branch lengths and the model of evolution used, which were not specified. It was unclear how the tree was time-calibrated. Most often ancestral state reconstructions utilize a maximum likelihood estimate based on a Brownian motion model of evolution but this would be at odds with the hypothesis that the clade is miniaturizing over time. Indeed such an analysis will be biased to look like it produces a lot of changes towards smaller body size if there is one very large taxa because this will heavily weight the internal nodes. Even within this analysis, there is little quantitative support for the conclusion of miniaturization, and the discussion is restricted to a general statement about more recently diverged species. Such analyses are better supported by phylogenetic tests of directedness in the trait over time, such as fitting a model with an adaptive peak or others.

Setting aside whether the clade as a whole tends towards smaller size, there is a further concern about the correlation of variation in wing morphology and changes in size (and the corresponding conclusion about lack of co-evolution in wing kinematics). Showing that there is a trend towards smaller size and a change in wing morphology does not test explicitly that these two are correlated with the phylogeny. Moreover, the subsample of species considered does not appear to recapitulate the miniaturization result of the larger ancestral state reconstruction.

Given the limitations of the phylogenetic comparative methods presented, the authors did not fully support the general conclusion that changes in wing morphology, rather than kinematics, correlate with or enable miniaturization. The aerodynamic analysis across the 8 species does however hold significant value and the data support the conclusion as far as it extends to these 8 species. This is suggestive but not conclusive that the analysis of consistent kinematics and allometric morphology will extend across the group and extend to miniaturization. Nonetheless, hoverflies face many shared ecological pressures on performance and the authors summarize these well. The conclusions of morphological allometry and conserved kinematics are supported in this subset and point to a clade-wide pattern without having to support an explicit hypothesis about miniaturization.

The data and analyses on these 8 species provide an important piece of work on a group of insects that are receiving growing attention for their interesting behaviors, accessibility, and ecologies. The conclusions about morphology vs. kinematics provide an important piece to a growing discussion of the different ways in which insects fly. Sometimes morphology varies, and sometimes kinematics depending on the clade, but it is clear that morphology plays a large role in this group. The discussion also relates to similar themes being investigated in other flying organisms. Given the limitations of the miniaturization analyses, the impact of this study will be limited to the general question of what promotes or at least correlates with evolutionary trends towards smaller body size and at what phylogenetic scale body size is systematically decreasing.

In general, there is an important place for work that combines broad phylogenetic comparison of traits with more detailed mechanistic studies on a subset of species, but a lot of care has to be taken about how the conclusions generalize. In this case, since the miniaturization trend does not extend to the 8 species subsample of the phylogeny and is only minimally supported in the broader phylogeny, the paper warrants a narrower conclusion about the connection between conserved kinematics and shared life history/ecology.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In their manuscript titled "Multiplexed Assays of Human Disease‐relevant Mutations Reveal UTR Dinucleotide Composition as a Major Determinant of RNA Stability" the authors aim to investigate the effect of sequence variations in 3'UTR and 5'UTRs on the stability of mRNAs in two different human cell lines.

To do so, the authors use a massively parallel reporter assay (MPRA). They transfect cells with a set of mRNA reporters that contain sequence variants in their 3' or 5' UTRs, which were previously reported in human diseases. They follow their clearance from cells over time relative to the matching non-variant sequence. To analyze their results, they define a set of factors (RBP and miRNA binding sites, sequence features, secondary structure etc.) and test their association with differences in mRNA stability. For features with a significant association, they use clustering to select a subset of factors for LASSO regression and identify factors that affect mRNA stability.<br /> They conclude that the TA dinucleotide content of UTRs is the strongest destabilizing sequence feature. Within that context, elevated GC content and protein binding can protect susceptible mRNAs from degradation. They also show that TA dinucleotide content of UTRs affects native mRNA stability, and that it is associated with specific functional groups. Finally, they link disease associated sequence variants with differences in mRNA stability of reporters.

Strengths:

(1) This work introduces a different MPRA approach to analyze the effect of genetic variants. While previous works in tissue culture use DNA transfections that require normalization for transcription efficiency, here the mRNA is directly introduced into cells at fixed amounts, allowing a more direct view of the mRNA regulation.

(2) The authors also introduce a unique analysis approach, which takes into account multiple factors that might affect mRNA stability. This approach allows them to identify general sequence features that affect mRNA stability beyond specific genetic variants, and reach important insights on mRNA stability regulation. Indeed, while the conclusions to genetic variants identified in this work are interesting, the main strength of the work involve general effect of sequence features rather than specific variants.

(3) The authors provide adequate supports for their claims, and validate their analysis using both their reporter data and native genes. For the main feature identified, TA di-nucleotides, they perform follow-up experiments with modified reporters that further strengthen their claims, and also validate the effect on native cellular transcripts (beyond reporters), demonstrating its validity also within native scenarios.

(4) The work provides a broad analysis of mRNA stability, across two mRNA regulatory segments (3'UTR and 5'UTR) and is performed in two separate cell-types. Comparison between two different cell-types is adequate, and the results demonstrate, as expected, the dependence of mRNA stability on the cellular context. Analysis of 3'UTR and 5'UTR regulatory effects also shows interesting differences and similarities between these two regulatory regions.

Weaknesses:

(1) The authors fail to acknowledge several possible confounding factors of their MPRA approach in the discussion.<br /> First, while transfection of mRNA directly into cells allows to avoid the need to normalize for differences in transcription, the introduction of naked mRNA molecules is different than native cellular mRNAs and could introduce biases due to differences in mRNA modifications, protein associations etc. that may occur co-transcriptionally.<br /> Second, along those lines, the authors also use in-vitro polyadenylation. The length of the polyA tail of the transfected transcripts could potentially be very different than that of native mRNAs and also affect stability.

(2) The analysis approach used in this work for identifying regulatory features in UTRs was not previously used. As such, lack of in-depth details of the methodology, and possibly also more general validation of the approach, is a drawback in convincing the reader in the validity of this approach and its results.<br /> In particular, a main point that is not addressed is how the authors decide on the set of "factors" used in their analysis? As choosing different sets of factors might affect the results of the analysis. For example, the choice to use 7-mer sequences within the factors set is not explained, particularly when almost all motifs that are eventually identified (Figure 3B-E) are shorter.<br /> In addition, the authors do not perform validations to demonstrate the validity of their approach on simulated data or well-established control datasets. Such analysis would be helpful to further convince the reader in the usefulness and robustness of the analysis.

(3) The analysis and regression models built in this work are not thoroughly investigated relative to native genes within cells. The effect of sequence "factors" on native cellular transcripts' stability is not investigated beyond TA di-nucleotides, and it is unclear to what degree do other predicted factors also affect native transcripts.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this manuscript, Bimbard and colleagues describe a new implant apparatus called "Apollo Implant", which should facilitate recording in freely moving rodents (mice and rats) using Neuropixels probes. The authors collected data from both mice and rats, they used 3 different versions of Neuropixels, multiple labs have already adopted this method, which is impressive. They openly share their CAD designs and surgery protocol to further facilitate the adaptation of their method.

Strengths:

Overall, the "Apollo Implant" is easy to use and adapt, as it has been used in other laboratories successfully and custom modifications are already available. The device is reproducible using common 3D printing services and can be easily modified thanks to its CAD design (the video explaining this is extremely helpful). The weight and price are amazing compared to other systems for rigid silicon probes allowing a wide range of use of the "Apollo Implant".

Weaknesses:

The "Apollo Implant" can only handle Neuropixels probes. It cannot hold other widely used and commercially available silicon probes. Certain angles and distances are not possible in their current form (distance between probes 1.8 to 4mm, implantation depth 2-6.5 mm, or angle of insertion up to 20 degrees).

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Heterochromatin is characterized by low transcription activity and late replication timing, both dependent on the NAD-dependent protein deacetylase Sir2, the founding member of the sirtuins. This manuscript addresses the mechanism by which Sir2 delays replication timing at the rDNA in budding yeast. Previous work from the same laboratory (Foss et al. PLoS Genetics 15, e1008138) showed that Sir2 represses transcription-dependent displacement of the Mcm helicase in the rDNA. In this manuscript, the authors show convincingly that the repositioned Mcms fire earlier and that this early firing partly depends on the ATPase activity of the nucleosome remodeler Fun30. Using read-depth analysis of sorted G1/S cells, fun30 was the only chromatin remodeler mutant that somewhat delayed replication timing in sir2 mutants, while nhp10, chd1, isw1, htl1, swr1, isw2, and irc5 had not effect. The conclusion was corroborated with orthogonal assays including two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and analysis of EdU incorporation at early origins. Using an insightful analysis with an Mcm-MNase fusion (Mcm-ChEC), the authors show that the repositioned Mcms in sir2 mutants fire earlier than the Mcm at the normal position in wild type. This early firing at the repositioned Mcms is partially suppressed by Fun30. In addition, the authors show Fun30 affects nucleosome occupancy at the sites of the repositioned Mcm, providing a plausible mechanism for the effect of Fun30 on Mcm firing at that position. However, the results from the MNAse-seq and ChEC-seq assays are not fully congruent for the fun30 single mutant. Overall, the results support the conclusions providing a much better mechanistic understanding how Sir2 affects replication timing at rDNA,

Strengths

(1) The data clearly show that the repositioned Mcm helicase fires earlier than the Mcm in the wild type position.<br /> (2) The study identifies a specific role for Fun30 in replication timing and an effect on nucleosome occupancy around the newly positioned Mcm helicase in sir2 cells.

Weaknesses

(1) It is unclear which strains were used in each experiment.<br /> (2) The relevance of the fun30 phospho-site mutant (S20AS28A) is unclear.<br /> (3) For some experiments (Figs. 3, 4, 6) it is unclear whether the data are reproducible and the differences significant. Information about the number of independent experiments and quantitation is lacking. This affects the interpretation, as fun30 seems to affect the +3 nucleosome much more than let on in the description.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary: Boffi and colleagues sought to quantify the single-trial, azimuthal information in the dorsal cortex of the inferior colliculus (DCIC), a relatively understudied subnucleus of the auditory midbrain. They used two complementary recording methods while mice passively listened to sounds at different locations: a large volume but slow sampling calcium-imaging method, and a smaller volume but temporally precise electrophysiology method. They found that neurons in the DCIC were variable in their activity, unreliably responding to sound presentation and responding during inter-sound intervals. Boffi and colleagues used a naïve Bayesian decoder to determine if the DCIC population encoded sound location on a single trial. The decoder failed to classify sound location better than chance when using the raw single-trial population response but performed significantly better than chance when using intermediate principal components of the population response. In line with this, when the most azimuth dependent neurons were used to decode azimuthal position, the decoder performed equivalently to the azimuthal localization abilities of mice. The top azimuthal units were not clustered in the DCIC, possessed a contralateral bias in response, and were correlated in their variability (e.g., positive noise correlations). Interestingly, when these noise correlations were perturbed by inter-trial shuffling decoding performance decreased. Although Boffi and colleagues display that azimuthal information can be extracted from DCIC responses, it remains unclear to what degree this information is used and what role noise correlations play in azimuthal encoding.

Strengths: The authors should be commended for collection of this dataset. When done in isolation (which is typical), calcium imaging and linear array recordings have intrinsic weaknesses. However, those weaknesses are alleviated when done in conjunction with one another - especially when the data largely recapitulates the findings of the other recording methodology. In addition to the video of the head during the calcium imaging, this data set is extremely rich and will be of use to those interested in the information available in the DCIC, an understudied but likely important subnucleus in the auditory midbrain.

The DCIC neural responses are complex; the units unreliably respond to sound onset, and at the very least respond to some unknown input or internal state (e.g., large inter-sound interval responses). The authors do a decent job in wrangling these complex responses: using interpretable decoders to extract information available from population responses.

Weaknesses:<br /> The authors observe that neurons with the most azimuthal sensitivity within the DCIC are positively correlated, but they use a Naïve Bayesian decoder which assume independence between units. Although this is a bit strange given their observation that some of the recorded units are correlated, it is unlikely to be a critical flaw. At one point the authors reduce the dimensionality of their data through PCA and use the loadings onto these components in their decoder. PCA incorporates the correlational structure when finding the principal components and constrains these components to be orthogonal and uncorrelated. This should alleviate some of the concern regarding the use of the naïve Bayesian decoder because the projections onto the different components are independent. Nevertheless, the decoding results are a bit strange, likely because there is not much linearly decodable azimuth information in the DCIC responses. Raw population responses failed to provide sufficient information concerning azimuth for the decoder to perform better than chance. Additionally, it only performed better than chance when certain principal components or top ranked units contributed to the decoder but not as more components or units were added. So, although there does appear to be some azimuthal information in the recoded DCIC populations - it is somewhat difficult to extract and likely not an 'effective' encoding of sound localization as their title suggests.

Although this is quite a worthwhile dataset, the authors present relatively little about the characteristics of the units they've recorded. This may be due to the high variance in responses seen in their population. Nevertheless, the authors note that units do not respond on every trial but do not report what percent of trials that fail to evoke a response. Is it that neurons are noisy because they do not respond on every trial or is it also that when they do respond they have variable response distributions? It would be nice to gain some insight into the heterogeneity of the responses. Additionally, is there any clustering at all in response profiles or is each neuron they recorded in the DCIC unique? They also only report the noise correlations for their top ranked units, but it is possible that the noise correlations in the rest of the population are different. It would also be worth digging into the noise correlations more - are units positively correlated because they respond together (e.g., if unit x responds on trial 1 so does unit y) or are they also modulated around their mean rates on similar trials (e.g., unit x and y respond and both are responding more than their mean response rate). A large portion of trial with no response can occlude noise correlations. More transparency around the response properties of these populations would be welcome.

It is largely unclear what the DCIC is encoding. Although the authors are interested in azimuth, sound location seems to be only a small part of DCIC responses. The authors report responses during inter-sound interval and unreliable sound-evoked responses. Although they have video of the head during recording, we only see a correlation to snout and ear movements (which are peculiar since in the example shown it seems the head movements predict the sound presentation). Additional correlates could be eye movements or pupil size. Eye movement are of particular interest due to their known interaction with IC responses - especially if the DCIC encodes sound location in relation to eye position instead of head position (though much of eye-position-IC work was done in primates and not rodent). Alternatively, much of the population may only encode sound location if an animal is engaged in a localization task. Ideally, the authors could perform more substantive analyses to determine if this population is truly noisy or if the DCIC is integrating un-analyzed signals.

Although this critique is ubiquitous among decoding papers in the absence of behavioral or causal perturbations, it is unclear what - if any - role the decoded information may play in neuronal computations. The interpretation of the decoder means that there is some extractable information concerning sound azimuth - but not if it is functional. This information may just be epiphenomenal, leaking in from inputs, and not used in computation or relayed to downstream structures. This should be kept in mind when the authors suggest their findings implicate the DCIC functionally in sound localization.

It is unclear why positive noise correlations amongst similarly tuned neurons would improve decoding. A toy model exploring how positive noise correlations in conjunction with unreliable units that inconsistently respond may anchor these findings in an interpretable way. It seems plausible that inconsistent responses would benefit from strong noise correlations, simply by units responding together. This would predict that shuffling would impair performance because you would then be sampling from trials in which some units respond, and trials in which some units do not respond - and may predict a bimodal performance distribution in which some trials decode well (when the units respond) and poor performance (when the units do not respond).

Significance: Boffi and colleagues set out to parse the azimuthal information available in the DCIC on a single trial. They largely accomplish this goal and are able to extract this information when allowing the units that contain more information about sound location to contribute to their decoding (e.g., through PCA or decoding on top unit activity specifically). The dataset will be of value to those interested in the DCIC and also to anyone interested in the role of noise correlations in population coding. Although this work is first step into parsing the information available in the DCIC, it remains difficult to interpret if/how this azimuthal information is used in localization behaviors of engaged mice.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

In this manuscript, Pierre Ferrer and colleagues explore the exciting possibility that, in the male germ line, the composition and function of deeply conserved chromatin remodeling complexes is fine-tuned by the addition of testis-specific actin-related proteins (ARPs). In this regard, the Authors aim to extend previously reported non-canonical (transcriptional) roles of ARPs in somatic cells to the unique developmental context of the germ line. The manuscript is focused on the potential regulatory role in post-meiotic transcription of two ARPs: ACTL7A and ACTL7B (particularly the latter). The canonical function of both testis-specific ARPs in spermatogenesis is well established, as they have been previously shown to be required for the extensive cellular morphogenesis program driving post-meiotic development (spermiogenesis). Disentangling the actual functions of ACTL7A and ACTL7B as transcriptional regulators from their canonical role in the profound morphological reshaping of post-meiotic cells (a process that also deeply impacts nuclear architecture and regulation) represents a key challenge in terms of interpreting the reported findings (see below).

The authors begin by documenting, via fluorescence microscopy, the intranuclear localization of ACTL7B. This ARP is convincingly shown to accumulate in the nucleus of spermatocytes and spermatids. Using a series of elegant reporter-based experiments in a somatic cell line, the authors map the driver of this nuclear accumulation to a potential NLS sequence in the ACTL7B actin-like body domain. Ferrer and colleagues then performed a testicular RNA-seq analysis in ACTL7B KO mice to define the putative role of ACTL7B in male germ cell transcription. They report substantial changes to the testicular transcriptome - particularly the upregulation of several classes of genes - in ACTL7B KO mice. However, wild-type testes were used as controls for this experiment, thus introducing a clear confounding effect to the analysis (ACTL7B KO testes have extensive post-meiotic defects due to the canonical role of ACTL7B in spermatid development). Then, the authors employ cutting-edge AI-driven approaches to predict that both ACTL7A and ACTL7B are likely to bind to four key chromatin remodeling complexes. Although these predictions are based on a robust methodology, they would certainly benefit from experimental validation. Finally, the authors associate the loss of ACTL7B with decreased lysine acetylation and lower levels of the HDAC1 and HDAC3 chromatin remodelers in the nucleus of developing spermatids.

Globally, these data may provide important insight into the unique processes male germ cells employ to sustain their extraordinarily complex transcriptional program. Furthermore, the concept that (comparably younger) testis-specific proteins can be incorporated into ancient chromatin remodeling complexes to modulate their function in the germ line is timely and exciting.

It is my opinion that the manuscript would benefit from additional experimental validation to better support the authors' conclusions. In particular, I believe that addressing two critical points would substantially strengthen the message of the manuscript:

(1) The proposed role of ACTL7B in post-meiotic transcriptional regulation temporally overlaps with the protein's previously reported canonical functions in spermiogenesis (PMID: 36617158 and 37800308). Indeed, the canonical functions of ACTL7B have been shown to have a profound effect at the level of spermatid morphology and to impact nuclear organization. This potentially renders the observed transcriptional deregulation in ACTL7B KO testes an indirect consequence of spermatid morphology defects. I acknowledge that it is experimentally difficult to disentangle the proposed intranuclear roles of ACTL7B from the protein's well-documented cytoplasmic function. Perhaps the generation of a NLS-scrambled ACTL7B variant could offer some insight. In light of the substantial investment this approach would represent, I would suggest, as an alternative, that instead of using wild-type testes as controls for the transcriptome and chromatin localization assays, the authors consider the possibility of using testicular tissue from a mutant with similarly abnormal spermiogenesis but due to transcription-independent defects. This would, in my opinion, offer a more suitable baseline to compare ACTL7B KO testes with.

(2) The manuscript would greatly benefit if experimental validation of the AI-driven predictions were to be provided (in terms of the binding capacity of ACTL7A and ACTL7B to key chromatin remodeling complexes). More so it seems that the authors have the technical expertise / available mass spectrometry data required for this purpose (lines 664-665). Still on this topic, given the predicted interactions of ACTL7A and ACTL7B with the SRCAP, EP400, SMARCA2 and SMARCA4 complexes (Figure 7), it is rather counter-intuitive that the Authors chose for their immunofluorescence assays, in ACTL7B KO testes, to determine the chromatin localization of HDAC1 and HDAC3, rather than that of any of above four complexes.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

(2.1) Summary

In this paper, the authors model motor adaptation as a Bayesian process that combines visual uncertainty about the error feedback, uncertainty about proprioceptive sense of hand position, and uncertainty of predicted (=planned) hand movement with a learning and retention rate as used in state space models. The model is built with results from several experiments presented in the paper and is compared with the PReMo model (Tsay, Kim et al., 2022) as well as a cue combination model (Wei & Körding, 2009). The model and experiments demonstrate the role of visual uncertainty about error feedback in implicit adaptation.

In the introduction, the authors notice that implicit adaptation (as measured in error-clamp based paradigms) does not saturate at larger perturbations, but decreases again (e.g. Moorehead et al., 2017 shows no adaptation at 135{degree sign} and 175{degree sign} perturbations). They hypothesized that visual uncertainty about cursor position increases with larger perturbations since the cursor is further from the fixated target. This could decrease importance assigned to visual feedback which could explain lower asymptotes.

The authors characterize visual uncertainty for 3 rotation sizes in a first experiment, and while this experiment could be improved, it is probably sufficient for the current purposes. Then the authors present a second experiment where adaptation to 7 clamped errors are tested in different groups of participants. The models' visual uncertainty is set using a linear fit to the results from experiment 1, and the remaining 4 parameters are then fit to this second data set. The 4 parameters are 1) proprioceptive uncertainty, 2) uncertainty about the predicted hand position, 3) a learning rate and 4) a retention rate. The authors' Perceptual Error Adaptation model ("PEA") predicts asymptotic levels of implicit adaptation much better than both the PReMo model (Tsay, Kim et al., 2022), which predicts saturated asymptotes, or a causal inference model (Wei & Körding, 2007) which predicts no adaptation for larger rotations. In a third experiment, the authors test their model's predictions about proprioceptive recalibration, but unfortunately compare their data with an unsuitable other data set (Tsay et al. 2020, instead of Tsay et al. 2021). Finally, the authors conduct a fourth experiment where they put their model to the test. They measure implicit adaptation with increased visual uncertainty, by adding blur to the cursor, and the results are again better in line with their model (predicting overall lower adaptation), than with the PReMo model (predicting equal saturation but at larger perturbations) or a causal inference model (predicting equal peak adaptation, but shifted to larger rotations). In particular the model fits for experiment 2 and the results from experiment 4 show that the core idea of the model has merit: increased visual uncertainty about errors dampens implicit adaptation.

(2.2) Strengths

In this study the authors propose a Perceptual Error Adaptation model ("PEA") and the work combines various ideas from the field of cue combination, Bayesian methods and new data sets, collected in four experiments using various techniques that test very different components of the model. The central component of visual uncertainty is assessed in a first experiment. The model uses 4 other parameters to explain implicit adaptation. These parameters are: 1) a learning and 2) a retention rate, as used in popular state space models and the uncertainty (variance) of 3) predicted and 4) proprioceptive hand position. In particular, the authors observe that asymptotes for implicit learning do not saturate, as claimed before, but decrease again when rotations are very large and that this may have to do with visual uncertainty (e.g. Tsay et al., 2021, J Neurophysiol 125, 12-22). The final experiment confirms predictions of the fitted model about what happens when visual uncertainty is increased (overall decrease of adaptation). By incorporating visual uncertainty depending on retinal eccentricity, the predictions of the PEA model for very large perturbations are notably different from, and better than, the predictions of the two other models it is compared to. That is, the paper provides strong support for the idea that visual uncertainty of errors matters for implicit adaptation.

(2.3) Weaknesses

Although the authors don't say this, the "concave" function that shows that adaptation does not saturate for larger rotations has been shown before, including in papers cited in this manuscript.

The first experiment, measuring visual uncertainty for several rotation sizes in error-clamped paradigms has several shortcomings, but these might not be so large as to invalidate the model or the findings in the rest of the manuscript. There are two main issues we highlight here. First, the data is not presented in units that allow comparison with vision science literature. Second, the 1 second delay between movement endpoint and disappearance of the cursor, and the presentation of the reference marker, may have led to substantial degradation of the visual memory of the cursor endpoint. That is, the experiment could be overestimating the visual uncertainty during implicit adaptation.

The paper's third experiment relies to a large degree on reproducing patterns found in one particular paper, where the reported hand positions - as a measure of proprioceptive sense of hand position - are given and plotted relative to an ever present visual target, rather than relative to the actual hand position. That is, 1) since participants actively move to a visual target, the reported hand positions do not reflect proprioception, but mostly the remembered position of the target participants were trying to move to, and 2) if the reports are converted to a difference between the real and reported hand position (rather than the difference between the target and the report), those would be on the order of ~20{degree sign} which is roughly two times larger than any previously reported proprioceptive recalibration, and an order of magnitude larger than what the authors themselves find (1-2{degree sign}) and what their model predicts. Experiment 3 is perhaps not crucial to the paper, but it nicely provides support for the idea that proprioceptive recalibration can occur with error-clamped feedback.

Perhaps the largest caveat to the study is that it assumes that people do not look at the only error feedback available to them (and can explicitly suppress learning from it). This was probably true in the experiments used in the manuscript, but unlikely to be the case in most of the cited literature. Ignoring errors and suppressing adaptation would also be a disastrous strategy to use in the real world, such that our brains may not be very good at this. So the question remains to what degree - if any - the ideas behind the model generalize to experiments without fixation control, and more importantly, to real life situations.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary

In this manuscript, Weng et al. identify the neuron specific transcriptome that impacts age dependent cognitive decline. The authors design a pipeline to profile neurons from wild type and long-lived insulin receptor/IGF-1 mutants using timepoints when memory functions are declining. They discover signatures unique to neurons which validates their approach. The authors identify that genes related to neuronal identity are lost with age in wild type worms. For example, old neurons reduce the expression of genes linked to synaptic function and neuropeptide signaling and increase the expression of chromatin regulators, insulin peptides and glycoproteins. Depletion of selected genes which are upregulated in old neurons (utx-1, ins-19 and nmgp-1) leads to improved short memory function. This indicates that some genes that increase with age have detrimental effects on learning and memory. The pipeline is then used to test neuronal profiles of long-lived insulin/IGF-1 daf-2 mutants. Genes related to stress response pathways are upregulated in long lived daf-2 mutants (e.g. dod-24, F08H9.4) and those genes are required for improved neuron function.

Strengths

The manuscript is well written, and the experiments are well described. The authors take great care to explain their reasoning for performing experiments in a specific way and guide the reader through the interpretation of the results, which makes this manuscript an enjoyable and interesting read. The authors discover novel regulators of learning and memory using neuron-specific transcriptomic analysis in aged animals, which underlines the importance of cell specific deep sequencing. The timepoints of the transcriptomic profiling are elegantly chosen, as they coincide with the loss of memory and can be used to specifically reveal gene expression profiles related to neuron function. The authors discuss on the dod-24 example how powerful this approach is. In daf-2 mutants whole-body dod-24 expression differs from neuron specific profiles, which underlines the importance of precise cell specific approaches. This dataset provides a very useful resource for the C. elegans and aging community as it complements existing datasets with additional time points and neuron specific deep profiling.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this study, Schweibenz et al., identify the transcriptional coactivator, Taiman (Tai), as a factor that determines the fitness level of epithelial cells by regulating Wingless (Wg), which is an important determinant of cellular fitness. Taiman determines cellular fitness level by regulating levels of cell-surface glypican Dally-like protein (Dlp), which regulates extracellular Wingless (Wg) distribution. Thus, by affecting levels of Wg via glypican regulation, Tai participates in determining cellular fitness, and cells with low Tai levels are eliminated as they are deprived of adequate Wg levels.

Strengths:

(1) The authors make a strong case for the effect of tai on Dlp and Wg levels in experiments where a relatively large group of cells have reduced tai levels.<br /> (2) The claim that tai-low clones are competitively eliminated is supported by experiments that show cell death in them, and their elimination at different time points.<br /> (3) The manuscript is well written.

Weaknesses:

(1) The study has relatively weak evidence for the mechanism of cell competition mediated by Dlp and Wg.

(2) More evidence is required to support the claim that dlp transcription or endocytosis is affected in tai clones.

Other comments:

(1) The authors put the study in the context of cell competition, and the first figure indeed is convincing in this regard. However, most of the rest of the study is not in the clonal context, and mainly relies on RNAi KD of tai in the posterior compartment, which is a relatively large group of cells. I understand why the authors chose a different approach to investigate the role of tai in cell competition. However because ubiquitous loss of tai results in smaller organs, it is important to determine to what extent reducing levels of tai in the entire posterior compartment compares with clonal elimination i.e. cell competition. This is important in order to determine to what extent the paradigm of Tai-mediated regulation of Dlp levels and by extension, Wg availability, can be extended as a general mechanism underlying competitive elimination of tai-low clones. If the authors want to make a case for mechanisms involved in the competitive elimination of tai clones, then they need to show that the KD of tai in the posterior compartment shows hallmarks of cell competition. Is there cell death along the A/P boundary? Or is the compartment smaller because those cells are growing slower? Are the levels of Myc/DIAP1, proteins required for fitness, affected in en>tai RNAi cells?

2) The authors do not have direct/strong evidence of changes in dlp mRNA levels or intracellular trafficking. To back these claims, the authors should look for dlp mRNA levels and provide more evidence for Dlp endocytosis like an antibody uptake assay or at the very least, a higher resolution image analysis showing a change in the number of intracellular Dlp positive punctae. Also, do the authors think that loss of tai increases Dlp endocytosis, making it less available on the cell surface for maintaining adequate extracellular Wg levels?

3) The data shown in the last figure is at odds with the model (I think) the authors are trying to establish: When cells have lower Tai levels, this reduces Dlp levels (S2) presumably either by reducing dlp transcription and/or increasing (?) Dlp endocytosis. This in turn reduces Wg (availability) in cells away from source cells (Figure 6). The reduced Wg availability makes them less fit, targeting them for competitive elimination. But in tai clones, I do not see any change in cell-surface Dlp (9B) (I would have expected them to be down based on the proposed model). The authors also see more total Dlp (9A) (which is at odds with S2 assuming data in S2 were done under permeabilizing conditions.).

As a side note, because Dlp is GPI-anchored, the authors should consider the possibility that the 'total' Dlp staining observed in 9A may not be actually total Dlp (and possibly mostly intracellular Dlp, since the permeabilizing membranes with detergent will cause some (most?) Dlp molecules to be lost, and how this might be affecting the interpretation of the data. I think one way to address this would be to process the permeabilized and non-permeabilized samples simultaneously and then image them at the same settings and compare what membrane staining in these two conditions looks like. If membrane staining in the permeabilized condition is decreased compared to non-permeabilized conditions, and the signal intensity of Dlp in permeabilized conditions remains high, then the authors will have evidence to support increased endocytosis in tai clones. Of course, these data will still need to be reconciled with what is shown in S2.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The hippocampal CA3 region is generally considered to be the primary site of initiation of sharp wave ripples-highly synchronous population events involved in learning and memory although the precise mechanism remains elusive. A recent study revealed that CA3 comprises two distinct pyramidal cell populations: thorny cells that receive mossy fiber input from the dentate gyrus, and athorny cells that do not. That study also showed that it is athorny cells in particular that play a key role in sharp wave initiation. In the present work, Sammons, Masserini, and colleagues expand on this by examining the connectivity probabilities among and between thorny and athorny cells. First, using whole-cell patch clamp recordings, they find an asymmetrical connectivity pattern, with athorny cells receiving the most synaptic connections from both athorny and thorny cells, and thorny cells receiving fewer. They then demonstrate in spiking neural network simulations how this asymmetrical connectivity may underlie the preferential role of athorny cells in sharp wave initiation.

Strengths:

The authors provide independent validation of some of the findings by Hunt et al. (2018) concerning the distinction between thorny and athorny pyramidal cells in CA3 and advance our understanding of their differential integration in CA3 microcircuits. The properties of excitatory connections among and between thorny and athorny cells described by the authors will be key in understanding CA3 functions including, but not limited to, sharp wave initiation.

As stated in the paper, the modeling results lend support to the idea that the increased excitatory connectivity towards athorny cells plays a key role in causing them to fire before thorny cells in sharp waves. More generally, the model adds to an expanding pool of models of sharp wave ripples which should prove useful in guiding and interpreting experimental research.

Weaknesses:

The mechanism by which athorny cells initiate sharp waves in the model is somewhat confusingly described. As far as I understood, random fluctuations in the activities of A and B neurons provide windows of opportunity for pyramidal cells to fire if they have additionally recovered from adaptive currents. Thorny and athorny pyramidal cells are then set in a winner-takes-all competition which is quickly won by the athorny cells. The main thesis of the paper seems to be that athorny cells win this competition because they receive more inputs both from themselves and from thorny cells, hence, the connectivity "underlies the sequential activation". However, it is also stated that athorny cells activate first due to their lower rheobase and steeper f-I curve, and it is also indicated in the methods that athorny (but not thorny) cells fire in bursts. It seems that it is primarily these features that make them fire first, something which apparently happens even when the A to A connectivity is set to 0-albeit with a very small lag. Perhaps the authors could further clarify the differential role of single cell and network parameters in determining the sequential activation of athorny and thorny cells. Is the role of asymmetric excitatory connectivity only to enhance the initial intrinsic advantage of athorny cells? If so, could this advantage also be enhanced in other ways?

Although a clear effort has been made to constrain the model with biological data, too many degrees of freedom remain that allow the modeler to make arbitrary decisions. This is not a problem in itself, but perhaps the authors could explain more of their reasoning and expand upon the differences between their modeling choices and those of others. For example, what are the conceptual or practical advantages of using adaptation in pyramidal neurons as opposed to short-term synaptic plasticity as in the model by Hunt et al.? Relatedly, what experimental observations could validate or falsify the proposed mechanisms?

In the data by Hunt et al., thorny cells have a higher baseline (non-SPW) firing rate, and it is claimed that it is actually stochastic correlations in their firing that are amplified by athorny cells to initiate sharp waves. However, in the current model, the firing of both types of pyramidal cells outside of ripples appears to be essentially zero. Can the model handle more realistic firing rates as described by Hunt et al., or as produced by e.g., walking around an environment tiled with place cells, or would that trigger SPWs continuously?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Lichtinger et al. have used an extensive set of molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to study the conformational dynamics and transport cycle of an important member of the proton-coupled oligopeptide transporters (POTs), namely SLC15A2 or PepT2. This protein is one of the most well-studied mammalian POT transporters that provides a good model with enough insight and structural information to be studied computationally using advanced enhanced sampling methods employed in this work. The authors have used microsecond-level MD simulations, constant-PH MD, and alchemical binding free energy calculations along with cell-based transport assay measurements; however, the most important part of this work is the use of enhanced sampling techniques to study the conformational dynamics of PepT2 under different conditions.

The study attempts to identify links between conformational dynamics and chemical events such as proton binding, ligand-protein interactions, and intramolecular interactions. The ultimate goal is of course to understand the proton-coupled peptide and drug transport by PepT2 and homologous transporters in the solute carrier family.

Some of the key results include (1) Protonation of H87 and D342 initiate the occluded (Occ) to the outward-facing (OF) state transition; (2) In the OF state, through engaging R57, substrate entry increases the pKa value of E56 and thermodynamically facilitates the movement of protons further down; (3) E622 is not only essential for peptide recognition but also its protonation facilitates substrate release and contributes to the intracellular gate opening. In addition, cell-based transport assays show that mutation of residues such as H87 and<br /> D342 significantly decrease transport activity as expected from simulations.

Strengths:

(1) This is an extensive MD based study of PepT2, which is beyond the typical MD studies both in terms of the sheer volume of simulations as well as the advanced methodology used. The authors have not limited themselves to one approach and have appropriately combined equilibrium MD with alchemical free energy calculations, constant-pH MD and geometry-based free energy calculations. Each of these 4 methods provides a unique insight regarding the transport mechanism of PepT2.

(2) The authors have not limited themselves to computational work and has performed experiments as well. The cell-based transport assays clearly establish the importance of the residues that have been identified as significant contributors to the transport mechanism using simulations.

(3) The conclusions made based on the simulations are mostly convincing and provide useful information regarding the proton pathway and the role of important residues in proton binding, protein-ligand interaction, and conformational changes.

Weaknesses:

There are inherent limitations with the methodology used such as the MEMENTO and constant pH MD that have been briefly noted in the manuscript.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

In this study, Wang et al. have demonstrated that TMC7, a testis-enriched multipass transmembrane protein, is essential for male reproduction in mice. Tmc7 KO male mice are sterile due to reduced sperm count and abnormal sperm morphology. TMC7 co-localizes with GM130, a cis-Golgi marker, in round spermatids. The absence of TMC7 results in reduced levels of Golgi proteins, elevated abundance of ER stress markers, as well as changes of Ca2+ and pH levels in the KO testis. However, further confirmation is required because the analyses were performed with whole testis samples in spite of the differences in the germ cell composition in WT and KO testis. In addition, the causal relationships between the reported anomalies await thorough interrogation

Strengths:

By using PD21 testes, the revised assays have consolidated that depletion of TMC7 leads to a reduced level of Ca2+ and an elevated level of ROS in the male germ cells. The immunohistochemistry analyses have clearly indicated the reduced abundance of GM130, P115, and GRASP65 in the knockout testis.

Weaknesses:

The Discussion section contains sentences reiterating the Introduction and Results of this manuscript (e.g., Lines 79-85 and 231-236; Lines 175-179 and 259-263). Those read repetitive and can be removed.

Future studies are required to decipher how TMC7 stabilizes Golgi structure, coordinates vesicle transport, and maintains the germ cell homeostasis.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

The superfamily I 3'-5' DNA helicase Srs2 is well known for its role as an anti-recombinase, stripping Rad51 from ssDNA, as well as an anti-crossover factor, dissociating extended D-loops and favoring non-crossover outcome during recombination. In addition, Srs2 plays a key role in ribonucleotide excision repair. Besides DNA repair defects, srs2 mutants also show a reduced recovery after DNA damage that is related to its role in downregulating the DNA damage signaling or checkpoint response. Recent work from the Zhao laboratory (PMID: 33602817) identified a role of Srs2 in downregulating the DNA damage signaling response by removing RPA from ssDNA. This manuscript reports further mechanistic insights into the signaling downregulation function of Srs2.

Using the genetic interaction with mutations in RPA1, mainly rfa1-zm2, the authors test a panel of mutations in Srs2 that affect CDK sites (srs2-7AV), potential Mec1 sites (srs2-2SA), known sumoylation sites (srs2-3KR), Rad51 binding (delta 875-902), PCNA interaction (delta 1159-1163), and SUMO interaction (srs2-SIMmut). All mutants were generated by genomic replacement and the expression level of the mutant proteins was found to be unchanged. This alleviates some concern about the use of deletion mutants compared to point mutations. The double mutant analysis identified that PCNA interaction and SUMO sites were required for the Srs2 checkpoint dampening function, at least in the context of the rfa1-zm2 mutant. There was no effect of these mutants in a RFA1 wild-type background. This latter result is likely explained by the activity of the parallel pathway of checkpoint dampening mediated by Slx4, and genetic data with an Slx4 point mutation affecting Rtt107 interaction and checkpoint downregulation support this notion. Further analysis of Srs2 sumoylation showed that Srs2 sumoylation depended on PCNA interaction, suggesting sequential events of Srs2 recruitment by PCNA and subsequent sumoylation. Kinetic analysis showed that sumoylation peaks after maximal Mec1 induction by DNA damage (using the Top1 poison camptothecin (CPT)) and depended on Mec1. These data are consistent with a model that Mec1 hyperactivation is ultimately leading to signaling downregulation by Srs2 through Srs2 sumoylation. Mec1-S1964 phosphorylation, a marker for Mec1 hyperactivation and a site found to be needed for checkpoint downregulation after DSB induction did not appear to be involved in checkpoint downregulation after CPT damage. The data are in support of the model that Mec1 hyperactivation when targeted to RPA-covered ssDNA by its Ddc2 (human ATRIP) targeting factor, favors Srs2 sumoylation after Srs2 recruitment to PCNA to disrupt the RPA-Ddc2-Mec1 signaling complex. Presumably, this allows gap filling and disappearance of long-lived ssDNA as the initiator of checkpoint signaling, although the study does not extend to this step.

Strengths

(1) The manuscript focuses on the novel function of Srs2 to downregulate the DNA damage signaling response and provide new mechanistic insights.

(2) The conclusions that PCNA interaction and ensuing Srs2-sumoylation are involved in checkpoint downregulation are well supported by the data.

Weaknesses

(1) Additional mutants of interest could have been tested, such as the recently reported Pin mutant, srs2-Y775A (PMID: 38065943), and the Rad51 interaction point mutant, srs2-F891A (PMID: 31142613).

(2) The use of deletion mutants for PCNA and RAD51 interaction is inferior to using specific point mutants, as done for the SUMO interaction and the sites for post-translational modifications.

(3) Figure 4D and Figure 5A report data with standard deviations, which is unusual for n=2. Maybe the individual data points could be plotted with a color for each independent experiment to allow the reader to evaluate the reproducibility of the results.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors elucidated the role of USP8 in the endocytic pathway. Using C. elegans epithelial cells as a model, they observed that when USP8 function is lost, the cells have a decreased number and size in lysosomes. Since USP8 was already known to be a protein linked to ESCRT components, they looked into what role USP8 might play in connecting lysosomes and multivesicular bodies (MVB). They observed fewer ESCRT-associated vesicles but an increased number of "abnormal" enlarged vesicles when USP8 function was lost. Then they observed that the abnormally enlarged vesicles, marked by the PI3P biosensor YFP-2xFYVE, are bigger but in the same number in USP8 (-) compared to wild-type animals, suggesting homotypic fusion. They confirmed this result by knocking down USP8 in a human cell line, and they observed enlarged vesicles marked by YFP-2xFYVE as well. They finally propose that USP8 dissociates Rabx-5 from early endosomes facilitating endosome maturation.

Strengths:

The authors have created significant, multifaceted tools for investigating systems involved in endosome dynamics control in both worm and human cells, which will help many members of the cell biology community. The study discovered an intriguing relationship between USP8 and the Rab5 guanine nucleotide exchange factor Rabx5, expanding USP8's targets and modes of action. The results provide significant contributions to our knowledge of how endosomal maturation works.

Weaknesses:

The rationales could have been stated clearer to help the readers.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This manuscript reveals an important mechanism of KCNQ1/IKs channel gating such that the open state of the pore is unstable and undergoes intermittent closed and open conformations. PUFA enhances the maximum open probability of IKs by binding to a crevice adjacent to the pore and stabilize the open conformation. This mechanism is supported by convincing single channel recordings that show empty and open channel traces and the ratio of such traces is affected by PUFA. In addition, mutations of the pore residues alter PUFA effects, convincingly supporting that PUFA alters the interactions among these pore residues.

Strengths:

The data are of high quality and the description is clear.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Mimura et al describe the discovery of the orphan transporter SLC35G1 as a citrate transporter in the small intestine. Using a combination of cellular transport assays, they show that SLC35G1 can mediate citrate transport in small intestinal cell lines. Furthermore, they investigate its expression and localization in both human tissue and cell lines. Limited evidence exists to date on both SLC35G1 and citrate uptake in the small intestine, therefore this study is an important contribution to both fields. However, the main claims by the authors are only partially supported by experimental evidence.

Strengths:

The authors convincingly show that SLC35G1 mediates uptake of citrate which is dependent on pH and chloride concentration. Putting their initial findings in a physiological context, they present human tissue expression data of SLC35G. Their Transwell assay indicates that SLC35G1 is a citrate exporter at the basolateral membrane.

Weaknesses:

Further confirmation and clarification are required to claim that the SLC indeed exports citrate at the basolateral membrane as concluded by the authors. Most experiments measure citrate uptake, but the authors state that SLC35G1 is an exporter, mostly based on the lack of uptake at physiological conditions faced at the basolateral side. The Transwell assay in Figure 1L is the only evidence that it indeed is an exporter. However, in this experiment, the applied chloride concentration was not according to the proposed model (120mM at the basolateral side). The Transwell assay, or a similar assay measuring export instead of import, should be carried out in knockdown cells to prove that the export indeed occurs through SLC35G1 and not through an indirect effect. Related to the mentioned chloride sensitivity, it is unclear how the proposed model works if the SLC faces high chloride conditions under physiological conditions though it is inhibited by chloride.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

Overall, this is an interesting series of experiments which have identified a putative inhibitor of the Plasmodium M1 alanyl aminopeptidases, PfA-M1 and PvA-M1. The weaknesses include the lack of additional analysis of additional targets identified in the chemoproteomic approaches.

Strengths:

The main strengths include the synthesis of MIPS2673 which is selectively active against the enzyme and in whole cell assay.

Weaknesses:

The authors have addressed the previously identified weaknesses and have now provided additional data and explanations. They have modified their conclusions to indicate the limitations of their work.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This study profiled the single-cell transcriptome of human spermatogenesis and provided many potential molecular markers for developing testicular puncture-specific marker kits for NOA patients.

Strengths:

Perform single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) and single-cell assay for transposase-accessible chromatin sequencing (scATAC-seq) on testicular tissues from two OA patients and three NOA patients.

Weaknesses:

Most results are analytical and lack specific experiments to support these analytical results and hypotheses.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

This manuscript by Beardslee and Schmitz reports discoveries made from a genetic screen to identify C-terminal degrons that cause the efficient depletion of a potent toxin, which allowed for a deep assessment of amino acid patterns that promote protein turnover.

Strengths:

The key findings are that SsrA-like C termini are a dominant class of efficient degrons and that ClpP (X/A) mediates the turnover in most cases. Moreover, the data provides insight into the importance of residues situated farther into the degron and reveals aspects of the ClpX engagement and processivity process. The manuscript is clearly written and there is ample supporting data for the conclusions drawn. The figures are also informative.

Weaknesses:

There are only a few minor suggestions on data interpretation.

(1) Page 6: It is stated that "We plated cells on media containing 0 - 1% arabinose inducer, and observed that stronger induction of untagged VapC indeed correlates with smaller colony size; ... We conclude that VapC levels have a titratable effect on growth rate."

In E. coli with intact arabinose import/response systems, sub-saturating levels of arabinose do not generally lower the induction level of the PBAD promoter in each cell; rather, a sub-population of cells becomes induced [PMID: 9223333]. The bulk observation is a reduced expression level, and, in this case, slowed growth, but it seems more likely that the slow growth observed is from the induced cohort dying off as the cultures and colonies develop.

(2) Page 8: "At 6-hours post-induction,..."

Because these experiments were enrichments from initial pools of clones, the number of cell divisions is more informative than the hours of outgrowth or culture densities at harvest. It would be helpful if the authors could indicate, or at least estimate, the number of cell divisions. this could then be included in the results or methods section.

(3) Page 12: "It is possible that these sequences compromise VapC folding and solubility, or mimic inhibitory interactions made by hydrophobic segments of the VapB antitoxin that block VapC activity (43, 59)."

Later in the manuscript, Lon is presented as a minor player in the overall story, but Lon prefers hydrophobic degrons. Could that hydrophobic class be Lon substrates? (Possibly presented as an additional mechanism here or in the discussion of this class of tags.)

(4) Page 13: "Arg in the 2nd position was also associated with proteolysis, yet Arg is virtually absent from proteobacterial ssrA sequences."

The nucleic acid changes required for evolutionary drift from the predominant amino acid codons at this position in proteobacteria to Arg may require moving through several codons that notably impair the performance of the degron. Such a constraint may also be responsible, in part, for the observed conservation.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

I very much enjoyed reading Lingxiu Xu et al.'s paper "Temporally controlled nervous system-to-gut signaling bidirectionally regulates longevity in C. elegans," where they investigate the mechanisms by which motor neurons regulate lifespan in C. elegans worms. In this paper, they first discover that interfering with synaptic release in cholinergic motor neurons affects lifespan. Using mutants and gene knockdowns they show that these effects are due to the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. They show that the effects of these motor neurons on lifespan are opposite, depending on timed genetic interventions promoting synaptic release. If these interventions occur during development, the lifespan is shortened, but if they occur starting on day 7 of adulthood, then lifespan is lengthened. They then show that the transcription factor daf-16 is required for the former effect, while the transcription factor hsf-1 is required for the latter one. In addition, these early and late effects, they find, required the acetylcholine receptors acr-6 and gar-3, respectively, and intestinal expression of these genes rescues the respective phenotypes. Interestingly, tagging the endogenous acr-6 and gar-3 genes with mCherry, they find that the ACR-6 and GAR-3 proteins are expressed in the intestine, ACR-6 during development, and GAR-3 during adulthood. Based on these findings they propose a model where acetylcholine from motor neurons regulates lifespan by modulating different receptors expressed at different times. These receptors, in turn, affect lifespan in opposing ways via different transcription factors.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

Summary:

The authors presented a data-centric ML approach for virtual ligand screening. They used BRAF as an example to demonstrate the predictive power of their approach.

Strengths:

The performance of predictive models in this study is superior (nearly perfect) with respect to exiting methods.

Weaknesses:

I feel the training and testing datasets may not be rigorously constructed. If that is the case, the results would be significantly affected.

I have 3 major comments:

(1) The authors identified ~4100 BRAF actives, then randomly selected 3600 BRAF actives to be part of the training dataset with the remaining 500 actives becoming a part of the hold-out test set. The problem is that, the authors did not evaluate the chemical similarity between the 3600 actives in the training, and the 500 actives in the testing set. If some of them were similar, the testing results would be very good but partially due to information leakage. The authors should carefully examine the chemical similarity between any pairs of their training and testing datasets, before any conclusion is made.

(2) The authors tried to explore the role of dataset size in the performance, in particular, what would happen when the number of actives are reduced. However the minimal number of actives used is 500 while the number of inactives ranges from 500 to 3600. This is quite different from real applications where the number of expected actives in the screening library would be at most 1-2% of the whole database. The authors should further reduced the number of actives (e.g. 125, 25, 5, 1), and evaluate their model's performance.

(3) The authors chose BRAF as example in this study. BRAF is a well studied drug target with thousands of known actives. In real applications, the target may only have a handful of known actives. The authors should try to apply their approach, to a couple other targets that have less known actives than BRAF, to evaluate their method's transferability.

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-42626-3

Resource: Bloomington Drosophila Stock Center (RRID:SCR_006457)

Curator: @maulamb

SciCrunch record: RRID:SCR_006457

What is this?

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):

The study presents strong evidence for allosteric activation of plant receptor kinases, which enhances our understanding of the non-catalytic mechanisms employed by this large family of receptors.

Plant receptor kinases (RKs) play a critical role in transducing extracellular signals. The activation of RKs involves homo- or heterodimerization of the RKs, and it is believed that mutual phosphorylation of their intracellular kinase domains initiates downstream signaling. However, this model faces a challenge in cases where the kinase domain exhibits pseudokinase characteristics. In their recent study, Mühlenbeck et al. reveal the non-catalytic activation mechanisms of the EFR-BAK1 complex in plant receptor kinase signaling. Specifically, they aimed to determine that the EFR kinase domain activates BAK1 not through its kinase activity, but rather by utilizing a "conformational toggle" mechanism to enter an active-like state, enabling allosteric trans-activation of BAK1. The study sought to elucidate the structural elements and mutations of EFR that affect this conformational switch, as well as explore the implications for immune signaling in plants. To investigate the activation mechanisms of the EFR-BAK1 complex, the research team employed a combination of mutational analysis, structural studies, and hydrogen-deuterium exchange mass spectrometry (HDX-MS) analysis. For instance, through HDX-MS analysis, Mühlenbeck et al. discovered that the EFR (Y836F) mutation impairs the accessibility of the active-like conformation. On the other hand, they identified the EFR (F761H) mutation as a potent intragenic suppressor capable of stabilizing the active-like conformation, highlighting the pivotal role of allosteric regulation in BAK1 kinase activation. The data obtained from this methodology strengthens their major conclusion. Moreover, the researchers propose that the allosteric activation mechanism may extend beyond the EFR-BAK1 complex, as it may also be partially conserved in the Arabidopsis LRR-RK XIIa kinases. This suggests a broader role for non-catalytic mechanisms in plant RK signaling.

The allosteric activation mechanism was demonstrated for receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs) many years ago. A similar mechanism has been suggested for the activation of plant RKs, but experimental evidence for this conclusion is lacking. Data in this study represent a significant advancement in our understanding of non-catalytic mechanisms in plant RK signaling. By shedding light on the allosteric regulation of BAK1, the study provides a new paradigm for future research in this area.

Reviewer #3 (Public Review):