Peer Review History
| Original SubmissionDecember 2, 2022 |
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PONE-D-22-33183Diurnal regulation of metabolism by GNAS in QPLOT neuronsPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Lang, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. While both reviewers acknowledge the potential interest in this piece of work, both have raised a number of concerns that need to be addressed in full before this can be reconsidered for publication. In particular I would advise the authors to address the serious concern that Opn5 is expressed in many other regions of the brain, where local effects of Gnas loss of function could account for the phenotypes that the authors currently ascribe exclusively to QPLOT neurons. Please submit your revised manuscript by Mar 23 2023 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:
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Kind regards, Nicholas Simon Foulkes, D.Phil Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements. 1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and 2. Thank you for stating the following in the Competing Interests section: "The Lang lab participates in a sponsored research agreement between CCHMC and BIOS Lighting, Inc." Please confirm that this does not alter your adherence to all PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials, by including the following statement: "This does not alter our adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.” (as detailed online in our guide for authors http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/competing-interests). If there are restrictions on sharing of data and/or materials, please state these. Please note that we cannot proceed with consideration of your article until this information has been declared. Please include your updated Competing Interests statement in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Partly Reviewer #2: Partly ********** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes ********** 5. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: Gaitonde et al. study the role of Gs signalling in the regulation of energy metabolism in mice. They show that mice carrying a deletion of Gnas (encoding the alpha subunit of Gs) in cells expressing neuropsin (Opn5) show reduced locomotor activity and subtle changes in the daily rhythms of energy metabolism as measured in an indirect calorimetry setup. They conclude that Opn5-positive neurons of the MPOA (Qplot neurons) regulate circadian (24-hour) rhythms of metabolism and activity. This is an interesting paper, albeit reporting mostly negative findings, but several points should be addressed to substantiate the conclusions: 1. Gnas KO: No data validating specificity and efficiency of the Opn5-Cre-driven deletion of Gnas are provided. Is there recombination seen in ither brain areas expressing Opn5 (such as cortex, cerebellum, retina etc.) and could these affect metabolic phenotype? How efficient is Gnas recombination in Qplot neurons? Could the mild phenotype be the result of inefficient knock out? 2. A rescue experiment would be needed to confirm Qplot Gnas as the driver of the observed activity (and, potentially, other) phenotype, but this would go beyond the scope of this paper. This should be discussed, though. 3. CircaCompare uses cosine fits to describe rhythm parameters, but not all the rhythms analysed here show sinusoidal patterns. This may skew the results. Cosine fitting is probably ok for EE and RER (albeit under some conditions bimodal patterns are observed), but they clearly do not work for intake rhythms. Algorithms allowing for complex profiles would be more suitable such as RAIN or CircaN – but then they often do not allow for direct comparison of two conditions. Minor points: 1. I would suggest avoiding acronyms in the title. 2. Would it be possible to extract sleep (or immobility as a proxy) data from the IR profiles? It remains unclear how Qplot Gs would affect activity, but a link to sleep has been made. Do mutant mice show more sleep during the dark phase compared to control animals? Reviewer #2: In their manuscript “Diurnal regulation of metabolism by GNAS in QPLOT neurons”, the authors examine patterns of diurnal metabolism and behavior at three different ambient temperatures in mice carrying a CRE mediated deletion of a stimulatory G protein alpha subunit (Gnas), with CRE driven by regulatory sequences of Opn5 (neuropsin) from an Opn5 CRE knock-in locus. The authors examine energy expenditure (EE), respiratory exchange ratios (RER), food and water intake, as well as locomotion, analyzing the data both with two-way ANOVA (comparing 3 hour bins) and by CircaCompare (to determine rhythmicity, MESOR, amplitude and phase). ANOVA reveals significant differences only for locomotion at 28 and 22 °C, at the beginning (both temperatures) and end (only 28°C) of the dark phase. CircaCompare reveals more differences, also in the metabolic parameters. All changes, except perhaps for the altered locomotion patterns, appear to be minor in magnitude. The authors conclude that Gnas mediated signaling in QPLOT neurons of the preoptic area of the hypothalamus regulates daily patterns of metabolism in mice. Data and data analysis of the manuscript are sound. An important issue, however, needs to be addressed regarding the experimental design and overall conclusion. Specifically, the authors want to examine the effect of G-protein coupled receptor signaling in a specific subtype of neurons (QPLOT neurons) of the preoptic hypothalamus, which are characterized by a combined expression of specific markers, among them the opsin Opn5 (neuropsin). They use an allele driving CRE from an Opn5 knock-in locus to tissue-specifically excise a floxed Gnas allele. However, Opn5 is not only expressed in QPLOT neurons, but also in retinal ganglion cells (Nguyen et al., Nat Cell Biol 2019;21:420-429; D’Souza et al., J Comp Neurol. 2022;530:1247-1262) and apparently also in the cerebellum and cortex (Mouse ENCODE transcriptome data, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/gene/353344). It is, therefore, possible that the observations made by the authors are not exclusively due to loss of function of Gnas in QPLOT neurons only, but might involve effects in other tissues as well that could directly or indirectly affect patterns of energy metabolism and behavior. This is especially important as the experiments were conducted under light-dark cycles, which might imply light dependent functions mediated by Opn5 expressing retinal ganglion cells. Therefore, the authors either need to present additional data highlighting that indeed Gnas loss-of-function in their system is restricted to QPLOT neurons, or they should discuss the specificity issues in more detail and modify title and conclusion accordingly, referring rather to “Gnas function in Opn5 expressing tissues, including QPLOT neurons” or similarly. Another issue is the rather subtle magnitude of the statistically significant effects observed for parameters other than locomotion, which are detected only by CircaCompare analysis. Could one main conclusion from the experiments be that metabolic patterns are relatively resilient to modification of Gnas mediated signaling in Opn5 expressing tissues, with other pathways playing redundant or more important roles? The authors may want to discuss such implications of their findings more explicitly. Minor points: Line 138: Why were only males used for indirect calometry experiments? Line 271/272: “Interestingly, the of Opn5Cre;…”: add “the MESOR of ” ********** 6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No ********** [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. |
| Revision 1 |
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Diurnal regulation of metabolism by Gs-alpha in hypothalamic QPLOT neurons PONE-D-22-33183R1 Dear Dr. Lang, We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication. An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. Kind regards, Nicholas Simon Foulkes, D.Phil Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed ********** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: Congrats on this nice story. I have no further comments or questions. Not sure what else I should wirite here given that all my concerns have been addressed. Reviewer #2: (No Response) ********** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No ********** |
| Formally Accepted |
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PONE-D-22-33183R1 Diurnal regulation of metabolism by Gs-alpha in hypothalamic QPLOT neurons Dear Dr. Lang: I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org. If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Dr. Nicholas Simon Foulkes Academic Editor PLOS ONE |
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