Dicer accumulates in cytoplasmic foci upon alphavirus infection and plays a proviral role in Myotis myotis bat cells

PLOS Pathogens

Dear Dr. Pfeffer,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Pathogens. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Pathogens'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 at Review Commons, according to the submitted Revision Plan (see below for details).

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Kind regards,

Ronald P van Rij

Guest Editor

PLOS Pathogens

Alexander Gorbalenya

Section Editor

PLOS Pathogens

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Pathogens

orcid.org/0000-0003-2946-9497

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Pathogens

orcid.org/0000-0002-7699-2064

Additional Editor Comments:

The plan for revision is solid, and I invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript addressing the reviewers’ comments as proposed.

Regarding the experiments that the authors prefer to not carry out: I agree that the flow cytometry assessment of Dicer expression is not essential if microscopy images are provided. I agree with the reviewers that experiments in other bat cells/with the Dicer protein of other bat species would be a valuable addition to the manuscript. However, if the authors cannot obtain other bat cell lines, the proposed experiments with only Tblu cells / T. brasiliensis Dicer would suffice.

Other suggestion:

I wonder whether the Z score plots of the VSV infections (in HEK and M myotis cells; Fig. 3D) are informative, given that they are based on very few overlapping reads. The authors may consider removing these plots, or alternatively, indicating in the figure the number of pairs underlying the plot.

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Figure resubmission:

Reproducibility:

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PPATHOGENS-D-25-02282R1

Bat Dicer antiviral role and subcellular localization differ upon alphavirus infection in two distinct species

PLOS Pathogens

Dear Dr. Pfeffer,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Pathogens. After careful consideration, we feel that the manuscript has greatly improved but does not yet fully meet PLOS Pathogens's publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the final point raised by the editor.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Feb 01 2026 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 plospathogens@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/ppathogens/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

* A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'. This file does not need to include responses to any formatting updates and technical items listed in the 'Journal Requirements' section below.

* A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.

* An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, competing interests statement, or data availability statement, please make these updates within the submission form at the time of resubmission. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Ronald P van Rij

Guest Editor

PLOS Pathogens

Alexander Gorbalenya

Section Editor

PLOS Pathogens

Sumita Bhaduri-McIntosh

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Pathogens

orcid.org/0000-0003-2946-9497

Michael Malim

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Pathogens

orcid.org/0000-0002-7699-2064

Editor Comments :

The authors have done extensive additional work to address the review comments (Review Commons) and restructured the manuscript. The conclusions are well supported by the data and the manuscript provides interesting new insights in the role of RNAi in bat cells.

There is still one experiment that I consider essential before the manuscript can be accepted:

- (viral) small RNA profiling of infected Tb1Luc cells. The authors suggest that Dicer has antiviral activity in Tadarida brasiliensis Tb1Lu cells, which contrasts with their observation in Myotis myotis cells. It will be important to study whether these cells produce viral siRNAs as an indication that the observed antiviral effect is small RNA/RNAi dependent.

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Figure resubmission:

Reproducibility:

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Dear Dr. Pfeffer,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'Bat Dicer antiviral role and subcellular localization differ upon alphavirus infection in two distinct species' has been provisionally accepted for publication in PLOS Pathogens.

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Thank you again for supporting Open Access publishing; we are looking forward to publishing your work in PLOS Pathogens.

Best regards,

Ronald P van Rij

Guest Editor

PLOS Pathogens

Alexander Gorbalenya

Section Editor

PLOS Pathogens

Sumita Bhaduri-McIntosh

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Pathogens

orcid.org/0000-0003-2946-9497

Michael Malim

Editor-in-Chief

PLOS Pathogens

orcid.org/0000-0002-7699-2064

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The authors have clearly explained (in rebuttal and discussion of the manuscript) their rationale for not investing time and resources into siRNA profiling of the Tadarida brasiliensis cells. While small RNA profiles would still be of significant interest, I agree with the authors that it is not essential to support their main conclusions and I therefore propose to accept the manuscript.

Reviewer Comments (if any, and for reference):