Prospective evaluation of bowel dysfunction after rectal cancer surgery.

Purpose: Bowel dysfunction after rectal cancer surgery may significantly affect the quality of life. Our study aimed to estimate the incidence and characterize the low anterior resection syndrome (LARS).

Methods: Prospective evaluation of patients treated with anterior resection for rectal cancer at two hospitals followed for 12 months after ileostomy reversal.

Semi-quantitative metabarcoding reveals how climate shapes arthropod community assembly along elevation gradients on Hawaii Island.

Spatial variation in climatic conditions along elevation gradients provides an important backdrop by which communities assemble and diversify. Lowland habitats tend to be connected through time, whereas highlands can be continuously or periodically isolated, conditions that have been hypothesized to promote high levels of species endemism. This tendency is expected to be accentuated among taxa that show niche conservatism within a given climatic envelope.

The effect of DNA degradation bias in passive sampling devices on metabarcoding studies of arthropod communities and their associated microbiota.

PCR amplification bias is a well-known problem in metagenomic analysis of arthropod communities. In contrast, variation of DNA degradation rates is a largely neglected source of bias. Differential degradation of DNA molecules could cause underrepresentation of taxa in a community sequencing sample.

Assessment of acute bowel function after radiotherapy for prostate cancer: Is it accurate enough?

Background And Purpose: Pelvic radiotherapy for prostate cancer can be associated with bowel toxicity, which may have a significant impact on quality of life. Our aim was to assess the adequacy of the tools currently used to assess bowel symptoms after radiotherapy, including physician and patient reported outcomes. This sub-study on acute toxicity was part of a prospective trial assessing long-term bowel dysfunction.

Clinical application of the LARS score: results from a pilot study.

Purpose: The impact of the low anterior resection syndrome (LARS) on quality of life has underscored the importance of measuring functional outcomes after treatment for rectal cancer. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether the LARS score as a single questionnaire was useful enough in the clinical setting.

Methods: Patients treated by curative anterior resection for rectal cancer were sent the LARS score and the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire-Core 30 questionnaires by post.

Condition dependence of male and female genital structures in the seed beetle Callosobruchus maculatus (Coleoptera: Bruchidae).

Theory predicts that costly secondary sexual traits will evolve heightened condition dependence, and many studies have reported strong condition dependence of signal and weapon traits in a variety of species. However, although genital structures often play key roles in intersexual interactions and appear to be subject to sexual or sexually antagonistic selection, few studies have examined the condition dependence of genital structures, especially in both sexes simultaneously. We investigated the responses of male and female genital structures to manipulation of larval diet quality (new versus once-used mung beans) in the bruchid seed beetle Callosobruchus maculatus.

Cheaper is not always worse: strongly protective isolates of a defensive symbiont are less costly to the aphid host.

Defences against parasites are typically associated with costs to the host that contribute to the maintenance of variation in resistance. This also applies to the defence provided by the facultative bacterial endosymbiont Hamiltonella defensa, which protects its aphid hosts against parasitoid wasps while imposing life-history costs. To investigate the cost-benefit relationship within protected hosts, we introduced multiple isolates of H.

Effects of heat shock on resistance to parasitoids and on life history traits in an aphid/endosymbiont system.

Temperature variation is an important factor determining the outcomes of interspecific interactions, including those involving hosts and parasites. This can apply to variation in average temperature or to relatively short but intense bouts of extreme temperature. We investigated the effect of heat shock on the ability of aphids (Aphis fabae) harbouring protective facultative endosymbionts (Hamiltonella defensa) to resist parasitism by Hymenopteran parasitoids (Lysiphlebus fabarum).

Genotype-by-genotype specificity remains robust to average temperature variation in an aphid/endosymbiont/parasitoid system.

Genotype-by-genotype interactions demonstrate the existence of variation upon which selection acts in host-parasite systems at respective resistance and infection loci. These interactions can potentially be modified by environmental factors, which would entail that different genotypes are selected under different environmental conditions. In the current study, we checked for a G × G × E interaction in the context of average temperature and the genotypes of asexual lines of the endoparasitoid wasp Lysiphlebus fabarum and isolates of Hamiltonella defensa, a protective secondary endosymbiont of the wasp's host, the black bean aphid Aphis fabae.

Evolution of male and female genitalia following release from sexual selection.

Despite the key functions of the genitalia in sexual interactions and fertilization, the role of sexual selection and conflict in shaping genital traits remains poorly understood. Seed beetle (Callosobruchus maculatus) males possess spines on the intromittent organ, and females possess a thickened reproductive tract wall that also bears spines. We investigated the role of sexual selection and conflict by imposing monogamous mating on eight replicate populations of this naturally polygamous insect, while maintaining eight other populations under polygamy.

The roles of life-history selection and sexual selection in the adaptive evolution of mating behavior in a beetle.

Although there is continuing debate about whether sexual selection promotes or impedes adaptation to novel environments, the role of mating behavior in such adaptation remains largely unexplored. We investigated the evolution of mating behavior (latency to mating, mating probability and duration) in replicate populations of seed beetles Callosobruchus maculatus subjected to selection on life-history ("Young" vs. "Old" reproduction) under contrasting regimes of sexual selection ("Monogamy" vs.