Genomic SNPs resolve the phylogeny of an ancient amphibian island radiation from the Seychelles.

Unusually for oceanic islands, the granitic Seychelles host multiple lineages of endemic amphibians. This includes an ancient (likely ca. 60 million years) radiation of eight caecilian species, most of which occur on multiple islands.

The biogeographic history of neosuchian crocodiles and the impact of saltwater tolerance variability.

Extant neosuchian crocodiles are represented by only 24 taxa that are confined to the tropics and subtropics. However, at other intervals during their 200 Myr evolutionary history the clade reached considerably higher levels of species-richness, matched by more widespread distributions. Neosuchians have occupied numerous habitats and niches, ranging from dwarf riverine forms to large marine predators.

Patient-reported outcomes in vasculitis.

Systemic vasculitis encompasses a group of multisystem disorders; both the diseases and the treatment strategies can have a significant impact on a patient's health-related quality of life (HRQoL). Using patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) and patient-reported experience measures (PREMs) to evaluate the patient's view of their condition, treatments, and healthcare journey is essential to the patient-centered care approach. In this paper, we discuss the use of generic, disease-specific, and treatment-specific PROMs and PREMs in systemic vasculitis and future research goals.

Lifestyle coaching is feasible in fatigued brain tumor patients: A phase I/feasibility, multi-center, mixed-methods randomized controlled trial.

Background: There are no effective treatments for brain tumor-related fatigue. We studied the feasibility of two novel lifestyle coaching interventions in fatigued brain tumor patients.

Methods: This phase I/feasibility multi-center RCT recruited patients with a clinically stable primary brain tumor and significant fatigue (mean Brief Fatigue Inventory [BFI] score ≥ 4/10).

Interventions for preventing and ameliorating cognitive deficits in adults treated with cranial irradiation.

Background: Cognitive deficits are common in people who have received cranial irradiation and have a serious impact on daily functioning and quality of life. The benefit of pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment of cognitive deficits in this population is unclear. This is an updated version of the original Cochrane Review published in Issue 12, 2014.

Interventions for the management of fatigue in adults with a primary brain tumour.

Background: Fatigue is a common and disabling symptom in people with a primary brain tumour (PBT). The effectiveness of interventions for treating clinically significant levels of fatigue in this population is unclear. This is an updated version of the original Cochrane Review published in Issue 4, 2016.

The state of the art-psoriatic arthritis outcome assessment in clinical trials and daily practice.

Psoriatic arthritis is a heterogeneous condition with substantial challenges in optimising outcome measures for both clinical trials and daily practice. As with other inflammatory arthritides, there is no gold standard instrument for measuring disease activity or impact, both of which are key to evaluate therapeutic approaches in trials and monitor disease in daily practice. A wide range of domains have been highlighted in the Outcome Measures in Rheumatology (OMERACT) core domain set for psoriatic arthritis; reflecting the disease involvement in multiple tissues (joints, tendons, skin, and spine) and the heterogenous impact of the disease on individuals.

Molecular phylogenetics of sub-Saharan African natricine snakes, and the biogeographic origins of the Seychelles endemic Lycognathophis seychellensis.

Phylogenetic relationships of sub-Saharan African natricine snakes are understudied and poorly understood, which in turn has precluded analyses of the historical biogeography of the Seychelles endemic Lycognathophis seychellensis. We inferred the phylogenetic relationships of Seychelles and mainland sub-Saharan natricines by analysing a multilocus DNA sequence dataset for three mitochondrial (mt) and four nuclear (nu) genes. The mainland sub-Saharan natricines and L.

Adaptation of the carbamoyl-phosphate synthetase enzyme in an extremophile fish.

Tetrapods and fish have adapted distinct carbamoyl-phosphate synthase (CPS) enzymes to initiate the ornithine urea cycle during the detoxification of nitrogenous wastes. We report evidence that in the ureotelic subgenus of extremophile fish , CPS III has undergone convergent evolution and adapted its substrate affinity to ammonia, which is typical of terrestrial vertebrate CPS I. Unusually, unlike in other vertebrates, the expression of CPS III in is localized to the skeletal muscle and is activated in the myogenic lineage during early embryonic development with expression remaining in mature fish.

The roles of vicariance and isolation by distance in shaping biotic diversification across an ancient archipelago: evidence from a Seychelles caecilian amphibian.

Background: Island systems offer excellent opportunities for studying the evolutionary histories of species by virtue of their restricted size and easily identifiable barriers to gene flow. However, most studies investigating evolutionary patterns and processes shaping biotic diversification have focused on more recent (emergent) rather than ancient oceanic archipelagos. Here, we focus on the granitic islands of the Seychelles, which are unusual among island systems because they have been isolated for a long time and are home to a monophyletic radiation of caecilian amphibians that has been separated from its extant sister lineage for ca.

The toad's warts: Discordance creates bumpy expectations of mitochondrial-nuclear evolution between species.

Discordance between the mitochondrial and nuclear genomes is a prevalent phenomenon in nature, in which the underlying processes responsible are considered to be important in shaping genetic variation in natural populations. Among the evolutionary processes that best explain such genomic mismatches incomplete lineage sorting and introgression are commonly identified, however, many studies are unable to distinguish between these hypotheses, which has become a major challenge in the field. In this issue of Molecular Ecology, Firneno et al.

A comprehensive molecular phylogeny of Afrotropical white-eyes (Aves: Zosteropidae) highlights prior underestimation of mainland diversity and complex colonisation history.

White-eyes (Zosterops) are a hyper-diverse genus of passerine birds that have rapidly radiated across the Afrotropics and Southeast Asia. Despite their broad range, a disproportionately large number of species are currently recognised from islands compared to the mainland. Described species-level diversity of this 'great speciator' from continental Africa-Arabia is strikingly low, despite the vast size and environmental complexity of this region.

Akt Phosphorylates NQO1 and Triggers its Degradation, Abolishing Its Antioxidative Activities in Parkinson's Disease.

The oxidative metabolism of dopamine and consequent oxidative stress are implicated in dopaminergic neuronal loss, mediating the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease (PD). The inducible detoxifying antioxidative enzyme Quinone oxidoreductase (NQO1) (NAD(P)H: quinone oxidoreductase 1), neuroprotective to counteract reactive oxidative species, is most prominent in the active stage of the disease and virtually absent at the end stage of the disease. However, the molecular mechanism dictating NQO1 expression oscillation remains unclear.

Comprehensive analysis of serum tumor markers and BRCA1/2 germline mutations in Chinese ovarian cancer patients.

Background: The serum tumor markers has been widely used in ovarian cancer diagnosis. BRCA1/2 germline mutations are the most common predisposing factors for ovarian cancer development. This study aimed to comprehensively investigate serum tumor markers and BRCA1/2 germline mutations and analyze their associations with ovarian cancer.

Prevalence and spectrum of AKT1, PIK3CA, PTEN and TP53 somatic mutations in Chinese breast cancer patients.

Breast cancer, one of the most frequently occurring cancers worldwide, is the leading cause of cancer-related death among women. AKT1, PIK3CA, PTEN and TP53 mutations were common observed in breast cancer representing potential clinical biomarkers for cancer classification and treatment. A comprehensive knowledge of AKT1, PIK3CA, PTEN and TP53 mutations in breast cancer was still insufficient in Chinese population.

Contrasting geographic structure in evolutionarily divergent Lake Tanganyika catfishes.

Geographic isolation is suggested to be among the most important processes in the generation of cichlid fish diversity in East Africa's Great Lakes, both through isolation by distance and fluctuating connectivity caused by changing lake levels. However, even broad scale phylogeographic patterns are currently unknown in many non-cichlid littoral taxa from these systems. To begin to address this, we generated restriction-site-associated DNA sequence (RADseq) data to investigate phylogeographic structure throughout Lake Tanganyika (LT) in two broadly sympatric rocky shore catfish species from independent evolutionary radiations with differing behaviors: the mouthbrooding claroteine, , and the brood-parasite mochokid, .

Diversification of clearwing butterflies with the rise of the Andes.

Aim: Despite the greatest butterfly diversity on Earth occurring in the Neotropical Andes and Amazonia, there is still keen debate about the origins of this exceptional biota. A densely sampled calibrated phylogeny for a widespread butterfly subtribe, Oleriina (Nymphalidae: Ithomiini) was used to estimate the origin, colonization history and diversification of this species-rich group.

Location: Neotropics.

Next-Generation Mitogenomics: A Comparison of Approaches Applied to Caecilian Amphibian Phylogeny.

Mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) sequences are being generated with increasing speed due to the advances of next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology and associated analytical tools. However, detailed comparisons to explore the utility of alternative NGS approaches applied to the same taxa have not been undertaken. We compared a 'traditional' Sanger sequencing method with two NGS approaches (shotgun sequencing and non-indexed, multiplex amplicon sequencing) on four different sequencing platforms (Illumina's HiSeq and MiSeq, Roche's 454 GS FLX, and Life Technologies' Ion Torrent) to produce seven (near-) complete mitogenomes from six species that form a small radiation of caecilian amphibians from the Seychelles.