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Phylogeny

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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Behavioural Display Systems Across Nine Anolis Lizard Species: Sexual Dimorphisms In Structure And Function, Michele A. Johnson, Juli Wade Jan 2015

Behavioural Display Systems Across Nine Anolis Lizard Species: Sexual Dimorphisms In Structure And Function, Michele A. Johnson, Juli Wade

Michele A Johnson

Relationships between structure and function are a primary focus in biology, yet they are most often considered within individual species. Sexually dimorphic communication behaviours and the morphology of associated structures can vary widely, even among closely related species, and these traits provide an ideal opportunity to investigate the evolution of structure-function patterns. Using nine Anolis lizard species, we addressed a series of questions regarding sex differences in and the evolution of relationships between extension of the throat fan (dewlap) and morphology of the muscles and cartilage controlling it. The main results indicated that within species, males displayed the dewlap more …

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Insights Into The Evolution And Diversification Of The At-Hook Motif Nuclear Localized Gene Family In Land Plants, Jianfei Zhao, David Favero, Jiwen Qiu, Eric Roalson, Michael Neff Dec 2013

Insights Into The Evolution And Diversification Of The At-Hook Motif Nuclear Localized Gene Family In Land Plants, Jianfei Zhao, David Favero, Jiwen Qiu, Eric Roalson, Michael Neff

Jianfei Zhao

Background:
Members of the ancient land-plant-specific transcription factor AT-Hook Motif Nuclear Localized (AHL)
gene family regulate various biological processes. However, the relationships among the AHL genes, as well as their evolutionary history, still remain unexplored.

Results:
We analyzed over 500 AHL genes from 19 land plant species, ranging from the early diverging Physcomitrella
patens and Selaginella to a variety of monocot and dicot flowering plants. We classified the AHL proteins into three types (Type-I/-II/-III) based on the number and composition of their functional domains, the AT-hook motif(s) and PPC domain. We further inferred their phylogenies via Bayesian inference analysis and …

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Phylotastic! Making Tree-Of-Life Knowledge Accessible, Reusable And Convenient, Arlin Stoltzfus, Hilmar Lapp, Helena Deus, Brian Sidlauskas, Christian M. Zmasek, Gaurav Vaidya, Enrico Pontelli, Karen Cranston, Rutger Vos, Campbell O. Webb, Luke J. Harmon, Megan Pirrung, Brian O'Meara, Matthew W. Pennell, Siavash Mirarab, Michael S. Rosenburg, James P. Balhoff, Holly M. Bik, Tracy A. Heath, Peter E. Midford, Joseph W. Brown, Emily Jane Mctavish, Jeet Sukumaran, Mark Westneat, Michael E. Alfaro, Aaron Steele, Greg Jordan Dec 2012

Phylotastic! Making Tree-Of-Life Knowledge Accessible, Reusable And Convenient, Arlin Stoltzfus, Hilmar Lapp, Helena Deus, Brian Sidlauskas, Christian M. Zmasek, Gaurav Vaidya, Enrico Pontelli, Karen Cranston, Rutger Vos, Campbell O. Webb, Luke J. Harmon, Megan Pirrung, Brian O'Meara, Matthew W. Pennell, Siavash Mirarab, Michael S. Rosenburg, James P. Balhoff, Holly M. Bik, Tracy A. Heath, Peter E. Midford, Joseph W. Brown, Emily Jane Mctavish, Jeet Sukumaran, Mark Westneat, Michael E. Alfaro, Aaron Steele, Greg Jordan

Tracy Heath

Background
Scientists rarely reuse expert knowledge of phylogeny, in spite of years ofeffort to assemble a great “Tree of Life” (ToL). A notableexception involves the use of Phylomatic, which provides tools togenerate custom phylogenies from a large, pre-computed, expert phylogeny ofplant taxa. This suggests great potential for a more generalized systemthat, starting with a query consisting of a list of any known species, wouldrectify non-standard names, identify expert phylogenies containing theimplicated taxa, prune away unneeded parts, and supply branch lengths andannotations, resulting in a custom phylogeny suited to the user’sneeds. Such a system could become a sustainable community resource ifimplemented …

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Phylogenetics Of Morus (Moraceae) Inferred From Its And Trnl-Trnf Sequence Data., Madhav Nepal Mar 2012

Phylogenetics Of Morus (Moraceae) Inferred From Its And Trnl-Trnf Sequence Data., Madhav Nepal

Madhav Nepal

Morus (Tribe Moreae, Moraceae) consists of ca. 13 species of trees distributed in Asia, Africa, Europe, and North, Central, and South America. The broad geographical distribution of the genus, overlapping ranges of many taxa, and documented hybridization between some species present interesting questions of taxonomy, phylogeny, and biogeography. Phylogenetic data for Morus also contribute to higher level taxonomic work in the family. We used sequence data from ITS of the nrDNA and the chloroplast trnL-trnF intergenic spacer to study phylogenetic relationships of Morus. Phylogenies based on separate data sets were not statistically incongruent, and the combined tree …

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The Problem With The Paleoptera Problem: Sense And Sensitivity, T. Heath Ogden Dec 2002

The Problem With The Paleoptera Problem: Sense And Sensitivity, T. Heath Ogden

T. Heath Ogden

While the monophyly of winged insects (Pterygota) is well supported, phylogenetic relationships among the most basal extant pterygote lineages are problematic. Ephemeroptera (mayflies) and Odonata (dragonflies) represent the two most basal extant lineages of winged insects, and determining their relationship with regard to Neoptera (remaining winged insects) is a critical step toward understanding insect diversification. A recent molecular analysis concluded that Paleoptera (Odonata +Ephemeroptera) is monophyletic. However, we demonstrate that this result is supported only under a narrow range of alignment parameters. We have further tested the monophyly of Paleoptera using additional sequence data from 18SrDNA, 28S rDNA, and Histone …

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