Identifying dramatic selection shifts in phylogenetic trees.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The rate of evolution varies spatially along genomes and temporally in time. The presence of evolutionary rate variation is an informative signal that often marks functional regions of genomes and historical selection events. There exist many tests for temporal rate variation, or heterotachy, that start by partitioning sampled sequences into two or more groups and testing rate homogeneity among the groups. I develop a Bayesian method to infer phylogenetic trees with a divergence point, or dramatic temporal shifts in selection pressure that affect many nucleotide sites simultaneously, located at an unknown position in the tree.

Results

Simulation demonstrates that the method is most able to detect divergence points when rate variation and the number of affected sit

SUBMITTER: Dorman KS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1796604 | biostudies-literature | 2007 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature