Abstract
Previous DNA-based phylogenetic studies of the Delphinidae family suggest it has undergone rapid diversification, as characterised by unresolved and poorly supported taxonomic relationships (polytomies) for some of the species within this group. Using an increased amount of sequence data we test between alternative hypotheses of soft polytomies caused by rapid speciation, slow evolutionary rate and/or insufficient sequence data, and hard polytomies caused by simultaneous speciation within this family. Combining the mitogenome sequences of five new and 12 previously published species within the Delphinidae, we used Bayesian and maximum-likelihood methods to estimate the phylogeny from partitioned and unpartitioned mitogenome sequences. Further ad hoc tests were then conducted to estimate the support for alternative topologies.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 65 |
Journal | BMC Evolutionary Biology |
Volume | 11 |
Number of pages | 10 |
ISSN | 1471-2148 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2011 |
Keywords
- Animals
- Bayes Theorem
- DNA, Mitochondrial
- Dolphins
- Evolution, Molecular
- Genome, Mitochondrial
- High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing
- Likelihood Functions
- Phylogeny
- Sequence Analysis, DNA