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Zoological Research
Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
ISSN: 2095-8137
Vol. 30, No. 3, 2009, pp. 225-232
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Bioline Code: zr09036
Full paper language: Chinese
Document type: Research Article
Document available free of charge
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Zoological Research, Vol. 30, No. 3, 2009, pp. 225-232
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Phylogenetic Relationships Among Species Subgroups in the Drosophila saltans Group (Diptera: Drosophilidae): Can Morphology Solve a Molecular Conflict?
Yassin, Amir
Abstract
Proper phylogenetic reconstruction is crucial for understanding many evolutionary phenomena. In spite of the great success of molecular phylogenetics, DNA signal still may be limited by some intrinsic constraints such as codon usage bias. The phylogenetic relationships between the five species subgroups of the Drosophila saltans group are a good example of conflicting molecular phylogenies drawn from different genes due to an ancestral substitutional shift. Here, forty morphological characters were analyzed using the same set of species used in previous molecular studies, with at least a single representative of each subgroup. The cladistic analysis was in disagreement with most of the previous hypotheses in placing the sturtevanti subgroup as an early branch, whereas the four remaining subgroups form a well supported clade that can be further subdivided into two sister clades: one containing the cordata and the elliptica subgroups, whereas the second includes the parasaltans and the saltans subgroups. The molecular evolution (codon usage bias) of the saltans group were revised in light of the present finding. The analysis highlights the important role of morphology in phylogeny reconstruction and in understanding molecular evolutionary phenomena.
Keywords
Sophophora ;Codon usage bias; Neotropical region; Cladistics
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© Copyright 2009 Kunming Institute of Zoology, the Chinese Academy of Sciences Alternative site location: http://www.zoores.ac.cn/
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