Proving universal common ancestry with similar sequences

Leonardo de Oliveira Martins; David Posada

doi:10.4081/eb.2012.e5

Editorials & Commentaries

9 May 2012

Vol. 4 No. 1 (2012)

https://doi.org/10.4081/eb.2012.e5

Proving universal common ancestry with similar sequences

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tree of life, model selection, common ancestry,

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Authors

Leonardo de Oliveira Martins

leomrtns@uvigo.es

Department of Biochemistry, Genetics and Immunology, University of Vigo, Spain.

David Posada

Department of Biochemistry, Genetics and Immunology, University of Vigo, Spain.

Douglas Theobald recently developed an interesting test putatively capable of quantifying the evidence for a Universal Common Ancestry uniting the three domains of life (Eukarya, Archaea and Bacteria) against hypotheses of Independent Origins for some of these domains. We review here his model, in particular in relation to the treatment of Horizontal Gene Transfer and to the quality of sequence alignment.