BIOL 1510 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Polyphyly, Thumb, Paraphyly
Document Summary
Phylogenetic trees phylogenetic tree: is a visual representation of the relationship between different organisms, showing the path through evolutionary time from a common ancestor to different descendants. Trees can represent relationships ranging from the entire history of life on earth, down to individuals in a population. bifurcating tree. The vertical lines represent a lineage nodes: are where they diverge, representing a speciation event from a common ancestor. The trunk at the base of the tree. The root node represents the most recent common ancestor of all of the taxa represented on the tree. Time is also represented, proceeding from the oldest at the bottom to the most recent at the top. What this particular tree tells us is that taxon a and taxon b are more closely related to each other than either taxon is to taxon c. The reason is that taxon a and taxon b share a more recent common ancestor than they do with taxon c.
