BSC 2010 Chapter Notes - Chapter 16: Binomial Nomenclature, Molecular Clock, Linnaean Taxonomy
3 Apr 2017
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Concept 16. 1 all of life is connected through its evolutionary history. The sequencing of complete genomes from many diverse species has confirmed what biologists have long suspected; all of life is related through a common ancestor. The evolutionary history of these relationships is known as a phylogeny and a phylogenetic tree is a diagrammatic reconstruction of that history. Phylogenetic trees are commonly used to depict the evolutionary history of species, populations and genes. A series of ancestors and descendant populations forms a lineage which we can depict as a line drawn on a time axis. When a single lineage divides into two, we depict such as event as a split, or a node, in the phylogenetic tree. The common ancestor of all the organisms in the tree forms the root of the tree. Left is earliest and right is most recent.
