15 Phylogeny and Systematics

Description: Principles of Evolution, Ecology and Behavior (EEB 122) The Tree of Life must be discovered through rigorous analysis. Genetic information is crucial because appearances can be deceiving, and species that look similar can prove to be genetically very dissimilar and not share recent common ancestors. Two criteria, used to determine what the "correct" Tree is, are simplicity and whether the tree maximizes the probability of observing what we actually see. Complete course materials are available at the Open Yale Courses website: open.yale.edu This course was recorded in Spring 2009.