Teaching

Accurate reconstructions of evolutionary relationships is the cornerstone of evolutionary biology. Building phylogenetic trees thus provides the fundamental framework upon which systematic, biogeographic, and evolutionary research operates. Given that the vast majority of the species that have ever lived are now extinct, morphological phylogenetics remains central to these endeavors. Furthermore, combining fossils with molecular data from extant species has proved to be the most comprehensive method of understanding evolutionary processes across deep time, as well as dating the times of origin of major lineages.

In this course, we will focus on the analysis of morphological data (alone and in combination with molecular data) using multiple optimality criteria for phylogenetic inference. We will discuss the best available approaches to construct morphological data sets and their downstream impacts. We will follow with theory and hands-on practice of phylogenetic programs using maximum parsimony, maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference. Participants will learn how to combine morphological and molecular data for total evidence analyses, how to perform divergence time estimation using tip and node dating techniques, different birth-death models, and relaxed clocks models.