Relationships of Metazoan Phyla: Advances, Problems, and Approaches hosted by the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Boston in January, 1998

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9707146 MCHUGH The symposium ORelationships of Metazoan Phyla: Advances, Problems, and ApproachesO, to be coordinated by Damhnait McHugh and Kenneth M. Halanych, will be hosted by the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Boston in January, 1998. This symposium will provide a critical assessment of the current state of knowledge about the historical (phylogenetic) relationships among the phyla of animals, especially those that have different body plans. By identifying problems and highlighting different approaches to reconstructing the phylogenetic relationships among animal groups, the symposium will play an important role in directing future research in the field. The two-day schedule includes three keynote addresses and 17 symposium presentations from researchers on topics such as the use of mitochondrial gene arrangements to analyze relationships among animals, the genetic basis for change in animal body plans, the phylogenetic relationships among bilaterally symmetrical animals as assessed by both morphological and molecular evidence, and the possibility that the great increase in the numbers of animal taxa observed in Cambrian-age fossils relative to those in older rocks does not mean that there were fewer animal species before the Cambrian. Symposium proceedings will be published in the journal OAmerican ZoologistO.