DISSERTATION RESEARCH: RAD Phylogenetics: Harnessing Next-Generation Sequencing for Molecular Systematics

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DNA sequences are now routinely used to reconstruct the branching evolutionary relationships among species, often displayed graphically as a phylogenetic tree. Phylogenetic trees are often based on just one or a few genetic loci, each representing a very small portion of the full genetic complement of a species. These small samples may produce misleading results due to complications arising from processes such as random genetic drift, natural selection, and hybridization. For some time, it has been recognized that the ideal solution would be to construct phylogenies using a large number of genetic loci sampled throughout the genome, but the cost of this approach has been prohibitive. Using two groups of bird species with different modes of reproduction and rates of speciation, this research will test the efficacy of a new "next-generation" sequencing method as a low-cost solution for recovering and sequencing essentially the same set of thousands of genetic loci from related species.Phylogenetic trees are critical to understanding the phenomenal diversity and evolutionary history of life on earth. The potentially powerful new tool evaluated by this research is likely to be of broad interest as it should be applicable with little or no modification to almost any organism and will produce data sets orders of magnitude larger than in the best current studies.