DISSERTATION RESEARCH: The evolutionary history of beryciforms and the contribution of signal and noise to phylogenetic inference in multi-locus datasets

最终导致今天深海鱼类多样性的进化途径仍然知之甚少。Beryciform和stephanoberciform鱼类在其1亿年的历史中多次成功地在近海岸和深海栖息地之间过渡。因此，他们提供了一个特殊的机会，调查与这些极端的栖息地之间的过渡的进化动力学。该项目将提供迄今为止关于这种辐射的最详细的系统发育研究，为今后调查深海鱼类种群多样化的模式和克里思提供必要的基础设施。我们利用这些鱼类作为进一步发展系统发育理论的模型组，也为系统发育实验设计的分子标记筛选制定了新标准。系统发育推断中的一个常见问题涉及在给定研究中使用的基因的选择。这个项目将经验性地描述一个给定的问题的先验筛选标记的效用，并证明不正确的，但强烈支持，推论时，基因座没有仔细检查的潜力。这提出了一个客观的度量，从该度量筛选适用于任何分类组的系统发育问题的序列数据的效用。该项目还为本科生提供生物遗传学、生物信息学和博物馆技术方面的培训，并进一步为博物馆收藏和公共数据库提供标本和数据。

The evolutionary pathways that culminated in the present day diversity of deep sea fishes remain poorly understood. Beryciform and stephanoberyciform fishes have successfully transitioned between near shore and deep-sea habitats multiple times over their 100 million year history. Thus, they provide an exceptional opportunity for investigating the evolutionary dynamics associated with transitions between these extreme habitats. This project will provide the most detailed phylogenetic study of this radiation to date, providing the necessary infrastructure for future investigations into the mode and tempo of diversification across deep-sea fish groups. Our utilization of these fishes as a model group for further developing phylogenetic theory also sets a new standard for the screening of molecular markers for phylogenetic experimental design. A common question in phylogenetic inference concerns the selection of genes to employ in a given study. This project will empirically depict the utility of screening markers for a given question a priori, and demonstrate the potential for incorrect, yet strongly supported, inferences when loci are not carefully scrutinized. This presents an objective metric from which to screen the utility of sequence data for a phylogenetic problem that is applicable to any taxonomic group. This project also provides training in phylogenetics, bioinformatics, and museum techniques to undergraduate students and further contributes specimens and data to museum collections and public databases.