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Science 14 December 2001:
Vol. 294. no. 5550, pp. 2348 - 2351
DOI: 10.1126/science.1067179
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Reports

Resolution of the Early Placental Mammal Radiation Using Bayesian Phylogenetics

William J. Murphy,1* Eduardo Eizirik,12* Stephen J. O'Brien,1dagger Ole Madsen,3 Mark Scally,45 Christophe J. Douady,45 Emma Teeling,45 Oliver A. Ryder,6 Michael J. Stanhope,57 Wilfried W. de Jong,38 Mark S. Springer4dagger

Molecular phylogenetic studies have resolved placental mammals into four major groups, but have not established the full hierarchy of interordinal relationships, including the position of the root. The latter is critical for understanding the early biogeographic history of placentals. We investigated placental phylogeny using Bayesian and maximum-likelihood methods and a 16.4-kilobase molecular data set. Interordinal relationships are almost entirely resolved. The basal split is between Afrotheria and other placentals, at about 103 million years, and may be accounted for by the separation of South America and Africa in the Cretaceous. Crown-group Eutheria may have their most recent common ancestry in the Southern Hemisphere (Gondwana).

1 Laboratory of Genomic Diversity, National Cancer Institute, Frederick, MD 21702, USA.
2 Department of Biology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA.
3 Department of Biochemistry, University of Nijmegen, Netherlands.
4 Department of Biology, University of California, Riverside, California 92521, USA.
5 Queen's University of Belfast, Biology and Biochemistry, Belfast, UK.
6 Center for Reproduction of Endangered Species, Zoological Society of San Diego, San Diego, CA 92112, USA.
7 Bioinformatics, GlaxoSmithKline, Collegeville, PA 19426, USA.
8 Institute for Systematics and Population Biology, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
*   These authors contributed equally to this work.

dagger    To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: mark.springer{at}ucr.edu (M.S.S.) or obrien{at}ncifcrf.gov (S.J.O.)

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