k8hertweck
commented
7 years ago Thank you for your lightning talk submission. We've included you on the list of presenters for June 23, 10:30am-noon. Please come prepared to load your 5-minute talk onto the presenting computer during the coffee break (10-10:30), as iEvoBio does not use the talk submission tool associated with the rest of the Evolution conference. Please let us know if you have any questions!
jhill1
Authors: Jon Hill, Katie E. Davis
Abstract: Constructing accurate, large phylogenies is time-consuming and onerous. In particular, the data needs processing and carefully cross-checking to remove synonyms, mis-spellings, outgroup taxa, etc. Manually checking the operation taxonomic units (OTUs) is an error-prone task in particular. However, Application Programming Interfaces do exist for a number of online taxonomic databases, including Encyclopedia of Life, World Register of Marine Species and Integrated Taxonomic Information Service. It is possible to automatically download taxonomic information from these and use these data to automatically check the OTUs in phylogenetic construction. Here, we will show how these data can be used to automatically process data when constructing phylogenies via supertree methods. We evaluate the performance of these methods on a diverse range of taxonomic groups, including oscine songbirds, bumblebees, achelatan lobsters and cockroaches/termites. We show that different taxonomic databases can produce similar phylogenies, but they differ in detail. The methods describe show that it will be possible to automatically construct large phylogenies with minimal human input.