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On the Number of Binary Characters Needed to Recover a Phylogeny Using Maximum Parsimony

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Abstract

We give an explicit construction to solve a conjecture of Mike Steel and David Penny that any phylogeny involving N taxa can be recovered unambiguously using on the order of log N binary characters and the method of maximum parsimony. Biologically, this means that homoplasy need not be a deterrent to parsimony methods. Some patterns of homoplasy are phylogenetically informative and can exponentially reduce the amount of data needed to resolve a phylogeny.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Indiana University, Bloomington, USA

    Juanjuan Chai & Elizabeth Ann Housworth

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  1. Juanjuan Chai
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  2. Elizabeth Ann Housworth
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Correspondence to Elizabeth Ann Housworth.

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Chai, J., Housworth, E.A. On the Number of Binary Characters Needed to Recover a Phylogeny Using Maximum Parsimony. Bull Math Biol 73, 1398–1411 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11538-010-9579-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11538-010-9579-3

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