Transcriptome sequencing reveals genome-wide variation in molecular evolutionary rate among ferns

Orthogroup data file. Zipped folder containing fasta-formatted reads identified by ProteinOrtho, used for all downstream orthogroup determination and analysis, along with readme document and relevant project-specific scripts (also available online via Dryad: http://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.rg22j ). (ZIP 12021 kb

Applications of deep convolutional neural networks to digitized natural history collections

Natural history collections contain data that are critical for many scientific endeavors. Recent efforts in mass digitization are generating large datasets from these collections that can provide unprecedented insight. Here, we present examples of how deep convolutional neural networks can be applied in analyses of imaged herbarium specimens. We first demonstrate that a convolutional neural network can detect mercury-stained specimens across a collection with 90% accuracy. We then show that such a network can correctly distinguish two morphologically similar plant families 96% of the time. Discarding the most challenging specimen images increases accuracy to 94% and 99%, respectively. These results highlight the importance of mass digitization and deep learning approaches and reveal how they can together deliver powerful new investigative tools

Sex and the Single Gametophyte: Revising the Homosporous Vascular Plant Life Cycle in Light of Contemporary Research

Homosporous vascular plants are typically depicted as extreme inbreeders, with bisexual gametophytes that produce strictly homozygous sporophytes. This view is promulgated in textbook life cycles despite ample evidence that natural populations of most species regularly outcross. We review research on a variety of mechanisms, including genetic load, asynchronous production of eggs and sperm, and pheromonal control of gamete production, that actively promote heterozygosity in ferns and lycophytes. Evolution of the land plants cannot be reconstructed without accurate depictions of the unique life cycle that has helped make ferns the second most diverse lineage of vascular plants on Earth. With revised illustrations and definitions, we provide scientists, educators, and students with a contemporary understanding of fern and lycophyte reproduction, revealing them as evolutionarily dynamic and exploiting a wide range of mating systems

SI_Appendix1

PAMLparser, a Python script for organizing PAML outputs (from both CODEML and BASEML) and reformated them in tab-delimited files

nucleotide_all_data

Nexus file for nucleotide-model based analyes (including a block of recoded indels)

SI_Table1

Primers used in amplification and sequencing

Data from: Accelerated rate of molecular evolution for vittarioid ferns is strong and not due to selection

Molecular evolutionary rate heterogeneity—the violation of a molecular clock—is a prominent feature of many phylogenetic datasets. It has particular importance to systematists not only because of its biological implications, but also for its practical effects on our ability to infer and date evolutionary events. Here we show, using both maximum likelihood and Bayesian approaches, that a remarkably strong increase in substitution rate in the vittarioid ferns is consistent across the nuclear and plastid genomes. Contrary to some expectations, this rate increase is not due to selective forces; the vittarioids bear no signature of the change in the relative strengths of selection and drift that one would expect if the rate increase was caused by altered fixation rates. Instead, the substitution rate increase appears to stem from an elevated supply of mutations, perhaps limited to the vittarioid ancestral branch. This generalized rate increase is accompanied by extensive fine-scale heterogeneity in rates across loci, genomes, and taxa. Our analyses demonstrate the power and flexibility of trait-free investigations of rate heterogeneity within a model selection framework, emphasize the importance of explicit tests for signatures of selection prior to invoking selection-related or demography-based explanations for patterns of rate variation, and illustrate some unexpected nuances in the behavior of relaxed clock methods for modeling rate heterogeneity, with implications for our ability to confidently date divergence events. In addition, our data provide strong support for the monophylly of Adiantum, and for the position of Calciphilopteris in the cheilanthoid ferns, two relationships for which convincing support was previously lacking