Polyploidy breaks speciation barriers in Australian burrowing frogs Neobatrachus. by Polina Yu Novikova, Ian G Brennan, William Booker, Michael Mahony, Paul Doughty, Alan R Lemmon, Emily Moriarty Lemmon, J Dale Roberts, Levi Yant, Yves Van de Peer, J Scott Keogh, Stephen C Donnellan

“…Polyploidy has played an important role in evolution across the tree of life but it is still unclear how polyploid lineages may persist after their initial formation. …”
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A comprehensive DNA barcoding reference database for Plecoptera of Switzerland by Laurent Vuataz, Jean-Paul Reding, Alexis Reding, Christian Roesti, Céline Stoffel, Gilles Vinçon, Jean-Luc Gattolliat

“…Despite considerable work to barcode the tree of life, many groups, including insects, remain partially or totally unreferenced, preventing barcoding from reaching its full potential. …”
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Orthology-Based Estimate of the Contribution of Horizontal Gene Transfer from Distantly Related Bacteria to the Intraspecific Diversity and Differentiation of <em>Xylella fastidios... by Giuseppe Firrao, Marco Scortichini, Laura Pagliari

“…Other species, such as <i>Xanthomonas vasicola</i> and <i>Xanthomonas albilineans</i> which were investigated for comparison, did not show a similar genetic contribution from distant branches of the prokaryotic tree of life. This finding indicates that the process of acquisition of DNA from the environment is still a relevant component of <i>Xylella fastidiosa</i> evolution. …”
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An evolutionary paradox on threadsnakes: Phenotypic and molecular evidence reveal a new and remarkably polymorphic species of Siagonodon (Serpentes: Leptotyphlopidae: Epictinae) fr... by Angele Martins, Manuella Folly, Guilherme Nunes Ferreira, Antônio Samuel Garcia da Silva, Claudia Koch, Antoine Fouquet, Alessandra Machado, Ricardo Tadeu Lopes, Roberta Pinto, Miguel Trefaut Rodrigues, Paulo Passos

“…Recent morphological studies—mostly based on µCT data of the skull and lower jaw—have resolved systematic issues within the group, for instance leading to the description of new taxa or re-positioning little-known scolecophidian taxa in the tree of life. Herein we describe a new polymorphic species of the genus Siagonodon from Amazonia based on morphological (external, osteology and hemipenis) and molecular data, and provide the first hemipenial description for the genus. …”
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Shelf life extension and sensory evaluation of birch tree sap using chemical preservatives by Maciej Bilek, Vladímir Vietoris, Vojtech Ilko

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Oral region homologies in paleozoic crinoids and other plesiomorphic pentaradial echinoderms. by Thomas W Kammer, Colin D Sumrall, Samuel Zamora, William I Ausich, Bradley Deline

“…These different types of mouth frame construction offer potential synapomorphies to aid in parsimony-based phylogenetics for exploring branching order among stem groups on the echinoderm tree of life.…”
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Of Retinoids and Organotins: The Evolution of the Retinoid X Receptor in Metazoa by Elza Fonseca, Raquel Ruivo, Débora Borges, João N. Franco, Miguel M. Santos, L. Filipe C. Castro

“…Here, we expand on the phylogenetic distribution of RXR across the metazoan tree of life by exploring multiple next-generation sequencing projects of protostome lineages. …”
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Comparative population genomic analyses of transporters within the Asgard archaeal superphylum. by Steven Russum, Katie Jing Kay Lam, Nicholas Alan Wong, Vasu Iddamsetty, Kevin J Hendargo, Jianing Wang, Aditi Dubey, Yichi Zhang, Arturo Medrano-Soto, Milton H Saier

“…However, the organization of the three-domain tree of life has been challenged following the discovery of archaeal lineages such as the TACK and Asgard superphyla. …”
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Larval assemblages over the abyssal plain in the Pacific are highly diverse and spatially patchy by Oliver Kersten, Eric W. Vetter, Michelle J. Jungbluth, Craig R. Smith, Erica Goetze

“…Recovery of abyssal populations from the impacts of polymetallic nodule mining will be partially determined by the availability and dispersal of pelagic larvae leading to benthic recolonization of disturbed areas of the seafloor. Here we use a tree-of-life (TOL) metabarcoding approach to investigate the species richness, diversity, and spatial variability of the larval assemblage at mesoscales across the abyssal seafloor in two mining-claim areas in the eastern Clarion Clipperton Fracture Zone (CCZ; abyssal Pacific). …”
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Using natural history to guide supervised machine learning for cryptic species delimitation with genetic data by Shahan Derkarabetian, James Starrett, Marshal Hedin

“…The approach also considers the natural history of organisms to make more biologically informed species delimitation decisions, and in principle is broadly applicable for taxa across the tree of life.…”
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Comparative Genomics and Evolutionary Analysis of RNA-Binding Proteins of the CsrA Family in the Genus Pseudomonas by Patricio Martín Sobrero, Claudio Valverde

“…Among them, the members of the CsrA family are small dimeric proteins with heterogeneous distribution across the bacterial tree of life, that act as global regulators of gene expression because they recognize characteristic sequence/structural motifs (short hairpins with GGA triplets in the loop) present in hundreds of mRNAs. …”
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In Honour of Steve and Joyce Fienberg by Natalie Shlomo

“…During this period of preparing for the special issue of the Journal of Privacy and Confidentiality in honour of Steve Fienberg, we received news of the tragic events that occurred at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh on October 27th, 2018 and the sudden senseless death of Joyce Fienberg. …”
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Cavity architecture based modulation of ligand binding tunnels in plant START domains by Sanjeet Kumar Mahtha, Kamlesh Kumari, Vineet Gaur, Gitanjali Yadav

“…The Steroidogenic acute regulatory protein (StAR)-related lipid transfer (START) domain represents an evolutionarily conserved superfamily of lipid transfer proteins widely distributed across the tree of life. Despite significant expansion in plants, knowledge about this domain remains inadequate in plants. …”
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Detecting lateral gene transfers by statistical reconciliation of phylogenetic forests by Daubin Vincent, Gouy Manolo, Tannier Eric, Abby Sophie S

“…We use Prunier on a biological dataset of 23 universal proteins and discuss their suitability for inferring the tree of life.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The ability of Prunier to take into account branch support in the process of reconciliation allows a gain in complexity, in comparison to EEEP, and in accuracy in comparison to RIATA-HGT. …”
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AIR: A batch-oriented web program package for construction of supermatrices ready for phylogenomic analyses by Mevik Bjørn-Helge, Ruden Torgeir, Enger Pål, Orr Russell JS, Skjæveland Åsmund, Kumar Surendra, Burki Fabien, Botnen Andreas, Shalchian-Tabrizi Kamran

“…<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Large multigene sequence alignments have over recent years been increasingly employed for phylogenomic reconstruction of the eukaryote tree of life. Such supermatrices of sequence data are preferred over single gene alignments as they contain vastly more information about ancient sequence characteristics, and are thus more suitable for resolving deeply diverging relationships. …”
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Natriuretic peptides appeared after their receptors in vertebrates by Anna Grandchamp, Shifa Tahir, Philippe Monget

“…Conclusions The present study further support that vertebrate natriuretic peptides appeared after their receptors in the tree of life. We suggest the existence of peptides that resemble natriuretic peptides in non-vertebrate species, that might be the result of convergent evolution.…”
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The challenges faced by living stock collections in the USA by Kevin McCluskey, Kyria Boundy-Mills, Greg Dye, Erin Ehmke, Gregg F Gunnell, Hippokratis Kiaris, Maxi Polihronakis Richmond, Anne D Yoder, Daniel R Zeigler, Sarah Zehr, Erich Grotewold

“…Here, we review some of the contributions made by living stock collections to research across all branches of the tree of life, and outline the challenges they face.…”
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High‐throughput methods for efficiently building massive phylogenies from natural history collections by Ryan A. Folk, Heather R. Kates, Raphael LaFrance, Douglas E. Soltis, Pamela S. Soltis, Robert P. Guralnick

“…Here, we report a high‐throughput collections‐based approach that empowers researchers to explore more branches of the tree of life with numerous loci. Methods We developed an integrated Specimen‐to‐Laboratory Information Management System (SLIMS), connecting sampling and wet lab efforts with progress tracking at each stage. …”
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Does more sequence data improve estimates of galliform phylogeny? Analyses of a rapid radiation using a complete data matrix by Rebecca T. Kimball, Edward L. Braun

“…The resolution of rapid evolutionary radiations or “bushes” in the tree of life has been one of the most difficult and interesting problems in phylogenetics. …”
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Evaluation of weight and appetite of adult wistar rats supplemented with ethanolic leaf extract of Moringa oleifera by Ferdinand Uwaifo

“…Background: Moringa oleifera, also known as “tree of life,” has been used in the treatment of numerous diseases. …”
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