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The history of life

Nature Genetics volume 28, pages 197–198 (2001)Cite this article

The story of phylogenetics

Before focusing on the most recent work, we must establish a perspective by ascending to the shoulders of giants. For over a century, microbiologists have struggled to analyze and to classify microorganisms in a natural system (an evolutionary and historical framework), as zoologists and botanists were doing in their fields. Yet, through the 1960s the new data and new tools of molecular phylogeny were largely focused on macro- (not micro-) organisms, in part because the relative wealth of morphological, developmental and fossil data provided a reality check; although there were complications and many arguments in the field, work in the 1960s showed that molecular phylogenies made basic sense. Nearly 30 years ago, Carl Woese4 recognized the potential of molecular phylogeny to microbiologists, who are faced not only with a paucity of traditional data, but must also confront the drift and innovation that accompany a history 20–30 times as long as that of mammals or flowering plants.

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  1. Department of Microbiology and Center for Biophysics and Computational Biology, University of Illinois, Urbana, 61801, Illinois, USA

    Gary J. Olsen

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  1. Gary J. Olsen
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Olsen, G. The history of life. Nat Genet 28, 197–198 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/90014

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