Overall pan-genomic background substitution rate

Range birds ~0.0019: mammals ~0.0027 substitutions/site/million years
Organism Vertebrates
Reference Zhang G et al., Comparative genomics reveals insights into avian genome evolution and adaptation. Science. 2014 Dec 12 346(6215):1311-20. doi: 10.1126/science.1251385 p.1315 left column bottom paragraphPubMed ID25504712
Method Abstract: "[Investigators] explored bird macroevolution using full genomes from 48 avian species representing all major extant clades."
Comments P.1315 left column bottom paragraph: "Genomic nucleotide substitution rates vary across species and are determined through both neutral and adaptive evolutionary processes (ref 43). [Investigators] found that the overall pan-genomic background substitution rate in birds (~1.9 × 10^–3 substitutions per site per million years) was lower than in mammals (~2.7 × 10^–3 substitution per site per million years) (Fig. 3A). However, the substitution rate estimates also exhibited interordinal variation among birds (Fig. 3A). There was a positive correlation between the substitution rate and the number of species per order [coefficient of determination (R^2) = 0.21, P = 0.01, Pearson’s test with phylogenetically independent contrasts] (Fig. 3B and fig. S19), evidencing an association with rates of macroevolution (ref 44)."
Entered by Uri M
ID 117106