title: A likelihood ratio test for species membership based on DNA sequence data.
abstract: DNA barcoding as an approach for species identification is rapidly increasing in popularity. However, it remains unclear which statistical procedures should accompany the technique to provide a measure of uncertainty. Here we describe a likelihood ratio test which can be used to test if a sampled sequence is a member of an a priori specified species. We investigate the performance of the test using coalescence simulations, as well as using the real data from butterflies and frogs representing two kinds of challenge for DNA barcoding: extremely low and extremely high levels of sequence variability.
authors.affiliation: Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience, Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, University of Florida, 9505 Ocean Shore Blvd, Saint Augustine, FL 32080, USA.
authors.forename: Mikhail V
authors.initials: MV
authors.lastname: Matz
authors.forename: Rasmus
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Nielsen
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001001:Anura / Q000235:genetics; D002080:Butterflies / Q000235:genetics; D002965:Classification / Q000379:methods*; D003198:Computer Simulation; D014644:Genetic Variation; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D008957:Models, Genetic; D010802:Phylogeny; D013045:Species Specificity