title: Reconstruction of phylogenetic trees using the ant colony optimization paradigm.
abstract: We developed a new approach for the reconstruction of phylogenetic trees using ant colony optimization metaheuristics. A tree is constructed using a fully connected graph and the problem is approached similarly to the well-known traveling salesman problem. This methodology was used to develop an algorithm for constructing a phylogenetic tree using a pheromone matrix. Two data sets were tested with the algorithm: complete mitochondrial genomes from mammals and DNA sequences of the p53 gene from several eutherians. This new methodology was found to be superior to other well-known softwares, at least for this data set. These results are very promising and suggest more efforts for further developments.
authors.affiliation: Laboratório de Bioinformática/CPGEI, Centro Federal de Educação Tecnológica do Paraná, CEFET-PR, Curitiba, PR, Brazil.
authors.forename: Mauricio
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Perretto
authors.forename: Heitor Silvério
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Lopes
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D000818:Animals; D001000:Ants / Q000235:genetics; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial / Q000235:genetics; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D016158:Genes, p53 / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D008322:Mammals; D010675:Pheromones / Q000235:genetics; D010802:Phylogeny
chemical_list: D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial; D010675:Pheromones