Phylogeny and beyond: Scientific, historical, and conceptual significance of the first tree of life.
In 1977, Carl Woese and George Fox published a brief paper in PNAS that established, for the first time, that the overall phylogenetic structure of the living world is tripartite. We describe the way in which this monumental discovery was made, its context within the historical development of evolutionary thought, and how it has impacted our understanding of the emergence of life and the characterization of the evolutionary process in its most general form.
Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA. Norman.Pace@colorado.edu
Norman R
NR
Pace
Jan
J
Sapp
Nigel
N
Goldenfeld
D001105:Archaea / Q000235:genetics*; D001419:Bacteria / Q000235:genetics*; D005075:Biological Evolution; D002965:Classification / Q000379:methods; D056890:Eukaryota / Q000235:genetics*; D049673:History, 20th Century; D008829:Microbiology / Q000266:history*; D008967:Molecular Biology / Q000266:history*; D009841:Oligonucleotides / Q000235:genetics; D010802:Phylogeny; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S / Q000235:genetics; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA / Q000379:methods
D009841:Oligonucleotides; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S