title: Mitogenomics at the base of Metazoa.
abstract: Unraveling the base of metazoan evolution is of crucial importance for rooting the metazoan Tree of Life. This subject has attracted substantial attention for more than a century and recently fueled a burst of modern phylogenetic studies. Conflicting scenarios from different studies and incongruent results from nuclear versus mitochondrial markers challenge current molecular phylogenetic approaches. Here we analyze the presently most comprehensive data sets of mitochondrial genomes from non-bilaterian animals to illuminate the phylogenetic relationships among early branching metazoan phyla. The results of our analyses illustrate the value of mitogenomics and support previously known topologies between animal phyla but also identify several problematic taxa, which are sensitive to long branch artifacts or missing data.
authors.affiliation: Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover, ITZ, Ecology and Evolution, Buenteweg 17d, D-30559 Hannover, Germany. Electronic address: h.j.osigus@ecolevol.de.
authors.forename: Hans-Jürgen
authors.initials: HJ
authors.lastname: Osigus
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Eitel
authors.forename: Matthias
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bernt
authors.forename: Alexander
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Donath
authors.forename: Bernd
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Schierwater
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003063:Cnidaria / Q000145:classification; D037302:Ctenophora / Q000145:classification; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D054629:Genome, Mitochondrial; D008957:Models, Genetic; D010802:Phylogeny; D054909:Placozoa / Q000145:classification; D011161:Porifera / Q000145:classification; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
keywords: Cnidaria; Ctenophora; Deep metazoan phylogeny; Mitochondrial genomes; Placozoa; Porifera