Reading the entrails of chickens: molecular timescales of evolution and the illusion of precision.

By Dan-Ovidiu Graur, William F. Martin. Trends in Genetics, 2004

662 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Subfields: Animal Science and Zoology, Molecular Biology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9d15e73141f9746812bf90c7d3dafb2235d06205

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Citations in the corpus

The role of the uplift of the Qinghai‐Tibetan Plateau for the evolution of Tibetan biotas (2015, background): “Potential errors from the original analysis may, however, be propagated to the second analysis, and thus should be interpreted with the necessary care (Graur & Martin, 2004; Renner, 2005).”
The Logic of Chance: The Nature and Origin of Biological Evolution (2011, background): “Molecular dating of evolutionary divergence events is a highly specialized research field, with many difficult technical problems (Bromham and Penny, 2003; Graur and Martin, 2004).”
Phylogeographic patterning in a freshwater crab species (Decapoda: Potamonautidae: Potamonautes) reveals the signature of historical climatic oscillations (2006, neutral): “Nevertheless, a cautionary approach should be undertaken when using molecular clock calibrations (Graur & Martin, 2004).”
The emerging field of geogenomics: Constraining geological problems with genetic data (2014, background): “…sampling variance (e.g., sampling some but not all species within a clade), evolutionary variance (i.e., the variance resulting from the evolutionary process, see Nei, 1987), and variance associated with age of the fossil or biogeographic events used for calibration (Graur and Martin, 2004).”
The Basal Penguin (Aves: Sphenisciformes) Perudyptes devriesi and a Phylogenetic Evaluation of the Penguin Fossil Record (2010, background): “Secondary calibrations have been widely criticized for methodological inconsistencies that may lead to erroneous estimates and artificially narrow envelopes of uncertainty (e.g., Shaul and Graur, 2002; Graur and Martin, 2004).”
The resurrection of oceanic dispersal in historical biogeography. (2005, background): “Molecular dating analyses have been criticized for a variety of reasons, including calibrations using suspect fossil dates, violation of the molecular clock assumption, absence of confidence intervals, and use of inappropriate taxa [ 32 ].”
Congeneric phylogeography: hypothesizing species limits and evolutionary processes in Patagonian lizards of the Liolaemus boulengeri group (Squamata: Liolaemini) (2006, background): “…a range of estimates for cytochrome b for other reptiles of 0.5–1.4% pairwise substitutions per million years (Giannasi, 1997; Zamudio & Green, 1997; Malhotra & Thorpe, 2000), the separation of these two groups is at least 1.2 Mya and as old as 3.5 Mya, but with caveats (Graur & Martin, 2004).”
Using regional comparative phylogeographic data from snake lineages to infer historical processes in Middle America (2010, methodology): “…is that we can first optimize rates using a Bayesian approach and obtain an ultrametric tree that relies only on the evolutionary process (and fitting of the relaxed clock model) and is unaffected by the uncertainty of the fossil record and other calibrations (Graur and Martin 2004, Heads 2005).”
Diversification of Neoaves: integration of molecular sequence data and fossils (2006, neutral): “Two palaeognaths (Rhea and Apteryx), one megapode and one screamer, were used as outgroups following the well-established hypothesis that Palaeognathae are the sister taxon of Neognathae, and that Galloanseres, in turn, are the sisters of Neoaves (Groth & Barrowclough 1999).”
Biogeographic history of the butterfly subtribe Euptychiina (Lepidoptera, Nymphalidae, Satyrinae) (2010, background): “Wider intervals are expected when employing secondary calibration points (Graur & Martin 2004).”
Are the Northern Andes a species pump for Neotropical birds? Phylogenetics and biogeography of a clade of Neotropical tanagers (Aves: Thraupini) (2010, neutral): “Moreover, the assumption that the mtDNA evolutionary rate for a particular group of birds is the same as the rate for a group with a good calibration is questionable (Graur & Martin, 2004; Lovette, 2004; Ho & Larson, 2006; Peterson, 2006).”
Did geckos ride the Palawan raft to the Philippines? (2012, methodology): “We recognize that any approach using secondary calibration points is subject to a variety of sources of error (Graur & Martin, 2004).”
The origin(s) of extant amphibians: a review with emphasis on the “lepospondyl hypothesis” (2013, methodology): “To use such a date as a calibration point for molecular divergence dating is suboptimal (e.g., Graur & Martin 2004).”
Phylogeography and species limits in the Gymnodactylus darwinii complex (Gekkonidae, Squamata): genetic structure coincides with river systems in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest (2005, background): “We are aware of the potential problems of using molecular clock estimates, the large error terms (Graur & Martin, 2004), and the uncertainty about which rates are more appropriate for a given group of organisms in the absence of external data for calibration.”