Skip to main content
Fig. 3 | BMC Ecology and Evolution

Fig. 3

From: Odorant-binding proteins in canine anal sac glands indicate an evolutionarily conserved role in mammalian chemical communication

Fig. 3

Evolutionary history of the obp gene repertoire in placental mammals. The taxonomic diversification of placental mammals is depicted here as a timetree (thick light grey branches) with divergence times inferred from ref. 84 (see “Methods”). Obp gene lineages are drawn as thin branches superimposed on the timetree with gene duplication events and gene losses along branches depicted as vertical bars (I) and crosses (X), respectively. Ancestral and extant gene repertoires are schematically shown at key internal nodes and terminal nodes respectively. Red and blue branches and genes represent two paralogous gene lineages that descended from a gene duplication inferred at the base of the placental radiation, in the ancestor of Euarchontoglires and Laurasiatheria. Probable pseudogenes are coloured in lighter shades. The reconstruction was obtained by reconciling an estimated gene tree with the mammalian timetree while inferring the lowest possible number of gene duplication events and losses. As a gene tree, we used a consensus phylogram from Bayesian and nonparametric bootstrapping analyses in which weakly supported branches (posterior probabilities < 0.9 and bootstrap percentages < 70%) were allowed to be rearranged if this reduced the number of inferred gene duplication events and losses. An alternative reconstruction in which such rearrangements were not allowed is shown in Additional file 6

Back to article page