Stochastic Models for Phylogenetic Trees

These pages form a complement to a project (with Lea Popovic and Maxim Krikun) we call Coherent Stochastic Models for Macroevolution. Part of the idea is that the behavior of higher-order taxa (genera, families etc) should emerge from a species-level model rather than being modeled directly.

Overview of project: model and results.

There exists a 2004 draft document (PDF) covering the whole project. This is not intended for publication as is, but will be made into 3 papers. The first, A critical branching process model for biodiversity, deals with the species-level model. One aspect of the model we emphasize is that qualitative behavior of different realizations can appear quite different: see our picture gallery of simulations. The second, Stochastic Models for Phylogenetic Trees on Higher-order Taxa , describes a way to combine the species-level model with schemes for classifying species into genera, and starts analytic study of the resulting trees on genera.