研究人员通过构建包含海绵、栉水母、刺胞动物、双边动物和各种动物近亲序列的大型和高信息量的数据矩阵来检验这些相互矛盾的假设的支持。新的数据矩阵和10个已发表的数据集在785个拓扑测试中进行了分析，主题是整合系统基因组学，一种统一连接和聚结的方法，以识别具有一致系统发育信号的基因。所有490个具有统计学意义的检验都支持海绵姐妹假说，没有一个支持栉水母姐妹假说；其余的295次试验没有得出结论。这些结果为海绵姐妹假说提供了令人信服的证据，并表明整合系统基因组学为解开生命之树上的分支提供了一种简单而有力的方法。
据介绍，确定海绵还是栉水母是动物树的根，对理解早期动物进化具有重要意义。
附：英文原文
Title: Integrative phylogenomics positions sponges at the root of the animal tree
Author: Jacob L. Steenwyk, Nicole King
Issue&Volume: 2025-11-13
Abstract: Determining whether sponges or ctenophores root the animal tree has important implications for understanding early animal evolution. Here, we examined support for these competing hypotheses by constructing large and highly informative data matrices containing sequences from sponges, ctenophores, cnidarians, bilaterians, and diverse animal relatives. The new data matrices and 10 published datasets were analyzed in 785 topology tests conducted using integrative phylogenomics, a method that unifies concatenation and coalescence to identify genes with a consistent phylogenetic signal. All 490 statistically significant tests supported the sponge-sister hypothesis and none supported the ctenophore-sister hypothesis; the remaining 295 tests were inconclusive. These results provide compelling evidence for the sponge-sister hypothesis and suggest that integrative phylogenomics provides a robust and powerful approach for disentangling branches in the tree of life.
DOI: adw9456
Source: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adw9456