Phylogenetic tree building in the genomic age

Knowing phylogenetic relationships among species is fundamental for many studies in biology. An accurate phylogenetic tree underpins our understanding of the major transitions in evolution, such as the emergence of new body plans or metabolism, and is key to inferring the origin of new genes, detecting molecular adaptation, understanding morphological character evolution and reconstructing demographic changes in recently diverged species. Although data are ever more plentiful and powerful analysis methods are available, there remain many challenges to reliable tree building. Here, we discuss the major steps of phylogenetic analysis, including identification of orthologous genes or proteins, multiple sequence alignment, and choice of substitution models and inference methodologies. Understanding the different sources of errors and the strategies to mitigate them is essential for assembling an accurate tree of life. Understanding evolutionary relationships between species requires the generation of accurate phylogenetic trees. In this Review, Kapli, Yang and Telford discuss the principles, steps and computational tools for phylogenetic tree building. They describe the impact of burgeoning genomic datasets as well as the diverse sources of errors and how they can be mitigated.