Bioinformatics Advance Access originally published online on January 31, 2007
Bioinformatics 2007 23(7):825-831; doi:10.1093/bioinformatics/btm024
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A simulation test bed for hypotheses of genome evolution

1Faculty of Computer Science, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, 2Institute for Molecular Bioscience and ARC Centre for Bioinformatics, Brisbane, Australia and 3GenomeAtlantic, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
*To whom correspondence should be addressed.
| Abstract |
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Motivation: Microbial genomes undergo evolutionary processes such as gene family expansion and contraction, variable rates and patterns of sequence substitution and lateral genetic transfer. Simulation tools are essential for both the generation of data under different evolutionary models and the validation of analytical methods on such data. However, meaningful investigation of phenomena such as lateral genetic transfer requires the simultaneous consideration of many underlying evolutionary processes.
Results: We have developed EvolSimulator, a software package that combines non-stationary sequence and gene family evolution together with models of lateral genetic transfer, within a customizable birth–death model of speciation and extinction. Here, we examine simulated data sets generated with EvolSimulator using existing statistical techniques from the evolutionary literature, showing in detail each component of the simulation strategy.
Availability: Source code, manual and other information are freely available at www.bioinformatics.org.au/evolsim
Contact: beiko{at}cs.dal.ca
Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
Present address: sanofi pasteur, 1755 Steeles Ave. W., Toronto ON, M2R 3T4
Associate Editor: Keith Crandall
Received on August 10, 2006; revised on November 23, 2006; accepted on January 22, 2007
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