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In this example, note that terminal nodes snake and lizard are sister taxa. The branches leading to them meet at node 1
(red arrow) to form clade a (red bracket). Likewise, bird and crocodile are sister taxa. They are members of clade b
who share a common ancestor, node 2, that lived more recently than their last common ancestor shared with clade a, which is at
node 3. According to this cladogram, a bird or crocodile are equally closely related to a lizard (or a snake), because they are related
by way of the common ancestor at node 3. Note also that clade a and clade b are sister taxa. One way to think about this
is to consider the snip rule for dividing clade c into
the daughter lineages derived from the common ancestor at node 3. Imagine traveling up each branch from node 3 only a
short distance before snipping. What falls off are the sister taxa: clade a and clade b.
For practice, can you answer the following questions? What is the sister taxon of the turtle? (*). Which node is the last shared common ancestor of mammal and lizard? (*)
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