Lindell Bromham

Research Group

Research Topics

Can we trust the molecular clock?

The use of genetic data to investigate evolutionary history is revolutionizing biology, across fields ranging from the origin of animals over half a billion years ago to the emergence of new viral diseases. But if the rate of molecular evolution can vary between species, can we trust molecular date estimates? I use a comparative approach to investigate aspects of a species biology, ecology or evolution that might influence rates of molecular evolution - such as body size, population size, social structure, rate of adaptation, speciation rate - in order to identify cases when molecular dates might be consistently error-prone.

Tempo and mode of animal body plan evolution

The sudden appearance of animal phyla in the fossil record in the early Cambrian has generated many theories of how such an apparently large amount of evolutionary change could occur in what appears to be a relatively short time. The description of key developmental genes that play fundamental roles in shaping phenotype have led to new ideas about the evolution of animal body plans. The increasing number of species for which genetic and developmental data is available allows these hypotheses about animal evolution to be tested in a phylogenetic context.

Recent Publications

Bromham L (2008) Reading the story in DNA: a beginner’s guide to molecular evolution. Oxford University Press. WEBSITE.

Lanfear R, Bromham L. (2008) Statistical Tests Between Competing Hypotheses of Hox Cluster Evolution. Systematic Biology in press PDF Supplementary Info

Bromham L (2008) Teaching evolutionary biology in schools can enhance critical thinking and active learning skills in preparation for university and life-long learning. School Science Review in press.

Bromham L (2008) Molecular Evolution: Rates. In: Encylopedia of Life Sciences. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd: Chichester http://www.els.net/ [DOI: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0001802.pub2]. PDF

Bromham L (2008) Molecular Evolution: Patterns and Rates. In: Encylopedia of Life Sciences. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd: Chichester http://www.els.net/ [DOI: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0001799.pub3] PDF

Welch JJ, Bininda-Emonds ORP, Bromham L (2008) Correlates of substitution rate variation in mammalian protein-coding sequences. BMC Evolutionary Biology 8:53. PDF

Lanfear R, Thomas J, Welch J, Brey T, Bromham L (2007) Metabolic Rate Does Not Calibrate the Molecular Clock Proc. natl. Acad Sci USA 104 (39): 15388-15393 PDF

Fontanillas E, Welch J, Thomas J, Bromham L (2007) The influence of body size and net diversification rate on molecular evolution during the radiation of animal phyla. BMC Evolutionary Biology 7:95 PDF

  • Bromham L, Cardillo M (2006) Primates follow the “Island Rule”: implications for interpreting Homo floresiensis. Biology Letters Biology Letters 3: 398-400 >PDF

    Thomas JA, Welch JJ, Woolfit M, Bromham L (2006). There is no universal molecular clock for invertebrates, but rate variation does not scale with body size. Proc. natl. Acad Sci USA 103 (19): 7366-7371 PDF

    Bromham L, Oprandi P. (2006) Evolution online: developing active and blended learning by using a virtual learning environment in an introductory biology course. Journal of Biological Education 41(1):21-25 PDF

    Bromham L (2006) Molecular dates for the Cambrian Explosion: is the light at the end of the tunnel an oncoming train? Palaeontologia Electronica 9(1):2E. PDF

    Welch JJ, Bromham L. (2005) Molecular dating when rates vary. Trends Ecol. Evol. 20(6): 320-327. PDF

    Bromham L, Leys, R. (2005) Sociality, population size and rate of molecular evolution. Mol. Biol. Evol 22(6):1393–1402. PDF

    Welch JJ, Fontanillas E, Bromham L. (2005) Molecular dates for the “Cambrian Explosion”: the influence of prior assumptions. Syst Biol 54(4):13–19 PDF

    Wanninger A, Koop D, Bromham L, Noonan E, Degnan BM (2005) Nervous and muscle system development in Phascolion strombus (Sipuncula). Dev Genes Evol 215(10):509-518. PDF

    Woolfit M, Bromham L. (2005) Population size and the rate of molecular evolution on islands. Proc Roy Soc Lond B 272(1578):2277-82. PDF

    Bromham L, Woolfit M (2004) Explosive radiations and the reliability of molecular clocks: island endemic radiations as a test case. Syst Biol 53(5): 758 - 766. PDF

    Burrows JM, Bromham L (joint first authors), M Woolfit, G Piganeau, J Tellam, G Connolly, N Webb, L Poulsen, L Cooper, S R. Burrows, D J. Moss, S M. Haryana, M Ng, J M. Nicholls, and R Khanna (2004) Selection Pressure-Driven Evolution of the Epstein-Barr Virus-Encoded Oncogene LMP1 in Virus Isolates from Southeast Asia J Virol. Journal of Virology 78(13): 7131-7137. PDF

    Bromham L, Penny D (2003) The modern molecular clock. Nature Reviews Genetics 4:216-224. PDF

    Bromham L (2003) Molecular clocks and explosive radiations. J. Mol. Evol. 57: S13-S20.

    Bromham L (2003) What can DNA tell us about the Cambrian Explosion? Integrative and Comparative Biology, 43(1): 148-156. PDF

    Woolfit M, Bromham L. (2003) Increased rates of sequence evolution in endosymbiotic bacteria and fungi with small effective population sizes. Mol. Biol. Evol. 20(9):1545–1555. PDF

    Cardillo M, Huxtable JS, Bromham L (2003) Geographic range size, life history and rates of diversification in Australian mammals. J. Evol. Biol 16:282–288. PDF

    Bromham L, Cardillo M. (2003) Testing the link between the latitudinal gradient in species richness and rates of molecular evolution. J. Evol. Biol, 16: 200-207. PDF

    Bromham L, Eyre-Walker A, Smith NH, Maynard Smith J (2003) Mitochondrial Steve: paternal inheritance of mitochondria in humans. Trends Ecol. Evol. 18(1): 2-4. PDF