ReviewOpen biology2025
Limitations of sequence dissimilarity as a predictor of prokaryotic lineage.
Review in Open biology, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- Descent from a common ancestor restricts exploration of protein sequence space.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Limitations of sequence dissimilarity as a predictor of prokaryotic lineage.Open biology · 2025Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The molecular clock rests upon the assumption that the observed changes among sequences capture the differentiation of lineages, or kinship, as dissimilarity increases with time. Although it has been questioned over the years, this paradigmatic principle continues to underlie the idea that the polymorphic space of a gene is so vast that it is unattainable in evolutionary time. Thus, the molecular clock has been used to obtain taxonomic annotations, proving to be very effective at delivering testable results. In this article, however, we ask how often this assumption leads to inaccuracies when inferring the lineage of prokaryotic genes. Thus, we open an interesting discussion by simulating, in realistic scenarios, the critical times in which specific 5S rRNA sequences of two distant lineages are exhausting the polymorphic space. We contend that certain genes in one lineage will become increasingly similar to those in another over time, as the space for new variants is finite, mimicking phylogenetic features by convergence or by chance, without implying true kinship.
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Registered trials
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