paleotree (version 2.5)

createMrBayesConstraints: Transform a Topology into a Set of Constraint Commands for MrBayes

Description

Takes a phylogeny in the form of an object of class phylo and outputs a set of topological constraints for MrBayes as a set of character strings, either printed in the R console or in a named text file, which can be used as commands in the MrBayes block of a NEXUS file for use with (you guessed it!) MrBayes.

Usage

createMrBayesConstraints(tree, partial = TRUE, file = NULL)

Arguments

tree

An object of class phylo.

partial

If TRUE (the default), then constraints will be defined as partial constraints with respect to the rest of the taxa in the input tree. If FALSE, constraints will be defined as hard clade membership constraints (i.

file

Filename (possibly with path) as a character string to a file which will be overwritten with the output constraint lines. If not null, not constraint lines are output to the console.

Value

• If argument file is NULL, then the constrain commands are ouput as a series of character strings.

Details

partial = TRUE may be useful if the reason for using createMrBayesConstraints is to constrain a topology containing some of the taxa in an analysis, while allowing other taxa to freely vary. For example, Slater (2013) constrained an analysis so extant taxon relationships were held constant, using a molecular-based topology, while allowing fossil taxa to freely vary relative to their morphological character data.

References

Slater, G. J. 2013. Phylogenetic evidence for a shift in the mode of mammalian body size evolution at the Cretaceous-Palaeogene boundary. Methods in Ecology and Evolution 4(8):734-744.

Examples

set.seed(444)
tree<-rtree(10)
createMrBayesConstraints(tree)
createMrBayesConstraints(tree,partial=FALSE)

createMrBayesConstraints(tree,file="topoConstraints.txt")