This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship for FY 2008. The fellowship supports a research and training plan entitled "From Gene Trees to Population Demography: An Approximate Bayesian Computation Approach" for Adam D. Leache. The host institutions for this research are University of California, Davis, and University College London, and the sponsoring scientists are Dr. Bruce Rannala and Dr. Ziheng Yang, respectively.
Phylogenetics is entering a new era in which researchers will have the opportunity to apply genomic-scale data sets to the study of non-model organisms. Novel computational methods and the accompanying software tools are required to handle these larger, more complex biological data sets. This research is developing an approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) statistical framework for estimating demographic parameters (ancestral and contemporary population sizes, levels of gene flow, and species/population divergence times) that is based on gene tree summary statistics. Estimating demographic parameters using ABC simulations conditional on gene tree summary statistics is appealing, because many genetic studies generate data conducive to gene tree estimation, creating a rich source of bioinformatics data.
Training objectives include extensive training in bioinformatics, computational biology, theoretical population genetics, and statistical phylogenetics. This interdisciplinary bioinformatics research will build links between the fields of mathematics, statistics, computational biology, theoretical population genetics, and statistical phylogenetics, while at the same time maintaining a central focus on concepts in evolutionary biology. This new statistical approach and accompanying software tools will accommodate complex biological problems across many nested levels in the tree of life.
