ModelFinder: fast model selection for accurate phylogenetic estimates

Abstract

ModelFinder is a fast model-selection method that greatly improves the accuracy of phylogenetic estimates. Model-based molecular phylogenetics plays an important role in comparisons of genomic data, and model selection is a key step in all such analyses. We present ModelFinder, a fast model-selection method that greatly improves the accuracy of phylogenetic estimates by incorporating a model of rate heterogeneity across sites not previously considered in this context and by allowing concurrent searches of model space and tree space.