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Semi-directed phylogenetic networks have recently emerged as a class of phylogenetic networks sitting between rooted (directed) and unrooted (undirected) phylogenetic networks as they contain both directed as well as undirected edges. While various spaces of rooted phylogenetic networks and unrooted phylogenetic networks have been analyzed in recent years and several rearrangement moves to traverse these spaces have been introduced, little is known about spaces of semi-directed phylogenetic networks. Here, we propose a simple rearrangement move for semi-directed phylogenetic networks, called cut edge transfer (CET), and show that the space of semi-directed level-1 networks with precisely k reticulations is connected under CET. This level-1 space is currently the predominantly used search space for most algorithms that reconstruct semi-directed phylogenetic networks. Our results imply that every semi-directed level-1 network with a fixed number of reticulations and leaf set can be reached from any other such network by a sequence of CETs. By introducing two additional moves, R + and R - , that allow for the addition and deletion, respectively, of a reticulation, we then establish connectedness for the space of all semi-directed level-1 networks on a fixed leaf set. As a byproduct of our results for semi-directed phylogenetic networks, we also show that the space of rooted level-1 networks with a fixed number of reticulations and leaf set is connected under CET, when translated into the rooted setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the study of rooted phylogenetic networks, analyzing the set of rooted phylogenetic trees that are embedded in such a network is a recurring task. Algorithmically, this analysis requires a search of the exponential-sized multiset S of rooted phylogenetic trees that are embedded in a rooted phylogenetic network N. In this paper, we introduce the notion of a non-essential arc, which is an arc whose deletion from N results in a rooted phylogenetic network N ′ that embeds the same set of rooted phylogenetic trees as N but whose associated multiset is smaller than S. We characterize non-essential arcs for the popular class of tree-child networks and show that identifying and deleting such arcs takes time that is cubic in the number of leaves of the network. Moreover, we show that deciding if a given arc of an arbitrary phylogenetic network is non-essential is Π 2 P -complete. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We describe a kernel of size 9 k − 8 for the NP-hard problem of computing the Tree Bisection and Reconnection (TBR) distance k between two unrooted binary phylogenetic trees. To achieve this, we extend the existing portfolio of reduction rules with three new reduction rules. Two of these are based on the idea of topologically transforming the trees in a distance-preserving way in order to guarantee execution of earlier reduction rules. The third rule extends the local neighborhood approach introduced in [20] to more global structures, allowing new situations to be identified when the deletion of a leaf definitely reduces the TBR distance by one. The bound on the kernel size is tight up to an additive term. Our results also apply to the equivalent problem of computing a maximum agreement forest between two unrooted binary phylogenetic trees. We anticipate that our results are widely applicable for computing agreement-forest based dissimilarity measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We give a counterexample to the conjecture of Martin and Thatte that two balanced rooted binary leaf-labeled trees on n leaves have a maximum agreement subtree (MAST) of size at least n1/2. In particular, we show that for any c > 0, there exist two balanced rooted binary leaflabeled trees on n leaves such that any MAST for these two trees has size less than cn1/2. We also improve the lower bound of the size of such a MAST to n 1/6. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently there has been considerable interest in the problem of finding a phylogenetic network with a minimum number of reticulation vertices which displays a given set of phylogenetic trees, that is, a network with minimum hybrid number. Such networks are useful for representing the evolution of species whose genomes have undergone processes such as lateral gene transfer and recombination that cannot be represented appropriately by a phylogenetic tree. Even so, as was recently pointed out in the literature, insisting that a network displays the set of trees can be an overly restrictive assumption when modeling certain evolutionary phenomena such as incomplete lineage sorting. In this paper, we thus consider the less restrictive notion of rigidly displaying which we introduce and study here. More specifically, we characterize when two trees can be rigidly displayed by a certain type of phylogenetic network called a temporal tree-child network in terms of fork-picking sequences. These are sequences of special subconfigurations of the two trees related to the well-studied cherry-picking sequences. We also show that, in case it exists, the rigid hybrid number for two phylogenetic trees is given by a minimum weight fork-picking sequence for the trees. Finally, we consider the relationship between the rigid hybrid number and three closely related numbers; the weak, beaded, and temporal hybrid numbers. In particular, we show that these numbers can all be different even for a fixed pair of trees, and also present an infinite family of pairs of trees which demonstrates that the difference between the rigid hybrid number and the temporal-hybrid number for two phylogenetic trees on the same set of n leaves can grow at least linearly with n. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of reconstructing phylogenetic networks from a collection of phylogenetic trees, several characterisations and subsequently algorithms have been established to reconstruct a phylogenetic network that collectively embeds all trees in the input in some minimum way. For many instances however, the resulting network also embeds additional phylogenetic trees that are not part of the input. However, little is known about these inferred trees. In this paper, we explore the relationships among all phylogenetic trees that are embedded in a given phylogenetic network. First, we investigate some combinatorial properties of the collection P of all rooted binary phylogenetic trees that are embedded in a rooted binary phylogenetic network N. To this end, we associated a particular graph G , which we call rSPR graph, with the elements in P and show that, if | P | = 2 k , where k is the number of vertices with in-degree two in N , then G has a Hamilton cycle. Second, by exploiting rSPR graphs and properties of hypercubes, we turn to the well-studied class of rooted binary level-1 networks and give necessary and sufficient conditions for when a set of rooted binary phylogenetic trees can be embedded in a level-1 network without inferring any additional trees. Lastly, we show how these conditions translate into a polynomial-time algorithm to reconstruct such a network if it exists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While every rooted binary phylogenetic tree is determined by its set of displayed rooted triples, such a result does not hold for an arbitrary rooted binary phylogenetic network. In particular, there exist two non-isomorphic rooted binary temporal normal networks that display the same set of rooted triples. Moreover, without any structural constraint on the rooted phylogenetic networks under consideration, similarly negative results have also been established for binets and trinets which are rooted subnetworks on two and three leaves, respectively. Hence, in general, piecing together a rooted phylogenetic network from such a set of small building blocks appears insurmountable. In contrast to these results, in this paper, we show that a rooted binary normal network is determined by its sets of displayed caterpillars (particular type of subtrees) on three and four leaves. The proof is constructive and realises a polynomial-time algorithm that takes the sets of caterpillars on three and four leaves displayed by a rooted binary normal network and, up to isomorphism, reconstructs this network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently it was shown that, if the subtree and chain reduction rules have been applied exhaustively to two unrooted phylogenetic trees, the reduced trees will have at most 15 k - 9 taxa where k is the TBR (Tree Bisection and Reconnection) distance between the two trees, and that this bound is tight. Here, we propose five new reduction rules and show that these further reduce the bound to 11 k - 9 . The new rules combine the "unrooted generator" approach introduced in Kelk and Linz (SIAM J Discrete Math 33(3):1556–1574, 2019) with a careful analysis of agreement forests to identify (i) situations when chains of length 3 can be further shortened without reducing the TBR distance, and (ii) situations when small subtrees can be identified whose deletion is guaranteed to reduce the TBR distance by 1. To the best of our knowledge these are the first reduction rules that strictly enhance the reductive power of the subtree and chain reduction rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phylogenetic networks are a generalization of phylogenetic trees to leaf-labeled directed acyclic graphs that represent ancestral relationships between species whose past includes non-tree-like events such as hybridization and horizontal gene transfer. Indeed, each phylogenetic network embeds a collection of phylogenetic trees. Referring to the collection of trees that a given phylogenetic network N embeds as the display set of N , several questions in the context of the display set of N have recently been analyzed. For example, the widely studied Tree-Containment problem asks if a given phylogenetic tree is contained in the display set of a given network. The focus of this paper are two questions that naturally arise in comparing the display sets of two phylogenetic networks. First, we analyze the problem of deciding if the display sets of two phylogenetic networks have a tree in common. Surprisingly, this problem turns out to be NP-complete even for two temporal normal networks. Second, we investigate the question of whether or not the display sets of two phylogenetic networks are equal. While we recently showed that this problem is polynomial-time solvable for a normal and a tree-child network, it is computationally hard in the general case. In establishing hardness, we show that the problem is contained in the second level of the polynomial-time hierarchy. Specifically, it is Π 2 P -complete. Along the way, we show that two other problems are also Π 2 P -complete, one of which being a generalization of Tree-Containment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2001 Allen and Steel showed that, if subtree and chain reduction rules have been applied to two unrooted phylogenetic trees, the reduced trees will have at most 28k taxa where k is the tree bisection and reconnection distance between the two trees. Here we reanalyze Allen and Steel's kernelization algorithm and prove that the reduced instances will in fact have at most 15k-9 taxa. Moreover we show, by describing a family of instances which have exactly 15k 9 taxa after reduction, that this new bound is tight. These instances also have no common clusters, showing that a third commonly encountered reduction rule, the cluster reduction, cannot further reduce the size of the kernel in the worst case. To achieve these results we introduce and use \unrooted generators" which are analogues of rooted structures that have appeared earlier in the phylogenetic networks literature. Using similar arguments we show that, for the minimum hybridization problem on two rooted trees, 9k-2 is a tight bound (when subtree and chain reduction rules have been applied) and 9k-4 is a tight bound (when, additionally, the cluster reduction has been applied) on the number of taxa, where k is the hybridization number of the two trees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Throughout the last decade, we have seen much progress towards characterising and computing the minimum hybridisation number for a set P of rooted phylogenetic trees. Roughly speaking, this minimum quantifies the number of hybridisation events needed to explain a set of phylogenetic trees by simultaneously embedding them into a phylogenetic network. From a mathematical viewpoint, the notion of agreement forests is the underpinning concept for almost all results that are related to calculating the minimum hybridisation number for when | P | = 2. However, despite various attempts, characterising this number in terms of agreement forests for | P | > 2 remains elusive. In this paper, we characterise the minimum hybridisation number for when P is of arbitrary size and consists of not necessarily binary trees. Building on our previous work on cherry-picking sequences, we first establish a new characterisation to compute the minimum hybridisation number in the space of tree-child networks. Subsequently, we show how this characterisation extends to the space of all rooted phylogenetic networks. Moreover, we establish a particular hardness result that gives new insight into some of the limitations of agreement forests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, the minimum number of reticulation events that is required to simultaneously embed a collection P of rooted binary phylogenetic trees into a so-called temporal network has been characterized in terms of cherry-picking sequences. Such a sequence is a particular ordering on the leaves of the trees in P . However, it is well-known that not all collections of phylogenetic trees have a cherry-picking sequence. In this paper, we show that the problem of deciding whether or not P has a cherry-picking sequence is NP-complete for when P contains at least eight rooted binary phylogenetic trees. Moreover, we use automata theory to show that the problem can be solved in polynomial time if the number of trees in P and the number of cherries in each such tree are bounded by a constant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last fifteen years, phylogenetic networks have become a popular tool to analyse relationships between species whose past includes reticulation events such as hybridisation or horizontal gene transfer. However, the space of phylogenetic networks is significantly larger than that of phylogenetic trees, and how to analyse and search this enlarged space remains a poorly understood problem. Inspired by the widely-used rooted subtree prune and regraft (rSPR) operation on rooted phylogenetic trees, we propose a new operation—called subnet prune and regraft (SNPR)—that induces a metric on the space of all rooted phylogenetic networks on a fixed set of leaves. We show that the spaces of several popular classes of rooted phylogenetic networks (e.g. tree child, reticulation visible, and tree based) are connected under SNPR and that connectedness remains for the subclasses of these networks with a fixed number of reticulations. Lastly, we bound the distance between two rooted phylogenetic networks under the SNPR operation, show that it is computationally hard to compute this distance exactly, and analyse how the SNPR-distance between two such networks relates to the rSPR-distance between rooted phylogenetic trees that are embedded in these networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phylogenetic networks are a generalization of evolutionary or phylogenetic trees that are used to represent the evolution of species which have undergone reticulate evolution. In this paper we consider spaces of such networks defined by some novel local operations that we introduce for converting one phylogenetic network into another. These operations are modeled on the well-studied nearest-neighbor interchange operations on phylogenetic trees, and lead to natural generalizations of the tree spaces that have been previously associated to such operations. We present several results on spaces of some relatively simple networks, called level-1 networks, including the size of the neighborhood of a fixed network, and bounds on the diameter of the metric defined by taking the smallest number of operations required to convert one network into another. We expect that our results will be useful in the development of methods for systematically searching for optimal phylogenetic networks using, for example, likelihood and Bayesian approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last decade, the use of phylogenetic networks to analyze the evolution of species whose past is likely to include reticulation events, such as horizontal gene transfer or hybridization, has gained popularity among evolutionary biologists. Nevertheless, the evolution of a particular gene can generally be described without reticulation events and therefore be represented by a phylogenetic tree. While this is not in contrast to each other, it places emphasis on the necessity of algorithms that analyze and summarize the tree-like information that is contained in a phylogenetic network. We contribute to the toolbox of such algorithms by investigating the question of whether or not a phylogenetic network embeds a tree twice and give a quadratic-time algorithm to solve this problem for a class of networks that is more general than tree-child networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Given a set of rooted phylogenetic trees on overlapping taxa, it takes polynomial time to decide whether or not there exists a rooted phylogenetic tree that is compatible with . Since not all evolutionary histories for a set of species can be explained by a single tree, it is natural to ask for the minimum number of rooted phylogenetic trees needed such that each tree in is compatible with at least one tree. This paper shows that it is computationally hard to compute this minimum number. In particular, if contains rooted triples (rooted binary phylogenetic trees on three leaves), it is NP-complete to decide whether there exist two rooted phylogenetic trees such that each rooted triple in is compatible with at least one of the two trees. Furthermore, for a set Σ of binary characters and a positive integer k, we show that to decide if there exists a set of k rooted phylogenetic trees such that each character in Σ is compatible with at least one tree in is NP-complete for all , but solvable in polynomial time for . This generalizes the result for , where it is well-known to be polynomial time. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Recently, we have shown that calculating the minimum-temporal-hybridization number for a set ${\mathcal{P}}$ of rooted binary phylogenetic trees is NP-hard and have characterized this minimum number when ${\mathcal{P}}$ consists of exactly two trees. In this paper, we give the first characterization of the problem for ${\mathcal{P}}$ being arbitrarily large. The characterization is in terms of cherries and the existence of a particular type of sequence. Furthermore, in an online appendix to the paper, we show that this new characterization can be used to show that computing the minimum-temporal hybridization number for two trees is fixed-parameter tractable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Answering a problem posed by Nakhleh, we prove that counting the number of phylogenetic trees inferred by a (binary) phylogenetic network is #P-complete. An immediate consequence of this result is that counting the number of phylogenetic trees commonly inferred by two (binary) phylogenetic networks is also #P-complete. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Phylogenetic networks are now frequently used to explain the evolutionary history of a set of species for which a collection of gene trees, reconstructed from genetic material of different parts of the species’ genomes, reveal inconsistencies. However, in the context of hybridization, the reconstructed networks are often not temporal. If a hybridization network is temporal, then it satisfies the time constraint of instantaneously occurring hybridization events; i.e. all species that are involved in such an event coexist in time. Furthermore, although a collection of phylogenetic trees can often be merged into a hybridization network that is temporal, many algorithms do not necessarily find such a network since their primary optimization objective is to minimize the number of hybridization events. In this paper, we present a characterization for when two rooted binary phylogenetic trees admit a temporal hybridization network. Furthermore, we show that the underlying optimization problem is APX-hard and, therefore, NP-hard. Thus, unless P=NP, it is unlikely that there are efficient algorithms for either computing an exact solution or approximating it within a ratio arbitrarily close to one. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: A major problem for inferring species trees from gene trees is that evolutionary processes can sometimes favor gene tree topologies that conflict with an underlying species tree. In the case of incomplete lineage sorting, this phenomenon has recently been well-studied, and some elegant solutions for species tree reconstruction have been proposed. One particularly simple and statistically consistent estimator of the species tree under incomplete lineage sorting is to combine three-taxon analyses, which are phylogenetically robust to incomplete lineage sorting. In this paper, we consider whether such an approach will also work under lateral gene transfer (LGT). By providing an exact analysis of some cases of this model, we show that there is a zone of inconsistency when majority-rule three-taxon gene trees are used to reconstruct species trees under LGT. However, a triplet-based approach will consistently reconstruct a species tree under models of LGT, provided that the expected number of LGT transfers is not too high. Our analysis involves a novel connection between the LGT problem and random walks on cyclic graphs. We have implemented a procedure for reconstructing trees subject to LGT or lineage sorting in settings where taxon coverage may be patchy and illustrate its use on two sample data sets. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Recently, considerable effort has been put into developing fast algorithms to reconstruct a rooted phylogenetic network that explains two rooted phylogenetic trees and has a minimum number of hybridization vertices. With the standard app1235roach to tackle this problem being combinatorial, the reconstructed network is rarely unique. From a biological point of view, it is therefore of importance to not only compute one network, but all possible networks. In this article, we make a first step toward approaching this goal by presenting the first algorithm-called allMAAF s-that calculates all maximum-acyclic-agreement forests for two rooted binary phylogenetic trees on the same set of taxa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phylogenetic (evolutionary) trees and networks are leaf-labeled graphs that are widely used to represent the evolutionary relationships between entities such as species, languages, cancer cells, and viruses. To reconstruct and analyze phylogenetic networks, the problem of deciding whether or not a given rooted phylogenetic network embeds a given rooted phylogenetic tree is of recurring interest. This problem, formally know as Tree Containment, is NP-complete in general and polynomial-time solvable for certain classes of phylogenetic networks. In this paper, we connect ideas from quantum computing and phylogenetics to present an efficient Quadratic Unconstrained Binary Optimization formulation for Tree Containment in the general setting. For an instance (N , T) of Tree Containment, where N is a phylogenetic network with n N vertices and T is a phylogenetic tree with n T vertices, the number of logical qubits that are required for our formulation is O (n N n T). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, numerous practical and theoretical studies in evolutionary biology aim at calculating the extent to which reticulation-for example, horizontal gene transfer, hybridization, or recombination-has influenced the evolution for a set of present-day species. It has been shown that inferring the minimum number of hybridization events that is needed to simultaneously explain the evolutionary history for a set of trees is an NP-hard and also fixed-parameter tractable problem. In this article, we give a new fixed-parameter algorithm for computing the minimum number of hybridization events for when two rooted binary phylogenetic trees are given. This newly developed algorithm is based on interleaving-a technique using repeated kernelization steps that are applied throughout the exhaustive search part of a fixed-parameter algorithm. To show that our algorithm runs efficiently to be applicable to a wide range of practical problem instances, we apply it to a grass data set and highlight the significant improvements in terms of running times in comparison to an algorithm that has previously been implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Calculating the rooted subtree prune and regraft (rSPR) distance between two rooted binary phylogenetic trees is a frequently applied process in various areas of molecular evolution. However, computing this distance is an NP-hard problem and practical algorithms for computing it exactly are rare. In this paper, a divide-and-conquer approach to calculating the rSPR distance is established. This approach breaks the problem instance into a number of smaller and more tractable subproblems. Two reduction rules which were previously used to show that computing the rSPR distance is fixed-parameter tractable can easily be used to complement this new theoretical result, and so a significant positive impact on the running time of calculating this distance in practice is likely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reticulation networks are now frequently used to model the history of life for various groups of species whose evolutionary past is likely to include reticulation events such as horizontal gene transfer or hybridization. However, the reconstructed networks are rarely guaranteed to be temporal. If a reticulation network is temporal, then it satisfies the two biologically motivated timing constraints of instantaneously occurring reticulation events and successively occurring speciation events. On the other hand, if a reticulation network is not temporal, it is always possible to make it temporal by adding a number of additional unsampled or extinct taxa. In the first half of the paper, we show that deciding whether a given number of additional taxa is sufficient to transform a non-temporal reticulation network into a temporal one is an NP-complete problem. As one is often given a set of gene trees instead of a network in the context of hybridization, this motivates the second half of the paper which provides an algorithm, called TemporalHybrid, for reconstructing a temporal hybridization network that simultaneously explains the ancestral history of two trees or indicates that no such network exists. We further derive two methods to decide whether or not a temporal hybridization network exists for two given trees and illustrate one of the methods on a grass data set. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Recently, Hill et al. [1] implemented a new software package-called SPRIT-which aims at calculating the minimum number of horizontal gene transfer events that is needed to simultaneously explain the evolution of two rooted binary phylogenetic trees on the same set of taxa. To this end, SPRIT computes the closely related socalled rooted subtree prune and regraft distance between two phylogenies. However, calculating this distance is an NP-hard problem and exact algorithms are often only applicable to small- or medium-sized problem instances. Trying to overcome this problem, Hill et al. propose a divide-and-conquer approach to speed up their algorithm and conjecture that this approach can be used to compute the rooted subtree prune and regraft distance exactly. Results: In this note, we present a counterexample to Hill et al's conjecture and subsequently show that a modified version of their conjecture holds. Conclusion: While Hill et al's conjecture may result in an overestimate of the rooted subtree prune and regraft distance, a slightly more restricted version of their approach gives the desired outcome and can be applied to speed up the exact calculation of this distance between two phylogenies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phylogenetic trees are leaf-labelled trees used to model the evolution of species. Here we explore the practical impact of kernelization (i.e. data reduction) on the NP-hard problem of computing the TBR distance between two unrooted binary phylogenetic trees. This problem is better-known in the literature as the maximum agreement forest problem, where the goal is to partition the two trees into a minimum number of common, non-overlapping subtrees. We have implemented two well-known reduction rules, the subtree and chain reduction, and five more recent, theoretically stronger reduction rules, and compare the reduction achieved with and without the stronger rules. We find that the new rules yield smaller reduced instances and thus have clear practical added value. In many cases they also cause the TBR distance to decrease in a controlled fashion, which can further facilitate solving the problem in practice. Next, we compare the achieved reduction to the known worst-case theoretical bounds of 15 k - 9 and 11 k - 9 respectively, on the number of leaves of the two reduced trees, where k is the TBR distance, observing in both cases a far larger reduction in practice. As a by-product of our experimental framework we obtain a number of new insights into the actual computation of TBR distance. We find, for example, that very strong lower bounds on TBR distance can be obtained efficiently by randomly sampling certain carefully constructed partitions of the leaf labels, and identify instances which seem particularly challenging to solve exactly. The reduction rules have been implemented within our new solver Tubro which combines kernelization with an Integer Linear Programming (ILP) approach. Tubro also incorporates a number of additional features, such as a cluster reduction and a practical upper-bounding heuristic, and it can leverage combinatorial insights emerging from the proofs of correctness of the reduction rules to simplify the ILP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complexity of variants of 3 -SAT and Not-All-Equal 3 -SAT is well studied. However, in contrast, very little is known about the complexity of the problems' quantified counterparts. In the first part of this paper, we show that ∀∃ 3 -SAT is Π 2 P -complete even if (1) each variable appears exactly twice unnegated and exactly twice negated, (2) each clause is a disjunction of exactly three distinct variables, and (3) the number of universal variables is equal to the number of existential variables. Furthermore, we show that the problem remains Π 2 P -complete if (1a) each universal variable appears exactly once unnegated and exactly once negated, (1b) each existential variable appears exactly twice unnegated and exactly twice negated, and (2) and (3) remain unchanged. On the other hand, the problem becomes NP-complete for certain variants in which each universal variable appears exactly once. In the second part of the paper, we establish Π 2 P -completeness for ∀∃ Not-All-Equal 3 -SAT even if (1′) the Boolean formula is linear and monotone, (2′) each universal variable appears exactly once and each existential variable appears exactly three times, and (3′) each clause is a disjunction of exactly three distinct variables that contains at most one universal variable. On the positive side, we uncover variants of ∀∃ Not-All-Equal 3 -SAT that are co-NP-complete or solvable in polynomial time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maximum parsimony is one of the most frequently-discussed tree reconstruction methods in phylogenetic estimation. However, in recent years it has become more and more apparent that phylogenetic trees are often not sufficient to describe evolution accurately. For instance, processes like hybridization or lateral gene transfer that are commonplace in many groups of organisms and result in mosaic patterns of relationships cannot be represented by a single phylogenetic tree. This is why phylogenetic networks, which can display such events, are becoming of more and more interest in phylogenetic research. It is therefore necessary to extend concepts like maximum parsimony from phylogenetic trees to networks. Several suggestions for possible extensions can be found in recent literature, for instance the softwired and the hardwired parsimony concepts. In this paper, we analyze the so-called big parsimony problem under these two concepts, i.e. we investigate maximum parsimonious networks and analyze their properties. In particular, we show that finding a softwired maximum parsimony network is possible in polynomial time. We also show that the set of maximum parsimony networks for the hardwired definition always contains at least one phylogenetic tree. Lastly, we investigate some parallels of parsimony to different likelihood concepts on phylogenetic networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Here we show that deciding whether two rooted binary phylogenetic trees on the same set of taxa permit a cherry-picking sequence , a special type of elimination order on the taxa, is NP-complete. This improves on an earlier result which proved hardness for eight or more trees. Via a known equivalence between cherry-picking sequences and temporal phylogenetic networks, our result proves that it is NP-complete to determine the existence of a temporal phylogenetic network that contains topological embeddings of both trees. The hardness result also greatly strengthens previous inapproximability results for the minimum temporal-hybridization number problem. This is the optimization version of the problem where we wish to construct a temporal phylogenetic network that topologically embeds two given rooted binary phylogenetic trees and that has a minimum number of indegree-2 nodes, which represent events such as hybridization and horizontal gene transfer. We end on a positive note, pointing out that fixed parameter tractability results in this area are likely to ensure the continued relevance of the temporal phylogenetic network model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A ternary permutation constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) is specified by a subset Π of the symmetric group S 3 . An instance of such a problem consists of a set of variables V and a set of constraints C , where each constraint is an ordered triple of distinct elements from V . The goal is to construct a linear ordering α on V such that, for each constraint ( a , b , c ) ∈ C , the ordering of a , b , c induced by α is in Π. Excluding symmetries and trivial cases there are eleven such problems, and their complexity is well known. Here we consider the variant of the problem, denoted 2-Π, where we are allowed to construct two linear orders α and β and each constraint needs to be satisfied by at least one of the two. We give a full complexity classification of all eleven 2-Π problems, observing that in the switch from one to two linear orders the complexity landscape changes quite abruptly and that hardness proofs become rather intricate. To establish the proofs, we use several computer-aided searches. Each such search returns a small instance with a unique solution for a given problem. We then focus on one of the eleven problems in particular, which is closely related to the 2- Caterpillar Compatibility problem in the phylogenetics literature. We show that this particular CSP remains hard on three linear orders, and also in the biologically relevant case when we swap three linear orders for three phylogenetic trees, yielding the 3- Tree Compatibility problem. Lastly, we give extremal results concerning the minimum number of trees required, in the worst case, to satisfy a set of rooted triplet constraints on n leaf labels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We show that the problem of computing the hybridization number of two rooted binary phylogenetic trees on the same set of taxa X has a constant factor polynomial-time approximation if and only if the problem of computing a minimum-size feedback vertex set in a directed graph (DFVS) has a constant factor polynomial-time approximation. The latter problem, which asks for a minimum number of vertices to be removed from a directed graph to transform it into a directed acyclic graph, is one of the problems in Karp's seminal 1972 list of 21 NP-complete problems. Despite considerable attention from the combinatorial optimization community, it remains to this day unknown whether a constant factor polynomial-time approximation exists for DFVS. Our result thus places the (in)approximability of hybridization number in a much broader complexity context, and as a consequence we obtain that it inherits inapproximability results from the problem Vertex Cover. On the positive side, we use results from the DFVS literature to give an O(log log r log r) approximation for the hybridization number where r is the correct value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]