Topologies, conflicts between

Pleurocarpy/non-pleurocarpy sensu Newton and De Luna (1999) was optimized onto one of the 24 most parsimonious trees (henceforth referred to as tree A) obtained from the molecular analysis in Bell and Newton (2004). In addition, the effects on optimization of using a slightly different topology (tree B), in which Leptotheca gaudichaudii is sister to Orthodontium lineare (as in the maximum likelihood tree in Bell and Newton, 2004), were explored. No other conflicts between topologies obtained under parsimony and likelihood criteria in Bell and Newton (2004) signiflcantly... 

Conflict between optimizations, especially under accelerated versus delayed transformation, as well as sensitivity to topological uncertainty, result in more than one equally plausible scenario for the early evolution of pleurocarpy. Rather than adopt a universal preference for, say ACCTRAN over DELTRAN a priori, it is useful to examine conflicting scenarios individually in the light of the nature of the morphological transformations they require. 

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