Annelid Phylogeny - update from D. McHugh

[Damhnait McHugh]

Dear colleagues,

Below is the opening paragraph of my rebuttal of the critique by Siddall et 
al. (1998) of my phylogenetic analysis of annelid relationships based on 
elongation factor-1alpha sequence data.  My rebuttal appeared in the latest 
issue of the journal "Cladistics".  If you would like a reprint, please contact 
me by e-mail.  

Thank you.
Damhnait McHugh
dmchugh at colgate.mail.edu


McHugh, D.  1999.  Phylogeny of the Annelida: Siddall et al. (1998)
Rebutted.  Cladistics 15: 85-89

Siddall et al. (1998) recently published a critique of my phylogenetic
analysis of annelid, echiurid, and siboglinid (= Pogonophora and
Vestimentifera (see McHugh, 1997; Rouse and Fauchald, 1997)) relationships
based on the nuclear coding gene, elongation factor-1a (EF-1a) (McHugh,
1997).  Unfortunately, Siddall et al. (1998) made several misleading and
obfuscatory statements about the EF-1a analysis, and omitted information
that supports the EF-1a results that I presented. In addition, they stated
that they could not reproduce the results of McHugh (1997), which may give
readers the mistaken impression of discordance between the methods I applied
and the results I presented.  Here, to clarify matters and to avoid the
propagation of incorrect information, I directly address specific quotes (in
italics) from Siddall et al. (1998) in order of their appearance in that
manuscript.

*******************
Damhnait McHugh

Department of Biology
Colgate University
Hamilton, NY 13346, U.S.A.
Tel: (315) 228-7339 
Fax: (315) 228-7997
dmchugh at mail.colgate.edu


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