A Fast Algorithm for Computing Geodesic Distances in Tree Space
Abstract
Comparing and computing distances between phylogenetic trees are important biological problems, especially for models where edge lengths play an important role. The geodesic distance measure between two phylogenetic trees with edge lengths is the length of the shortest path between them in the continuous tree space introduced by Billera, Holmes, and Vogtmann. This tree space provides a powerful tool for studying and comparing phylogenetic trees, both in exhibiting a natural distance measure and in providing a Euclidean-like structure for solving optimization problems on trees. An important open problem is to find a polynomial time algorithm for finding geodesics in tree space. This paper gives such an algorithm, which starts with a simple initial path and moves through a series of successively shorter paths until the geodesic is attained.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.0907.3942,
title = {A Fast Algorithm for Computing Geodesic Distances in Tree Space},
author = {Megan Owen and J. Scott Provan},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0907.3942},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
20 pages, 5 figures. Added new section on including common edges and leaf edge-lengths in the algorithm, clarified starting point for algorithm, added references, other minor improvements. To appear in IEEE/ACM Transactions on Computational Biology and Bioinformatics