Microbial Phylogeny and Evolution Concepts and Controversies

The birth of bacterial genomics since the mid-1990s brought withit several conceptual modifications and wholly new controversies. Working beyond the scope of the neo-Darwinian evolutionary synthesis, a group of leading microbial evolutionists addresses the following and related issues, often with markedly varied viewpoints:
DT Did the eukaryotic nucleus, cytoskeleton and cilia also orginate from symbiosis?
DT Do the current scenarios about he origin of mitochondria and plastids require revision?
DT What is the extent of lateral gene transfer (between "species") among bacteria?
DT Does the rDNA phylogenetic tree still stand in the age of genomics?
DT Is the course of the first 3 billion years of evolution even knowable?

The extent of lateral gene transfer among diverse microbes has effectively broken down our concept of species when we seek to apply it to the microbial world. The explosive growth of whole genome sequences for a great number of microbes give us an unprecedented perspective on the entire process of cellular evolution known. The field is rife with controversies, which have been waged fiercely over the past 20 years and which now are all coming to a point of resolution. Sapp has brought together the best workers in this field to assess what we now know, and to try to reach an accommodation and consensus on the broad outline of how cellular life has evolved.