User:Manudouz/sandbox/Echimyidae phylogeny

Systematics
The current taxonomic content of the family Echimyidae has been reshaped over time, and its organization into coherent units stems from two realizations. The first is that cladistic approaches applied to morphological characters showed that many traits used to define taxa were plesiomorphic or homoplastic. The second realization came from the advent of phylogenetic analyses of DNA sequence and protein sequence data with probability methods — maximum likelihood and Bayesian inference —, leading to the identification of robust clades and the recognition of higher categorical ranks.

Describe subfamilies and tribes:
 * Echimyinae
 * Euryzygomatomyinae
 * Echimyini
 * Myocastorini
 * Plagiodontini
 * Capromyini

Phylogeny
The phylogenetic tree of the Echimyidae shows a major split between the subfamily Echimyinae and an assemblage containing the Euryzygomatomyinae, Carterodon, and the Capromyidae. The first major clade contains a majority of arboreal genera (e.g., Phyllomys, Dactylomys, and Mesomys), a few terrestrial taxa (e.g., Proechimys), and a subaquatic one (Myocastor). The second major clade includes fossorial genera (e.g., Euryzygomatomys or Carterodon), a terrestrial one (Trinomys), and members inhabiting the Caribbean islands (Capromyidae).