Deep time evolution and molecular dating of the archaeal tree of life

Archaea are thought to play a major role in the evolution of life and origin of Eukaryotes. Obtaining a timescale for archaeal evolution is crucial to understand early life evolution but is difficult owing to the scarcity of fossils. In recent years the diversity of archaea has been dramatically expanded using metagenomic approaches. HGT-based temporal constraints can be particularly helpful when the fossil record is sparse. In this project, we sought out to provide a timeframe for the archaeal tree of life by taking advantages of relative time constraints provided by HGT within the archaeal domain.