International audienceA fundamental problem in the study of phylogenetic networks is to determine whether or not a given phylogenetic network contains a given phylogenetic tree. We develop a quadratic-time algorithm for this problem for binary nearly-stable phylogenetic networks. We also show that the number of reticulations in a reticulation visible or nearly stable phylogenetic network is bounded from above by a function linear in the number of taxa

In studies of molecular evolution, phylogenetic trees are rooted binary trees, whereas phylogenetic networks are rooted acyclic digraphs. Edges are directed away from the root and leaves are uniquely labeled with taxa in phylogenetic networks. For the purpose of validating evolutionary models, biologists check whether or not a phylogenetic tree (resp. cluster) is contained in a phylogenetic network on the same taxa. These tree and cluster containment problems are known to be NP-complete. A phylogenetic network is reticulation-visible if every reticulation node separates the root of the network from at least a leaf. We answer an open problem by proving that the problem is solvable in quadratic time for reticulationvisible networks. The key tool used in our answer is a powerful decomposition theorem. It also allows us to design a linear-time algorithm for the cluster containment problem for networks of this type and to prove that every galled network with n leaves has 2(n − 1) reticulation nodes at most.

Galled trees are widely studied as a recombination model in population genetics. This class of phylogenetic networks is generalized into galled networks by relaxing a structural condition. In this work, a linear recurrence formula is given for counting 1galled networks, which are galled networks satisfying the condition that each reticulate node has only one leaf descendant. Since every galled network consists of a set of 1-galled networks stacked one on top of the other, a method is also presented to count and enumerate galled networks.

Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Tree containment problem is a fundamental problem in phylogenetic study, as it is used to verify a network model. It asks whether a given network contain a subtree that resembles a binary tree.