FAQ

Concerning SpartExplorer :

What is Spart Explorer?

Spart Explorer is a user-friendly web platform, in which species hypotheses are based on DNA sequences using two popular species delimitation tools, ABGD and ASAP. The platform also implements LIMES, which can compare different partitions. Species partitions obtained on the platform or uploaded from local files can then be compared in a dynamic and intuitive graphic representation, associated to a phylogenetic tree, to facilitate result interpretation and comparison in an integrative taxonomy framework.

When using Spart Explorer, you can start with a species delimitation analysis using ABGD and ASAP, simply by uploading your DNA sequence alignment. The species partitions obtained can then be compared with LIMES, which will calculate some statistics related to the similarity difference between each pair of partitions, and then visualized in the graphic interface: the spart viewer. Alternatively, you can also directly upload species partitions in the spart format, obtained independently with other tools, or even prepared de novo from e.g. morphospecies hypotheses, and visualize them in the spart viewer. Here, you will be able to compare visually all the partitions in front of a phylogenetic tree, organize them by simply drag-and-drop them, hide/show any you want, in order to more easily decide which partition(s) is/are the more likely, in an integrative taxonomy context.

Concerning the method :

What is ASAP ?

ASAP is a tool designed to propose partitions of species hypotheses using genetic distances calculated between DNA sequences.

How many sequences can I load?

ASAP can handle more than 10 000 sequences, but the computation time can be quite important in this case (several hours). If you need to work with a very large dataset, we recommend you to download the command line version of ASAP to run it on your computer instead of overloading the server.

Concerning results :

Why results can be slightly different if I re-run ASAP with the same data?

ASAP uses a seed to generate random partitions in order to estimate the probability of a partition. A new seed can slightly change the probabilities.

I have my own hypothesis concerning the number of species included in my dataset, but ASAP doesn't class it at first rank

Remember that ASAP is an exploratory tool designed to identify the best partitions of species, given the criteria used by ASAP (in particular the genetic distances). Your own species hypotheses might be based on other data, methods or criteria of species delimitation, and might thus be different from the best ASAP partitions. Combining all these results in an integrative taxonomy approach is generally a good idea.