Fig. 2: Ancient polyploidy events and evolution of gene families in seed plants.

a, Inference of the number of gene families with duplicated genes surviving after WGD events mapped on a phylogenetic tree depicting the relationships among 16 vascular plants included in this study. The number of gene families with retained gene duplicates reconciled on a particular branch of the species tree are shown above the branch across the phylogeny (Methods). Numbers in square brackets denote the number of gene families with duplicated genes also supported by synteny evidence. b, Evolutionary analyses and phylogenetic profiles depicting the gains (light green), losses (light red), expansions (light yellow) and contractions (light blue) of orthogroups, according to the reconstruction of the ancestral gene content at key nodes and the dynamic changes of the lineage-specific gene characteristics.