---
title: "New Research Adds Another Branch to the Evolutionary Tree of Life"
description: "Researchers studying a tiny microbe discover that it warrants the creation of an entirely new branch on the Charles Darwin-created Tree of Life."
date: "2018-11-16"
modified: "2018-11-16"
authors:
  - name: "Kristin Houser"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/kristin"
url: "https://futurism.com/tree-life-evolution-hemimastigotes"
categories:
  - "Evolution"
  - "Science & Energy"
tags:
  - "evolution"
  - "microbes"
  - "Tree of life"
---

# New Research Adds Another Branch to the Evolutionary Tree of Life

![Researchers studying a tiny microbe discover that it warrants the creation of an entirely new branch on the Charles Darwin-created Tree of Life.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/tree-life-evolution-hemimastigotes.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: Dalhousie University\</em\>*

## Tree House

The [Tree of Life](<https://futurism.com/theres-revised-tree-life-1000-new-species>) is a metaphor established by Charles Darwin to give some perspective to evolution. Every living organism on Earth has a home somewhere on the Tree, and by looking at it, we can see how species relate to one another.

While we've known about a type of microbe called hemimastigotes since the 1800s, it turns out we were totally wrong about where they fit on the Tree of Life — because they didn't fit on any of the existing branches.

## Home of Its Own

In a [study](<https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0708-8>) published Wednesday in the journal *Nature*, researchers from Dalhousie University detail their discovery that hemimastigotes are so unlike anything else in the Tree of Life, they require the creation of a brand-new branch.

"It was clear from our analyses that hemimastigotes didn’t belong to any known kingdom-level group, or even to a known 'super-group' of several kingdoms together, like the one that includes both animals and fungi," researcher Alastair Simpson said in a news release.

"This one little collection of organisms is a whole new group at that level, all on its own," she continued. "It’s a branch of the Tree of Life that has been separate for a very long time, perhaps more than a billion years, and we had no information on it whatsoever."

## Evolution of Tech

The Dalhousie team was only able to reach this conclusion thanks to an advanced genetic analysis technique that wasn't available when scientists first discovered hemimastigotes.

"That such a distinct form of life could be hiding literally under our feet," Simpson said in the press release, "is a sharp reminder about how little we still know about the diversity of life on Earth."

And as our technologies advance even further, there's no telling what else we might discover — or how many other branches we might add to the Tree of Life.

**READ MORE:** [Hidden in Plain Sight: Dal Evolutionary Biologists Uncover a New Branch on the Tree of Life](<https://www.dal.ca/news/2018/11/15/hidden-in-plain-sight--dal-evolutionary-biologists-uncover-a-new.html>) \[Dalhousie University\]

***More on the Tree of Life: [There’s a Revised “Tree of Life,” and It Has 1000+ New Species](<https://futurism.com/theres-revised-tree-life-1000-new-species>)***

### Author social links  
[LinkedIn](<https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinjhouser>)