An algorithm for reconstructing level-2 phylogenetic networks from trinets

Evolutionary histories for species that cross with one another or exchange genetic material can be represented by leaf-labelled, directed graphs called phylogenetic networks. A major challenge in the burgeoning area of phylogenetic networks is to develop algorithms for building such networks by amalgamating small networks into a single large network. The level of a phylogenetic network is a measure of its deviation from being a tree; the higher the level of a network, the less treelike it becomes. Various algorithms have been developed for building level-1 networks from small networks. However, level-1 networks may not be able to capture the complexity of some data sets. In this paper, we present a polynomial-time algorithm for constructing a rooted binary level-2 phylogenetic network from a collection of 3-leaf networks or trinets. Moreover, we prove that the algorithm will correctly reconstruct such a network if it is given all of the trinets in the network as input. The algorithm runs in time O(t⋅n+n⁴) with t the number of input trinets and n the number of leaves. We also show that there is a fundamental obstruction to constructing level-3 networks from trinets, and so new approaches will need to be developed for constructing level-3 and higher level-networks.