Resolving deep evolutionary nodes within the phylogeny of bamboo corals

Keratoisididae is a globally distributed, and exclusively deep-sea, family of octocorals that contains species and genera that are polyphyletic. An alphanumeric system, based on a three-gene-region phylogeny, is widely used to describe the biodiversity within this family. That phylogeny identified 12 major groups although it did not have enough signal to explore the relationships among groups. Using increased phylogenomic resolution generated from Ultraconserved Elements and exons (i.e. conserved elements), we aim to resolve deeper nodes within the family and investigate the relationships among those predefined groups.