Elsevier Grand Challenge

Elsevier recently announced the 10 semi-finalists for their Grand Challenge. To my consternation, I'm one of them. I wrote a proposal entitled "Towards realising Darwin’s dream: setting the trees free" (I have uploaded a copy to Nature Precedings, it should be available shortly see doi:10.1038/npre.2008.2217.1). The "setting the trees" free is a reference to my oft expressed view that much of our knowledge of evolutionary history is locked up in the pages of Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution.

Of course, writing a proposal is one thing, making something useful is quite another. I envision something along the lines of this, but *cough* better. Meantime, the other semi-finalists look scarily good.