Fig 2. Spike positions with high volatility in the baseline group emerge as sites of sub/lineage-founder mutations.

(A) Phylogenetic tree based on 16,808 unique spike sequences. Terminal groups are colored and labeled, with their WHO variant designations in parentheses. (B) Volatility values for all positions of spike subunit S1 calculated using the 114 baseline clusters (see values for subunit S2 in S4B Fig). (C) Comparison of volatility values between spike positions that emerged with LFMs, sLFMs or no such mutations. P-values in an unpaired T test: ***, P<0.0005; ****, P<0.00005; ns, not significant. (D) Number of positions that appeared with LFMs and sLFMs when volatility in the BL group was zero or larger than zero. The number of positions in each subset is indicated in parentheses.