limit for the date of bat infecting parasites is consistent with the estimates of the dates of evolution of the mammalian infecting Plasmodium species. The divergence of Old World monkeys and apes has been dated to to . Since the subgenus Laverinia infects apes rather than monkeys, this date suggests an upper limit for the evolution of this subgenus. This date also places an upper limit on the date when the species infecting Old World monkeys evolved. A Bayesian estimate has suggested that the genus Plasmodium evolved about . The authors also found that the lemur clade evolved about , the rodent species about , the two known ovale species about and the Asian species about . The subgenus Laverinia evolved about . The branching order in this subgenus suggests that P. billbrayi and P. gaboni are sister species and form an early diverging clade. P. falciparum and P. reichenowi are sister species and they are related to P. billcolinsi. A Bayesian estimate of the date of the most recent common ancestor of the rodent species put this between and . An estimate based on the genome sequences of Plasmodium gallinaceum and Plasmodium relictum and the previously sequenced mammalian parasite genomes has suggested a divergence date of . This estimate was based on a separation date of 1 million years for the two ovale species. The dates seem to be at odds with other estimates. This may be because the date of separation of the ovale species currently has considerable variance: the 95% confidence interval in one paper was 0.5 – 7.7 Mya. Laverania Four species (P. billbrayi, P. billcollinsi, P. falciparum and P. reichenowi) form a clade within the subgenus Lavernia. This subgenus is more closely related to the other primate species than to the bird species or the included Leuocytozoon species. Both P. billbrayi and P. billcollinsi infect both the chimpanzee subspecies included in this study (Pan troglodytes troglodytes and Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii). P. falciparum infects the bonobo (Pan paniscus) and P. reichenowi infects only one subspecies (Pan troglodytes troglodytes). Caution has been raised about the adequacy of the description of these new species. A report of a new species that clusters with P. falciparum and P. reichenowi in chimpanzees has been published, although to date the species has been identified only from the sequence of its mitochondrion. Further work will be needed to describe this new species,