Marker-Based Estimation of Genetic Parameters in Genomics

Linear mixed model (LMM) analysis has been recently used extensively for estimating additive genetic variances and narrow-sense heritability in many genomic studies. While the LMM analysis is computationally less intensive than the Bayesian algorithms, it remains infeasible for large-scale genomic data sets. In this paper, we advocate the use of a statistical procedure known as symmetric differences squared (SDS) as it may serve as a viable alternative when the LMM methods have difficulty or fail to work with large datasets. The SDS procedure is a general and computationally simple method based only on the least squares regression analysis. We carry out computer simulations and empirical analyses to compare the SDS procedure with two commonly used LMM-based procedures. Our results show that the SDS method is not as good as the LMM methods for small data sets, but it becomes progressively better and can match well with the precision of estimation by the LMM methods for data sets with large sample sizes. Its major advantage is that with larger and larger samples, it continues to work with the increasing precision of estimation while the commonly used LMM methods are no longer able to work under our current typical computing capacity. Thus, these results suggest that the SDS method can serve as a viable alternative particularly when analyzing ‘big’ genomic data sets.     

利用序列保守模体和局部构象信息预测转录因子结合位点

转录因子结合位点的计算预测是研究基因转录调控的重要环节,但常用的位置特异得分矩阵方法预测特异性偏低.通过深入分析结合位点的生物特征,提出了一种综合利用序列保守模体和局部构象信息的结合位点预测方法,以极大相关得分矩阵作为保守模体的描述模型,并根据二苷参数模型计算位点序列的局部构象,将两类信息得分组合为多维特征向量,在二次判别分析的框架下进行训练和滑动预测.预测过程中还引入了位置信息量以优化似然得分和过滤备选结果.针对大肠杆菌CRP和Fis结合位点数据的留一法测试结果表明,描述模型的改进和多种信息的融合能有效地改善预测方法的性能,大幅度提高特异性.