Nonparametric methods for analyzing replication origins in genomewide data

Nonparametric inference for local extrema with application to oligonucleotide microarray data in yeast genome

Identifying local extrema of expression profiles is one primary objective in some cDNA microarray experiments. To study the replication dynamics of the yeast genome, for example, local peaks of hybridization intensity profiles correspond to putative replication origins. We propose a nonparametric kernel smoothing (NKS) technique to detect local hybridization intensity extrema across chromosomes. The novelty of our approach is that we base our inference procedures on equilibrium points, namely those locations at which the first derivative of the intensity curve is zero. The proposed smoothing technique provides both point and interval estimation for the location of local extrema. Also, this technique can be used to test for the hypothesis of either one or multiple suspected locations being the true equilibrium points. We illustrate the proposed method on a microarray data set from an experiment designed to study the replication origins in the yeast genome, in that the locations of autonomous replication sequence (ARS) elements are identified through the equilibrium points of the smoothed intensity profile curve. Our method found a few ARS elements that were not detected by the current smoothing methods such as the Fourier convolution smoothing.

Nonparametric methods for analyzing replication origins in genomewide data

Due to the advent of high-throughput genomic technology, it has become possible to monitor cellular activities on a genomewide basis. With these new methods, scientists can begin to address important biological questions. One such question involves the identification of replication origins, which are regions in the chromosomes where DNA replication is initiated. One hypothesis is that their locations are nonrandom throughout the genome. In this article, we analyze data from a recent yeast study in which candidate replication origins were profiled using cDNA microarrays to test this hypothesis. We find no evidence for such clustering.