Mendelian Model Based Inference in Statistical Genetics

RES730 – NIH “Genetics”

Phase I research will focus on designing a single S-Plus software package that facilitates use of statistical techniques for the genetics community. In genetics, research is conducted in order to test hypotheses, which are derived from the genetic theory. Having stated a specific hypothesis which seem important to a certain theory, data is collected which should enable the researcher to make a decision concerning the hypothesis. The decision may lead researchers to retain, revise, or reject the hypothesis. To reach an objective decision the researcher must have an objective procedure for rejecting or accepting that hypothesis. This objective procedure should be based on information or data obtained in research. The procedure usually involves several steps. Despite the vast amount of genetic statistical procedures and software that exist to solve problems there is not existing software package that provides comprehensive and easy to use genetic statistical functions for the biomedical researcher. The genetics epidemiology module will include descriptive and exploratory data analysis, methods testing hypotheses about genotype frequencies, random/non-randomness of data, exact tests for independence, computation of likelihoods for genetic models.