Department of Statistics, The Ohio State University
Statistics and Biostatistics Colloquium Series

In nature, most functional regions of the genome for a chromosome pair express equally. A variation from this equivalence results in genomic imprinting, a phenomenon also called parent-of-origin effect. The imprinting-like phenomenon has been widely observed in plants, animals and humans. Many previously puzzling diseases such as Prader-Willis and Angelman syndrome are now known to be related to imprinted genes. Quantitative trait loci (QTL) mapping with molecular markers has been proven to be a promising way in targeting genetic regions harboring potential functional genes. However, most current approaches, by considering a trait measured at a single time point, are too simple to describe the dynamic gene effect during an individual ontology. For a developmental character such as growth, any dynamic change in trajectory would potentially reflect the change of the underlying gene function. To search for imprinted genes and further understand the role of genomic imprinting in the control of embryonic growth and development, it is essential to consider and incorporate the dynamic phenotypic changes into a mapping model. In this talk, I will introduce a functional mapping approach by incorporating the nature of the developmental law into a genetic mapping framework and demonstrate the power of the approach in mapping of imprinted QTL underlying dynamic imprinting traits. The proposed framework can answer a number of biological questions at the interplay between gene action and development regarding the imprinting mechanism of an imprinted gene. Both simulation studies and real data analysis will be presented to show the statistical property and utility of the approach.

Meet the speaker in Room 212 Cockins Hall at 4:30 p.m. Refreshments will be served.