Bioinformatics Seminar
Time:
Venue: Na
13 October 2020
NaLeveraging statistical shapes in genomics: looking beyond what’s Normal.
Jessica MarUniversity of Queensland
In genomics ; we often assume that continuous data ; such as gene expression ; follows a single type of statistical distribution. However ; we rarely stop to question the validity of this assumption ; and whether it applies uniformly to every gene measured in the genome. This talk includes studies from my group where a focus on the shape of gene expression distributions ; specifically shape diversity ; revealed new insights into biology. These studies highlight the value of studying the shape of a gene’s expression distribution as a means to model heterogeneity in the cancer genome. These insights would not have been uncovered using standard approaches that assume a single distribution applies to everyone in a patient cohort. Collectively ; this work raises new questions and opportunities to investigate how diversity in statistical shapes can help explain heterogeneity in genomics.