Cited by 5,195Gene expression and cancer classificationGenomics and Phylogenetic StudiesSingle-cell and spatial transcriptomics

Differential expression analysis of multifactor RNA-Seq experiments with respect to biological variation

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McCarthy, Davis J., Chen, Yunshun, Smyth, Gordon K.·2012·Nucleic Acids Research

Abstract

A flexible statistical framework is developed for the analysis of read counts from RNA-Seq gene expression studies. It provides the ability to analyse complex experiments involving multiple treatment conditions and blocking variables while still taking full account of biological variation. Biological variation between RNA samples is estimated separately from the technical variation associated with sequencing technologies. Novel empirical Bayes methods allow each gene to have its own specific variability, even when there are relatively few biological replicates from which to estimate such variability. The pipeline is implemented in the edgeR package of the Bioconductor project. A case study analysis of carcinoma data demonstrates the ability of generalized linear model methods (GLMs) to detect differential expression in a paired design, and even to detect tumour-specific expression changes. The case study demonstrates the need to allow for gene-specific variability, rather than assuming a common dispersion across genes or a fixed relationship between abundance and variability. Genewise dispersions de-prioritize genes with inconsistent results and allow the main analysis to focus on changes that are consistent between biological replicates. Parallel computational approaches are developed to make non-linear model fitting faster and more reliable, making the application of GLMs to genomic data more convenient and practical. Simulations demonstrate the ability of adjusted profile likelihood estimators to return accurate estimators of biological variability in complex situations. When variation is gene-specific, empirical Bayes estimators provide an advantageous compromise between the extremes of assuming common dispersion or separate genewise dispersion. The methods developed here can also be applied to count data arising from DNA-Seq applications, including ChIP-Seq for epigenetic marks and DNA methylation analyses.

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  • Regularization by combining information across similar genes is commonly applied in learning error models for bulk RNA-seq in differential expression analysis, but has not been previously applied in this context for single-cell normalization.

    “This approach is commonly applied in learning error models for bulk RNA-seq in the context of differential expression analysis [22–25], but to our knowledge has not been previously applied in this context for single-cell normalization.”
  • edgeR introduced GLM algorithms and statistical methods for estimating biological variation on a genewise basis and separating it from technical variation.

    “Additionally, edgeR [22] introduced GLM algorithms and statistical methods for estimating biological variation on a genewise basis and separating it from technical variation.”
  • A regularization step that pools parameter estimates across genes with similar mean abundance can effectively overcome the overfitting and yield reproducible models.

    “We demonstrate that a regularization step, a commmon step in bulk RNA-seq analysis [22, 28] where parameter estimates are pooled across genes with similar mean abundance, can effectively overcome this challenge and yield reproducible models.”
  • The quasi-likelihood framework in edgeR was used to handle the pronounced variability of single-cell expression states.

    “and the quasi-likelihood framework within edgeR to handle the pronounced variability of the single cell expression states.”
  • A negative binomial model in edgeR was used to account for the sparse single-cell count matrix.

    “We used the negative binomial (NB) model implemented in edgeR (3.10.0)79–83 for our single cell differential expression analysis to explicitly account for the sparse count matrix”

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Authors
McCarthy, D. J., Chen, Y., & Smyth, G. K.
Affiliations
The University of Melbourne (AU)
Corresponding author
Smyth, Gordon K.
Venue
Nucleic Acids Research
Published
2012-01-28
Volume
40
Issue
10
Pages
4288-4297
ISSN
  • 0305-1048 (ISSN-L)
  • 1362-4962
OpenAlex
W2130116522
Cited by
5,195
References
70
Citations by year
2026: 203 · 2025: 339 · 2024: 496 · 2023: 527 · 2022: 680 · 2021: 828 · 2020: 640 · 2019: 463 · 2018: 354 · 2017: 237 · 2016: 157 · 2015: 110 · 2014: 92 · 2013: 47 · 2012: 18
FWCI
34.30
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Nucleic Acids Research (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Minerva Access (University of Melbourne) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • HighWire Press Open Archive (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • Medical Research Council
  • National Health and Medical Research Council
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Gene expression and cancer classification
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Genomics and Phylogenetic Studies
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Single-cell and spatial transcriptomics
Keywords
differential gene expression, RNA-seq read counts, biological variation, technical variability, empirical Bayes, edgeR, generalized linear models, paired design, carcinoma, profile likelihood, count data analysis, DNA sequencing, ChIP-seq, DNA methylation
MeSH terms
Algorithms, Bayes Theorem, Carcinoma, Squamous Cell, Mouth Neoplasms, Genetic Variation, Linear Models, Sequence Analysis, RNA, Gene Expression Profiling, High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing

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