Associating Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms and RNA-seq Measures of Transcript Abundance with Quantitative Traits

Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) can be used to track genomic variation at millions of loci across genotypes.  RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) can be used to measure transcript abundance levels of tens of thousands of genes.  Baker Center personnel (Li, Wang, and Nettleton) are developing methods for modeling quantitative traits as additive functions of SNP effects and nonlinear transcript abundance effects.  Adaptive group LASSO (AGLASSO) methods are used to select and estimate the effects of important SNPs and transcripts.