The quantitative amplification of small amounts of DNA generates some uncertainty
in values for the low intensity spots. In order to track that uncertainty and
average repeated experiments with appropriate related weights, we adopted a
single-array error model first described by Hughes et al.
(2000).
According to this error model, the significance of a measured
ratio at a spot is defined by a statistic X, which takes the form
|
(1)
|

|
where a1,2 are the intensities measured in the two channels for each
spot,
1,2
are the uncertainties due to background subtraction, and f is a fractional multiplicative
error such as would come from hybridization non-uniformities, fluctuations in
the dye incorporation efficiency, scanner gain fluctuations, etc. The distribution
of X across all spots on a chip is approximately normal. The parameters
and
f were chosen based on control hybridizations such that X had unit variance. The
significance of a change of magnitude x is then calculated as
For each factor, three independent experiments were performed and each of the
three samples were analyzed individually using the single-array error model
described above. The average binding ratio and associated p-value from the triplicate
experiments were then calculated using a weighted average analysis method adapted
from Hughes et al. (2000).
Briefly, the binding ratio is expressed as the log10(a2/a1),
where a1,a2 are the intensities measured in the two channels
for each spot. The uncertainty in the log(Ratio) is defined as
| (3) |

|
where X is the statistic derived from the single array error model. We use the
minimum-variance weighted average to compute the mean log10(a2/a1)
of each spot:
| (4) |

|
| (5) |

|
Here
i
is the error of log10(a2/a1) from (3), xi
stands for i-th measurement of log10(a2/a1),
n is the number of repeats.
The error of
can be computed in two ways. One is to propagate the errors
i
, another is from the scatter of xi:
| (6) |

|
For the average of multiple slides, the significance statistic X is computed
as:
| (7) |

|
and the confidence is computed using Equation (2) from the single array error
model.