Variance adjusted weighted UniFrac: a powerful beta diversity measure for comparing communities based on phylogeny.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Beta diversity, which involves the assessment of differences between communities, is an important problem in ecological studies. Many statistical methods have been developed to quantify beta diversity, and among them, UniFrac and weighted-UniFrac (W-UniFrac) are widely used. The W-UniFrac is a weighted sum of branch lengths in a phylogenetic tree of the sequences from the communities. However, W-UniFrac does not consider the variation of the weights under random sampling resulting in less power detecting the differences between communities.

Results

We develop a new statistic termed variance adjusted weighted UniFrac (VAW-UniFrac) to compare two communities based on the phylogenetic relationships of the individuals. The VAW-UniFrac is used to test if the two commun

SUBMITTER: Chang Q 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3108311 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature