MASQOT : a method for cDNA microarray spot quality control.

• BackgroundcDNA microarray technology has emerged as a major player in the parallel detection of biomolecules, but still suffers from fundamental technical problems. Identifying and removing unreliable data is crucial to prevent the risk of receiving illusive analysis results. Visual assessment of spot quality is still a common procedure, despite the time-consuming work of manually inspecting spots in the range of hundreds of thousands or more.ResultsA novel methodology for cDNA microarray spot quality control is outlined. Multivariate discriminant analysis was used to assess spot quality based on existing and novel descriptors. The presented methodology displays high reproducibility and was found superior in identifying unreliable data compared to other evaluated methodologies.ConclusionThe proposed methodology for cDNA microarray spot quality control generates non-discrete values of spot quality which can be utilized as weights in subsequent analysis procedures as well as to discard spots of undesired quality using the suggested threshold values. The MASQOT approach provides a consistent assessment of spot quality and can be considered an alternative to the labor-intensive manual quality assessment process.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Automatic Data Processing/instrumentation/methods

Data Interpretation; Statistical

Discriminant Analysis

Microarray Analysis/*instrumentation/methods

Multivariate Analysis

Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis/*standards

Quality Control

ROC Curve

Software

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)