Smooth modeling of bisulfite sequencing (SOMNiBUS) is a statistical method for modelling covariate effects in bisulfite sequencing derived measures of DNA methylation. Identifying disease-associated changes in DNA methylation can help us gain a better understanding of disease etiology. Developed in Prof. Celia Greenwood's group by former PhD student Kaiqiong Zhao, (now Assistant Professor at York University) this algorithm contains a very powerful method for identifying associations between phenotypes and sequencing-derived measures of methylation in predefined genomic regions.
SOMNiBUS estimates relationships between phenotypes or covariates and methylation patterns. The gain in statistical power is obtained by borrowing information from nearby measurements; this concept also means that the method optimises use of the data even when some are missing or when some positions were read with low sequencing depth. This method also allows for sequencing errors and can adjust for variability in cell type mixture.
