Year: 2021
Type: preprint
Abstract: We propose a statistical framework to investigate whether a given subpopulation lies between two other subpopulations in a multivariate feature space. This methodology is motivated by a biological question from a collaborator: Is a newly discovered cell type between two known types in several given features? We propose two in-betweenness indices (IBI) to quantify the in-betweenness exhibited by a random triangle formed by the summary statistics of the three subpopulations. Statistical inference methods are provided for triangle shape and IBI metrics. The application of our methods is demonstrated in three examples: the classic Iris data set, a study of risk of relapse across three breast cancer subtypes, and the motivating neuronal cell data with measured electrophysiological features.
Source: arXiv (Cornell University)
Institution: University of California, Irvine
Language: English
Subfield: Computational Theory and Mathematics
Field: Computer Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3138621366