GOAD.DAVISON@BIONET-20.ARPA (04/02/88)
From: Dan Davison <GOAD.DAVISON@BIONET-20.ARPA> > From: Jack Kramer <CMATHEWS.KRAMER@BIONET-20.ARPA> > Subject: Statistical significance of "PERCENT" homology. > > The statistical significance of sequence similarity has been > extensively analysed. I would add, and still not well understood. There has been a lot of important work by Arratia, Waterman, and Galas, but I would not say that the problem is well understood. The distribution of nucleic acid similarities is described by extreme value theory and the Erdos-Renyai (sp?) law (with shifts) but there is no well defined distribution (a la binomial or Poisson) for them. Yet. I'd be glad to hear about any work in this field. dan davison/ theoretical biology/ t-10 ms k710 / los alamos national lab los alamos, nm 87545/ dd@lanl.gov, goad.davison@bionet-20.arpa -------