Title:  A Bootstrap Assessment of Variability in Pedigree 
        Reconstruction Based on DNA Markers

Author: Anthony Almudevar


Abstract:

The problem of assessing the variability in pedigree
reconstruction using DNA markers is considered
for the special case of single generation samples
with no parents present in the sample. Error in
pedigree reconstruction is measured through a metric
imposed on the space of partitions of the individuals into family
groups. A confidence set can therefore be taken to
be a neighbourhood of a point estimate, analogous
to the estimation of a parameter in Euclidean space.
The coverage probability is estimated using bootstrap techniques.
Although the distributional properties of the sample
depend on the population genotype frequencies, these are in 
practice usually unknown.
Confidence sets conditioned on a statistic approximately
sufficient for these frequencies are compared to confidence
sets obtained by substituting frequency estimates directly
into the sampling distribution. In two simulation studies the
difference is found to be of some consequence.


Key words: pedigree reconstruction, bootstrapping,
           DNA markers