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Record of Changes to MERLIN
ChangeLog
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CHANGES AFTER PUBLIC RELEASE OF MERLIN
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MERLIN 1.1.2
============
* Fixed bug in handling of large swap files that caused Merlin to
crash when certain swap file components exceed 1 GB in size. This
bug affected analyses with the --swap option enabled.
* Fixed bug that caused Merlin to crash when --singlepoint option
was used in datasets with Mendelian inconsistencies.
* Fixed bug that caused trait names in Linkage format files to be lost.
* Added support for gzipped input files to Windows binary versions.
* Made the --rsq option a little smarter, so that it now avoids
creating LD clusters that induce too many obligate recombinants.
* Removed extra gibberish from error messages referring to missing
data and pedigree files.
* Updated examples subdirectory.
* Minor code changes to reduce the number of compilation warnings.
MERLIN 1.1.1
============
* Simulation of quantitative traits under the alternative hypothesis.
This capability described in the reference documentation and is
controlled through the --simulate and --trait options.
* The new --tabulate option stores results for most common analysis
(including linkage and association analyses) in a tab delimited file
to facilitate downstream analyses.
* Most input files can now be provided in .gzip format and will be
decompressed on the fly. This ability is not available for Windows
platforms.
* Multiple pedigree and data files can be provided as input. These
files should be separated by commas in the command line and must
be paired (every pedigree must be matched to a specific data
file). For example, if phenotype and genotype data were stored
in separate files the command line would look like this:
merlin -d geno.dat,pheno.dat -p geno.ped,pheno.ped ...
* Many small bug fixes and improvements in output readability
MERLIN 1.1.0
============
* Integrated quantitative trait association analysis and genotype
inference. Merlin can now evaluate evidence for association between
a SNP and a quantitative trait in families. If some genotypes are
missing, they will be estimated using information on flanking markers,
genotypes for their relatives and (if the markers fall within a
cluster of markers in LD), linkage disequilibrium information.
The approach provides a powerful and rapid test of association
for quantitative traits.
For details, see www.sph.umich.edu/csg/abecasis/tour/assoc.html
* Quantitative trait association analysis and genotype inference
for the X chromosome.
* Covariate lists for variance component-based quantitative trait
linkage and association analyses can now be customized for each
trait, using the --custom option.
* Support for base pair allele labels. Alleles can now be labelled
A, C, T and G in the pedigree file.
* Packed genotype storage so that each genotype consumes only two
bytes of memory, even for microsatellite data. Large output
pedigrees (from --simulate --swap option) now use less whitespace
to save disk usage.
* The --reruns (for running multiple rounds of simulation) and -fm
(for estimating maximum likelihood allele frequencies) are now
available within merlin-regress.
* Speed improvements in code used to model linkage disequilibrium.
* Redesigned memory management system, enables Merlin to analyze
more markers than previous versions. The --smallSwap option
reduces swap file and memory usage further by discarding and
later recalculating some values. It should never slow Merlin
down by > ~50%.
* Improved handling of founder couple symmetries in parametric
linkage analysis.
* Code changes to enhance portability, including GCC 4 compilation
support.
* Extras now include hapmapConverter utility to convert hapmap
genotype files into Merlin format.
* The --sexAsCovariate variable allows sex to be used as a covariate
without requiring a duplicate column in the pedigree file.
MERLIN 1.0.0
============
* Maximum Likelihood Allele Frequencies. Maximum likelihood estimates
of allele frequency are now possible with the -fm command line option.
* Parametric Analysis with Liability Classes. Parametric linkage analysis
now allows for user specified liability classes. Liability classes can
be defined according to values of covariates in the pedigree or sex
codes.
* Mersenne Twister Random Number Generator. A better random number
generator is now included in Merlin and especially useful when
producing very large numbers of replicates.
* Output Tweaks. Tweaked screen output for runs with very large numbers
of markers to improve readability.
* Haplotype Frequency Estimates for Long Clusters. When a cluster of
markers includes >16384 possible haplotypes, Merlin now uses a
divide-and-conquer algorithm for haplotype frequency estimation.
* Bug fix for haplotype sampling option in the presence of LD. Conditional
sampling of haplotypes (with the --sample command line option) now
produces correct results even when there are clusters of markers in
linkage disequilibrium.
* Bug fix to output of IBD estimates for X-linked markers. Fixed bug
that could result in incorrect IBD estimates for some three generation
pedigrees. The bug did not affect other calculations (such as variance
components analysis) and lead to incorrect IBD estimates for pairs of
individuals including one founder.
* Changed example input files for parametric linkage analysis to match
example on website tutorial.
MERLIN 1.0.0 (alpha release)
============================
* Cluster of Markers in LD.
See http://www.sph.umich.edu/csg/abecasis/Merlin/tour/disequilibrium.html
* Parametric Linkage Analysis.
See http://www.sph.umich.edu/csg/abecasis/Merlin/tour/parametric.html
* Kong and Cox Exponential Model.
This is an alternative likelihood-based non-parametric linkage test
that is more powerful in samples that include large pedigrees or where
large effects are observed.
* Improved Simulation Capability.
Multiple simulations can now be carried out consecutively, using the
--reruns option.
* Automated Trait Model Fitting for Random Samples in Merlin-Regress.
MERLIN 0.10.2
=============
* Simwalk2 Interface. Updated file formats, for users of the
MENDEL/SIMWALK2/MERLIN interface which allows fast NPL calculations
in datasets including large and small pedigrees.
* Updates to internal allele recoding code.
MERLIN 0.10.1
=============
* Case Selection. Cases who are most likely to carry disease alleles
can be identified on the bases of allele sharing information. This
information can increase the power of follow-up association studies
where a single individual per family is genotyped (see Fingerlin et
al, AJHG for more details).
* Output File Management. Names for output files can now be specified
with the --prefix option. For example, when using the --ibd option
the default is to generate a [merlin.ibd] file. However, if the
"--prefix foo" option were added to the command line the IBD output
file would be called [foo.ibd] instead.
* Support for multiple trait measurements in MERLIN-REGRESS. If multiple
trait measurements were taken, two columns should be included in
the pedigree file for each trait. The standard column with trait
measurement should include the average of all measurements for
each subject, a second covariate column should include the number
of repeat measurements taken for each subject. This second column
should be labelled with the trait name and the prefix "_repeats"
appended. (If the trait is called VERBAL_IQ, the number of repeat
measurements should be VERBAL_IQ_REPEATS). The testRetest correlation
is specified with the testRetest command line parameter.
* A new version of PedStats. A much improved version of pedstats with
better statistics and graphical output is now included. Please see
http://www.sph.umich.edu/csg/abecasis/pedstats for details.
* Per family LOD score contributions in variance components analyses.
When the --vc and --perFamily options are combined, each family's
contribution to the overall LOD score is recorded in the perFamily
file.
* Support for monozygotic twins. Monozygotic twins require a Merlin/QTDT
format data and pedigree file with a zygosity column (labelled "Z" in
the data file) and with the code MZ for all monozygotic twins and zero
(0) for all other individuals. If there are multiple sets of twins in
a sibship, the MZ code should be replaced with a unique odd number for
each twinship.
* Bug fix in analysis assuming with the --zero recombination fraction. In
rare instances where the --zero command line option is specified, the
recombination fractions specified in the map file is not zero, and the
first marker in some families is uninformative, previous versions of Merlin
allow for recombination between the first marker and the first informative
marker.
* Internal Allele Recoding. A bug whereby allele labels could be lost for
some of the alleles described in the original frequency file or linkage
format data file but which did not appear in the pedigree. This bug could
cause problems when analysing simulated pedigrees where the allele was
sampled.
* Information content calculations now include completely uninformative
families. Previous versions of Merlin calculated information content only
within families that were at least partially informative, which could
result in slight over-estimates of the actual information content.
MERLIN 0.9.12
=============
* Bug fix in variance components analyses for X-linked loci. The kinship
coefficient for founder males is now correctly set at 1.0, rather 0.5.
This problem most often lead to non-positive definite variance-covariance
matrices, but could also lead to inaccurate results.
* Cleaned up output of --likelihood option.
* Pedstats now generates pairwise correlation plots for different types
of relatives when the --pairs and --pdf options are specified.
MERLIN 0.9.11
=============
* Variance Components with Covariates. Fixed memory allocation leak that
caused Merlin to stop when unused covariates present in the pedigree
file. This bug resulted from ongoing re-engineering of the variance
components module to support a simple ascertainment correction.
MERLIN 0.9.10
=============
* Added tracking of allele names for alleles that are not present in pedigree.
This is required when the --save or --frequencies options are used.
MERLIN 0.9.9
============
* Improved Portability. Removed all (void *) to (int) conversions to allow
compilation on some 64-bit architectures. In addition, provided replacement
snprintf for architectures with a buggy version in the system library.
* Improved PDF Graph Layout. Graphs in PedStats now provide better handling
of missing data. R^2 in the sib-sib trait and covariate plots has been
replaced by the correlation coefficient r, which is expected to be half
of the heritability for a simple genetic trait.
* Pedstats/PDF bug fixes. Fixed mislabelling of males and females in breakdown
of phenotype scores by sex.
* Fixed Problems With Internal Allele Recoding. The new allele recoding engine,
introduced in version 0.9.8, did not track allele frequencies of the alleles
not present in the pedigree file. This could cause Merlin to crash when the
--simulate option was used.
* Speed Refinements for Variance Components. Variance components linkage analysis
now proceeds faster than in version 0.9.8 and is comparable to version 0.9.3.
MERLIN 0.9.8
============
* Basic PDF output. Merlin and Merlin-Regress now produce a simple PDF
file with one LOD score plot per page when the --pdf option is used.
Each trait, chromosome and analysis option is plotted on a separate page.
* Pedigree Trimming. Merlin and Merlin-Regress can now remove uninformative
individuals from pedigrees to speed up analysis. To use this functionality,
use the --trim command line option.
* Microsatellite Allele Sizes. Allele numbers are now recoded internally,
allowing microsatellite allele sizes to be used in the pedigree file.
* Extended IBD state information. Extended allele IBD state probabilities,
which distinguish maternal and paternal allele sharing and provide additional
information on inbreeding can now be calculated.
* Multiple Trait Models for Regression Analyses. MERLIN-REGRESS now accepts an
optional table describing mean, variance and heritability for each trait. This
facilitates analyses of pedigree files with multiple traits.
* Founder couple symmetries can be optionally disabled with the --noCoupleBits
option.
* For variance components analysis, fixed bug that led to non-invertible
matrices when the parameter estimated variance components are close to
zero. This condition could produce a crash in earlier versions.
* Fixed bug in Merlin-Regress that caused crashes in families with
more than 4 pairs of grand-parents with no phenotype or genotype
data. This condition would produce a crash in earlier versions.
* Fixed aggressive optimization that could cause the --all option (which lists
all non-recombinant haplotypes) to miss some haplotype states. Formerly,
markers were labelled uninformative whenever they implied identical likelihoods
for all inheritance vectors. This version implements a stricter definition
that also requires that the same allelic state is implied for each vector.
MERLIN 0.9.3
============
* Minor source code changes for compatibility with GCC version 3.
* Horizontal haplotypes are no longer output by default, but
require --horizontal flag.
MERLIN 0.9.2
============
* Public release incorporating changes in versions 0.9.0 and 0.9.1.
MERLIN 0.9.1
============
* Added general pedigree regression analysis. This is an early
implementation of the approach proposed by Sham et al (2002)
in the AJHG. It is still somewhat slow, but functional. Run
as a separate program, MERLIN-REGRESS.
* Added --horizontal option which selects horizontal haplotype
layout in [merlin.chr] output file.
* Stopped Merlin from automatically loading [merlin.freq] allele
frequency file. To load allele frequencies, the -f filename
option must be specified explicitly.
* Added --useCovariates options to support covariates
in variance components linkage analyses.
* Fixed bug that led to crashes when the number of alleles in
the pedigree exceeded those in the allele frequency file by
exactly one.
* Renamed the option --marker-names as --markerNames, for
consistency with other two word options, such as --minStep
and --maxStep.
MERLIN 0.9.0
============
* Support for X chromosome incorporated. Runs as a separate
program, Merlin In X (MINX).
* New --frequencies output option saves allele frequencies as
estimated by merlin in merlin.freq file.
* New --perFamily output option saves information and NPL
scores for individual families in separate files.
* Quiet output no longer includes warning when markers with
very low information are skipped.
* Input pedigree files now checked for the presence of parents
with identical sexes. If a pedigree file has more than one
formatting problem, Merlin tries to report as many problems
as possible before stopping.
* Linkage datafiles where lines end precisely with "<<" or
">>" now handled correctly. In previous versions, these lines
would be rejected by Merlin with an error message.
* Changed scaling of non-parametric linkage statistics in
Simwalk2 interface file.
* Minor changes in source code to improve portability.
Specifically, there are no longer any return statements
with void arguments or new style type casts. This should
allow compilation with Sun Workshop C++ compiler.
* Minor changes in Makefile to improve portability.
Specifically, ar and ranlib are now invoked separately to
allow compilation in Mac OS X systems.
MERLIN 0.8.8
============
* Fixed problem reading linkage files with liability class
information. Previous versions printed a spurious warning
about trailing columns in input pedigree and ignored the
last column in input.
MERLIN 0.8.7a
=============
* Families with impossible recombination patterns excluded
from NPL analyses (previously scored as zero) and variance
components analyses.
MERLIN 0.8.7
============
* Merlin now estimates kinship between inbred parents and
their offspring (previously assumed to be 0.25).
MERLIN 0.8.6
============
* Fixed singlepoint so correct marker names are displayed.
(Problem occurred when --steps, --minStep, --maxStep, and
--grid, --start and --stop options were introduced)
* Change optimization default from -O3 to -O2 to avoid
crashing gcc-2.95.3.
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CHANGES BEFORE PUBLIC RELEASE OF MERLIN
=============================================================
MERLIN 0.8.5
============
* Added --steps, --minStep, --maxStep as well as --grid,
--start and --stop for fine control of analysis locations.
* The --steps option now replaces the old -i (steps per
interval) option.
* Now includes intermediate output at all markers, even
those that map at the same location, for --simwalk2
analyses.
* Fixed in variance components that resulted in non-
positive definite matrices in some pedigrees with
uninformative grand-parents.
* Added pedwipe to MERLIN distribution.
MERLIN 0.8.3
============
* Check whether recombination fractions or centiMorgan
distances are provided in linkage datafiles.
MERLIN 0.8.2
============
* Maintain ordering for markers separate by the recombination
fractions of zero. Previously, the output order for these
markers was random. The new version keeps the same order
as in the linkage datafile (linkage format) or mapfile
(qtdt format)
* Output IBD probabilities with 5 digit precision.
MERLIN-0.8.1
============
* Major editing of tree traversal and construction code to
account for changes in operator precedence between gcc
version 3.0 and versions 2.95.*.
(and you thought C++ was pretty well established, eh?)
* Minor fix to code which optimizes ordering of individuals
within pedigrees. No effect on results, but may sometimes
speed things up.
MERLIN-0.7.3
============
* Catch out of memory errors during haplotyping and gracefully
skip to next pedigree.
MERLIN-0.7.1
============
* Attempt to recover from memory allocation failures. In 32-bit
systems some failures are unrecoverable (e.g., trying to
allocate memory blocks > 2GB), so the --megabytes option is
necessary so Merlin doesn't try to allocate these huge blocks.
* The --bits option now replaces the old -b option.
MERLIN-0.6.1
============
* Very unlikely genotypes now have scores in scientific notation,
e.g., 1e-10 instead of 0.00000.
* Added support for variance components analysis.
MERLIN-0.5.1
============
* First version distributed outside Oxford.
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OLDER VERSIONS OF MERLIN ONLY USED INTERNALLY
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