{"title":"A Crisis of Population Genetics Statistics","authors":"Matthew J. Maxwell","doi":"10.1007/s10441-026-09517-8","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div>\n \n <p>Population genetics relies heavily on homozygosity statistics. Over the past two decades, however, as the number and applications of homozygosity-based statistics has increased, there has been a crisis of confidence. Homozygosity statistics are mathematically constrained by other population genetics statistics, such as maximum allele frequency, creating problems for interpretation and portability. Mathematical investigations into these constraints have been criticized for being irrelevant to biology. Noah Rosenberg’s new book <i>Mathematical Properties of Population-Genetic Statistics</i> is his response to these concerns. While accepting many of the criticisms, Rosenberg shows that careful attention to purely mathematical constraints on homozygosity can be leveraged to design new statistics to achieve new goals.</p>\n </div>","PeriodicalId":7057,"journal":{"name":"Acta Biotheoretica","volume":"74 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.3000,"publicationDate":"2026-02-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Acta Biotheoretica","FirstCategoryId":"99","ListUrlMain":"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10441-026-09517-8","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"MATHEMATICAL & COMPUTATIONAL BIOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Population genetics relies heavily on homozygosity statistics. Over the past two decades, however, as the number and applications of homozygosity-based statistics has increased, there has been a crisis of confidence. Homozygosity statistics are mathematically constrained by other population genetics statistics, such as maximum allele frequency, creating problems for interpretation and portability. Mathematical investigations into these constraints have been criticized for being irrelevant to biology. Noah Rosenberg’s new book Mathematical Properties of Population-Genetic Statistics is his response to these concerns. While accepting many of the criticisms, Rosenberg shows that careful attention to purely mathematical constraints on homozygosity can be leveraged to design new statistics to achieve new goals.
期刊介绍：
Acta Biotheoretica is devoted to the promotion of theoretical biology, encompassing mathematical biology and the philosophy of biology, paying special attention to the methodology of formation of biological theory.
Papers on all kind of biological theories are welcome. Interesting subjects include philosophy of biology, biomathematics, computational biology, genetics, ecology and morphology. The process of theory formation can be presented in verbal or mathematical form. Moreover, purely methodological papers can be devoted to the historical origins of the philosophy underlying biological theories and concepts.
Papers should contain clear statements of biological assumptions, and where applicable, a justification of their translation into mathematical form and a detailed discussion of the mathematical treatment. The connection to empirical data should be clarified.
Acta Biotheoretica also welcomes critical book reviews, short comments on previous papers and short notes directing attention to interesting new theoretical ideas.
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