Scuphr: A probabilistic framework for cell lineage tree reconstruction

PLoS Comput Biol. 2024 May 9;20(5):e1012094. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1012094. eCollection 2024 May.

Abstract

Cell lineage tree reconstruction methods are developed for various tasks, such as investigating the development, differentiation, and cancer progression. Single-cell sequencing technologies enable more thorough analysis with higher resolution. We present Scuphr, a distance-based cell lineage tree reconstruction method using bulk and single-cell DNA sequencing data from healthy tissues. Common challenges of single-cell DNA sequencing, such as allelic dropouts and amplification errors, are included in Scuphr. Scuphr computes the distance between cell pairs and reconstructs the lineage tree using the neighbor-joining algorithm. With its embarrassingly parallel design, Scuphr can do faster analysis than the state-of-the-art methods while obtaining better accuracy. The method's robustness is investigated using various synthetic datasets and a biological dataset of 18 cells.

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms*
  • Cell Lineage* / genetics
  • Computational Biology* / methods
  • Humans
  • Models, Statistical
  • Sequence Analysis, DNA / methods
  • Single-Cell Analysis* / methods
  • Software