Multi-allelic measures of inbreeding
by
Bruce Weir
Department of Statistics, North Carolina State University

It is convenient to quantify allelic dependencies by ''inbreeding coefficients'' and also convenient to use a single coefficient for loci with several alleles. It is simple to construct moment estimators for these coefficients, but maximum likelihood estimates require iterative methods. By making the assumption that allele frequencies can be estimated by their observed values, a multivariate approach leads to a simple maximum likelihood estimate for the inbreeding coefficient and a chi-square sampling distribution for the estimate. This approach can be extended to the parameters used to characterize population structure when data are available from several populations.

Date received: November 7, 2001

Copyright © 2001 by the author(s). The author(s) of this document and the organizers of the conference have granted their consent to include this abstract in Atlas Conferences Inc. Document # caic-27.