Software for Constructing and Verifying Pedigrees within Large Genealogies and an Application to the Old Order Amish of Lancaster County
- Richa Agarwala1,2,
- Leslie G. Biesecker1,
- Katherine A. Hopkins3,
- Clair A. Francomano4 and
- Alejandro A. Schaffer1,5
- 1Laboratory for Genetic Disease Research (LGDR)/National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI)/National Institutes of Health (NIH), Bethesda, Maryland 20892 USA; 2(under contract to R.O.W. Sciences, Inc., Rockville, Maryland); 3Immunogenetics Laboratory, Division of Medical Genetics, Department of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland 21205 USA; 4Medical Genetics Branch (MGB)/NHGRI/NIH, Bethesda, Maryland 20892 USA, and Center for Medical Genetics and Department of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland 21205 USA;
Abstract
This paper describes PedHunter, a software package that facilitates creation and verification of pedigrees within large genealogies. A frequent problem in medical genetics is to connect distant relatives with a pedigree. PedHunter uses methods from graph theory to solve two versions of the pedigree connection problem for genealogies as well as other pedigree analysis problems. The pedigrees are produced by PedHunter as files in LINKAGE format ready for linkage analysis. PedHunter uses a relational database of genealogy data, with tables in specified format, for all calculations. The functionality and utility ofPedHunter are illustrated by examples using the Amish Genealogy Database (AGDB), which was created for the Old Order Amish community of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
- Received September 22, 1997.
- Accepted February 6, 1998.
- Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press