3 ms·
Their accuracy is completely subject to stable mutation rate and frequency of sample -- with that second paper, they were working with ~10 samples from 15 years
by mikeyouse 4y ago
Their accuracy is completely subject to stable mutation rate and frequency of sample -- with that second paper, they were working with ~10 samples from 15 years ago vs. thousands of samples with hourly granularity and entirely traceable transmission chains in the early days of Covid. Completely different capabilities arise with Covid-level specificity.
- dekhn 4y agoThanks, I'll have to give this some deep thought, it's news to me that having that much more data gives you high resolution in real time.
- mikeyouse 4y agoIt's more a matter of decreasing the error bars on the rate of substitution, to have extremely specific dates for the oldest infections in each clade and the ability to run real-time backtesting to make sure your assumptions are solid. The rate of spread of Covid was a curse but was important to this type of work -- when we were looking at contact tracing and trying to assess the rate of substitution on mutations, it was useful to know that e.g. on Jan 1st there was no Covid in NYC and on Feb 1st there was.