What are the advantages of a gene-based approach to tagSNP selection?
The gene-based approach offers a lower cost alternative to choosing anonymous SNPs across a region that has been chosen for fine-mapping. It provides a reasonable way to focus limited resources on the stretches of DNA most likely to contain disease susceptibility variants, the genes and flanking regions. tagSNPs are selected in and near genes, while intergenic regions are skipped over. Cost savings will, of course, be greater when this approach is employed in gene-poor regions, and lesser when it is employed in gene-rich regions.
