Chromlook: an interactive program for error detection and mapping in reference linkage data.

Preliminary genetic linkage maps of every human chromosome have been generated over the past few years, and efforts to extend and refine these maps are under way. However, fine-resolution mapping is tedious and difficult because the inevitable errors in the data confound estimates of both the placement of loci and the distances between them. Fortunately, in most cases these errors result in observed recombinants where no true recombinant has occurred. The simple strategy presented here identifies these recombinants by relying on the assumption that recombinants between two adjacent markers are relatively rare events. This strategy has been implemented in the computer program CHROMLOOK, and examples of its use are given. Identification of recombinants allows for the directed regenotyping of suspicious data, the quick mapping of new polymorphisms using recombination minimization, and the development of a meiotic breakpoint map.