PleioGRiP: genetic risk prediction with pleiotropy

Motivation: Although several studies have used Bayesian classifiers for risk prediction using genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) datasets, no software can efficiently perform these analyses on massive genetic datasets and can accommodate multiple traits. Results: We describe the program PleioGRiP that performs a genome-wide Bayesian model search to identify SNPs associated with a discrete phenotype and uses SNPs ranked by Bayes factor to produce nested Bayesian classifiers. These classifiers can be used for genetic risk prediction, either selecting the classifier with optimal number of features or using an ensemble of classifiers. In addition, PleioGRiP implements an extension to the Bayesian search and classification and can search for pleiotropic relationships in which SNPs are simultaneosly associated with two or more distinct phenotypes. These relationships can be used to generate connected Bayesian classifiers to predict the phenotype of interest either using genetic data alone or in combination with the secondary phenotype(s).