Computational biologyAdvanced

Multi-Scale TAD Boundary Detection

A robust chromatin boundary should remain visible across more than one analysis window.

Hi-CTADsBoundary detectionGenomics

Site connection

The HiC-TAD project sweeps window sizes to separate robust boundaries from noisy local patterns.

Visual model

Boundary signal across scales

Move the boundary and read the heatmap as domain structure rather than a single fixed line.

Interactive

TAD boundaries appear where contact intensity changes

Why Scale Matters

A small window can detect local insulation changes but may be noisy. A large window smooths noise but can blur nearby domains.

Multi-scale detection asks whether a boundary is stable enough to survive changes in window size.

Robustness Over One-Off Peaks

A single peak in an insulation track is weaker evidence than a boundary that appears across resolutions or window settings.

Common Pitfalls

  • Calling boundaries from one arbitrary window size.
  • Comparing resolutions without normalization.
  • Treating all boundary calls as equal confidence.

Quick check

Quiz

Why sweep multiple window sizes?
  1. To make plots larger
  2. To test whether boundary calls are robust
  3. To delete low-contact regions
  4. To avoid normalization

Robust boundaries should not depend entirely on one analysis window.

Sources and Further Reading

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