RT Journal Article SR Electronic T1 The Phase Shift Correlation function uncovers periodic Ulcerative Colitis microbiome relationships without temporal sampling JF bioRxiv FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory SP 2020.07.01.174409 DO 10.1101/2020.07.01.174409 A1 Robert E. Brown A1 Alena Arlova A1 Patrick M. Gillevet YR 2020 UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/07/02/2020.07.01.174409.abstract AB Correlation analysis is a fundamental technique to determine potential relationships within biological processes. However, many biological processes have been shown to function in a periodic manner. When modeling correlations, the fluctuations that are associated with periodicity cause significant issues. We have implemented a Phase Shift Correlation (PSC) algorithm, with a corresponding value PSCrho, to address the periodicity and phase variance associated with features that vary with the same frequency -- but are phase shifted. The phase shift could well indicate causality with one feature’s quantitative change leading to the change in the other feature.We applied the PSC algorithm to Ulcerative Colitis (UC) microbiome data and compared the resulting feature relationships with the equivalent Spearman correlation function results. PSC located many instances of higher phase shifted correlations, where the corresponding Pearson correlation was low.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.