Spatial point process analysis of promyelocytic leukemia nuclear bodies

Abstract

There has been widespread interest in the nuclear body (NB) Promyelocytic leukemia (PML) because of its link to several human disorders, including Promyelocytic leukemia and AIDS. The notion of PML NB interaction with its surrounding and other NBs such as RNA Polymerase II (RNA Pol II) is of great importance as it can improve our understanding of the function of PML. In this paper, spatial point process methods are used to conduct multivariate analysis to assess the relationship between the spatial locations of PML NBs relative to RNA Pol II. We also propose a model for PML NB locations. By fitting a model to the PML NBs we are able to gain insight into how PML NBs are distributed across the nucleus in relation to themselves and the nuclear boundary.