Question on grn output: how to interpret the grn output where there are list of TFs and their target genes?

[yojetsharma]

The column consists of "estimate", "statistic" and "correlation" among others. What do the former mean really? For example, an X-gene is being unregulated at level of mRNA, then the TF regulating the expression of that X-gene can be 'estimated' (the higher number the more truer it is)? Or should we be looking at how well they're correlated (higher the correlation the truer it is)? Any insight on this will be very helpful!

[joschif]

• estimate is essentially the coefficient of the linear model that is fit by pando. It should indicate the strength and direction of the regulatory interaction.
• correlation indicated the global (pearson) correlation of the TF with the target gene. This often has a similar sign than estimate but does not have to, since the linear model takes into account many more terms.
• statistic is a value derived from the statistical significance test on the coefficients that is used to derive the p-value, which in turn is used to prune the network for 'significant' connections in modules. What exactly this value represents depends on the method used for fitting the model, though