Some discrepancy in total biomass values between the different maps can be attributed to the differences in allometric models applied to the field dataset used to develop the maps.
This process was then repeated until there were no discrepancies between the different maps.
Thus the loci we aligned between the different maps and the bovine sequence carry a very high probability of correctly assigned homology.
Field notes from the discussions and interviews were reviewed and salient themes noted as well as divergences and discrepancies between the different maps.
Unfortunately, it is not currently possible to cross-reference the linkage groups presented in this report with the groups generated in the present study, as too few markers are common between the different maps.
Therefore, the significance of the point-mutant studies shown here is two-fold: First, they demonstrate high consistency between all the different mapping-approaches and, second, by using conformationally-intact reagents, these studies attest to the physiologic relevance of the data.
After evaluation of the consistency of the loci order between the two different maps, 75 common loci between the two mapping populations (55 AFLP and 20 framework) were used to determine the relative orientations of the linkage groups in their respective maps and to combine the maps into a consensus map (Fig. 1).
The association of features between different maps gives us transformations between the different key maps.
Since the collinearity between the different individual maps was very good, the conservation of the block organization between these individual maps was also very good with some additional blocks on some maps due to the different number of markers mapped in these regions (Additional file 3: Figure S1).
For chromosomes with regions showing a low number of markers in common between the different linkage maps values were moved up to 5.0 and down to 0, respectively, allowing for map integration.
In order to quantify the compatibility between the different cochleotopic maps we used an alignment index introduced by Sereno and Huang [3].
