NoVaTeST: Identifying Genes with Location Dependent Noise Variance in Spatial Transcriptomics Data.MOTIVATION
 In this paper, we propose NoVaTeST, a framework to identify genes with location-dependent noise variance in ST data.  NoVaTeST models gene expression as a function of spatial location and allows the noise to vary spatially.  NoVaTeST then statistically compares this model to one with constant noise and detects genes showing significant spatial noise variation.  In tumor samples, the noisy genes detected by NoVaTeST are largely independent of the spatially variable genes detected by existing tools that assume constant noise, and provide important biological insights into tumor microenvironments.


 An implementation of the NoVaTeST framework in Python along with instructions for running the pipeline is available at https://github.com/abidabrar-bracu/NoVaTeST.



NoVaTeST