Hi, Having a set of values (non-time series), what are the approximation functions that could determine the trend of the values? Cheers, Carol [[alternative HTML version deleted]]

It depends on the number of x-values you have and the approximate shape of the trend. Polynomials are popular. Sines and cosines are popular for periodic functions. If you have lots of x-values, you could use nonparametric estimators such as smoothing splines or loess. --Naomi Altman At 03:50 PM 4/6/2009, carol white wrote: >Hi, >Having a set of values (non-time series), what are the approximation >functions that could determine the trend of the values? > >Cheers, > >Carol > > > > > [[alternative HTML version deleted]] > >_______________________________________________ >Bioconductor mailing list >Bioconductor at stat.math.ethz.ch >https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/bioconductor >Search the archives: >http://news.gmane.org/gmane.science.biology.informatics.conductor Naomi S. Altman 814-865-3791 (voice) Associate Professor Dept. of Statistics 814-863-7114 (fax) Penn State University 814-865-1348 (Statistics) University Park, PA 16802-2111