The Quartet Project for Multi-sample Quality Control of Multi-omics Profiling and Data Integration
Multi-omics profiling is facing challenges including quality control (QC) of new technologies and effective integration of diverse datasets from various scenarios. In this and the companion papers, we report the findings of the Quartet Project and provide tools and best practices for multi-omics studies. Large quantities of public accessible multi-omics reference materials (28,000 vials) and datasets (100 TB) were established from the B-lymphoblastoid cell lines derived from parents and monozygotic twin daughters. The Quartet between-sample relationship also provided reference-free QC metrics to improve the performance evaluations for each omics type. In addition, the ability to differentiate biologically different samples, defined as Quartet signal-to-noise ratio, enabled the objective assessment of within-omics and cross-omics data integration. Practical guidelines and the Data Portal were developed to facilitate utilization of the established Quartet multi-omics “ground truths” and QC tools, improving process control within a laboratory and developing analytical strategies for data integration of multi-omics profiling.