Figure 1

Curve group ‘123’ (upper panels; differences in gene expression values for cases and matched controls highest closest to diagnosis) and ‘321’ (lower panels; gene expression differences highest further from diagnosis) according to time to diagnosis. The left panels present spline-estimated curves for 20 randomly selected genes from each given curve group for illustrational purposes. The dashed, vertical lines indicate the last 2 years prior to diagnosis. In the middle panel the circles represent the differences in gene expression for each case–control pair for one randomly chosen gene, and the respective mean values in each time period are displayed in red and a spline-estimated curve with the gene expression differences for the same gene is displayed in black. The right panels display the same results as the middle panel but calculated for 20 genes.