Computational approaches for inferring 3D conformations of chromatin from chromosome conformation capture data

Chromosome conformation capture (3C) and its variants are powerful experimental techniques for probing intra- and inter-chromosomal interactions within cell nuclei at high resolution and in a high-throughput, quantitative manner. The contact maps derived from such experiments provide an avenue for inferring the 3D spatial organization of the genome. This review provides an overview of the various computational methods developed in the past decade for addressing the very important but challenging problem of deducing the detailed 3D structure or structure population of chromosomal domains, chromosomes, and even entire genomes from 3C contact maps.