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GROMTools offers near-identical GReX accuracy with 100-fold CPU savings versus PrediXcan and PLINK2

GROMTools offers near-identical GReX accuracy with 100-fold CPU savings versus PrediXcan and PLINK2
Photo by Navy Medicine / Unsplash
Key Takeaway
Consider GROMTools for efficient GReX imputation with high accuracy and reduced resource use.

This publication describes the software tool GROMTools and benchmarks its performance against PrediXcan and PLINK2 within shared and cloud-based compute environments. The evaluation utilized data from 50,000 to 450,000 individuals in the UK Biobank population. The primary outcome assessed was individual-level genetically regulated gene expression imputation across 388,017 variants and 11,724 gene-tissue pairs derived from 32 single-cell models.

The analysis found that GROMTools produced near-identical predictions compared to the comparators. Accuracy was defined by a minimum Pearson correlation greater than 0.999 and a maximum RMSE less than 0.001. Performance metrics for CPU time and peak memory were also reduced, showing about 100-fold and about 33-fold reductions respectively.

The authors note that existing tools were not designed for mega-biobank-scale settings and require complex, memory-intensive workflows. Consequently, GROMTools is presented as a practical and cost-efficient solution for routine biobank-scale individual-level GReX imputation on standard CPU infrastructure. Safety data such as adverse events or tolerability were not reported.

Study Details

EvidenceLevel 5
PublishedApr 2026
View Original Abstract ↓
Motivation: The computational burden of individual-level genetically regulated gene expression (GReX) imputation has risen sharply with the growth of human mega-biobanks and the rapid expansion of transcriptomic imputation models across tissues and single-cell hierarchies. Existing tools were not designed for this setting and require complex, memory-intensive workflows that are poorly matched to shared and cloud-based compute environments, where runtime, memory, and I/O directly determine cost and throughput. GROMTools is an open-source C++ engine with an R interface that exploits sparse prediction weights, streams PLINK2 genotypes, and writes compact binary outputs for scalable individual-level GReX imputation. Results: In UK Biobank (UKBB), benchmarks on chromosome 1 across 50,000-450,000 individuals, 388,017 variants, and 11,724 gene-tissue pairs from 32 single-cell models, GROMTools produced near-identical predictions to PrediXcan and PLINK2, with minimum Pearson correlation >0.999 and maximum RMSE <0.001 across all of the imputed genes, while reducing CPU time by about 100-fold and peak memory by about 33-fold. These gains make routine biobank-scale individual-level GReX imputation practical and cost-efficient on standard CPU infrastructure.
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