Figure 6

Assessment of quantitative real-time PCR efficiencies from the replicates of four independent dilution datasets. Four independent datasets (in rows) were analyzed in respect to the PCR efficiencies of five different methods (in columns), as follows: 4-par: a four-parametric log-logistic model; 5-par: a five-parameter log-logistic model; exp: an exponential model after outlier cycle detection [9]; w-o-l: the window-of-linearity method as described in [8]; calib: a calibration curve obtained from linear regression of all threshold cycles. The boxplots depict the statistical features of the replicates within each dilution step. For methods 1–4, efficiencies were calculated per curve, while for method 5 one efficiency estimation was obtained from all dilution steps. If estimated efficiencies were larger than 2.1, this is denoted in the graphs. The derivation of the efficiency from four- and five-parameter models was done with Equation 8.