ABSTRACT.- Background: Likelihood-based inferences such as variance components estimation and hypothesis testing need logarithms of the determinant (log-determinant) of high dimensional matrices. Calculating the log-determinant is memory and time-consuming, making it impossible to perform likelihood-based inferences for large datasets. Conclusions: The method presented in this study allows to approximate the log-determinant of positive semi-definite matrices and, therefore, the likelihood for datasets of any size. This opens the possibility of performing likelihood-based inferences for large datasets in animal and plant breeding.
© The Author(s) 2025.