  It has been recently claimed that it is possible to predict the rate of de
novo mutation of each site in the human genome with almost perfect accuracy
(Michaelson et al. (2012) Cell, 151, 1431-1442). We show that this claim is
unwarranted. By considering the correlation between the rate of de novo
mutation and the predictions from the model of Michaelson et al., we show that
there could be substantial unexplained variance in the mutation rate. We also
demonstrate that the model of Michaelson et al. fails to capture a major
component of the variation in the mutation rate, that which is local but not
associated with simple context.
