Dear All, I've been using step function to find me the best model.this basically works by using AIC score fucntion that is implemented on step(). The problem I'm facing with lots of variables on the model for example : step(lm(x1~x2,x3,x4,......x13)) sometimes gives me a warning message which is : AIC=- inf Coefficients: (Intercept) wnt3.values wnt6.values wnt10b.values wnt9a.values 2.3462 -0.4689 2.0730 1.2769 -0.2319 sfrp1.values wnt5b.values sfrp1.1.values sfrp5.values fzd5.1.values -0.2597 0.3150 0.3811 0.5926 -1.5567 fzd1.values fzd4.values fzd6.values fzd7.values fzd7.1.values 0.6459 -2.3016 0.3636 NA NA fzd8.values NA Warning message: attempting model selection on an essentially perfect fit is nonsense . which stops the search. Does this means that Residual Sum of Squares (RSS) equals to zero that makes AIC goes to -inf .And how would I overcome this problem.Can I for example find those that have strong correlation with x1 first and then use AIC score to find me the best model among them,. Regards Adel, [[alternative HTML version deleted]]