Hesburgh Libraries

In this hands-on workshop, participants will learn about R and Unix/Linux tools available for collecting, processing, and analyzing biological data sets.

Together bioinformatics and biostatistics are important interdisciplinary fields for those conducting research in a wide variety of biological sciences. The primary goal of any bioinformatics analysis workflow is to give meaning to complex biological data. Using the R programming language and Unix/Linux command line, it is possible to automate the analysis of large omics data sets.

This workshop includes an introduction to bioinformatics and common workflows for biological data analysis. Participants will also explore techniques for creating modular R and BASH scripts that integrate to automate the analysis of large omics data sets.

The sessions in this 2-part series may be taken independently of each other.

No prior programming or data analysis experience is required.

Technology

There will be computers available with the necessary software. For those who wish to use their own laptop, please pre-install the following tools that will be used during the workshop:

1. Mandatory for all participants—R for Mac and Windows users: https://cran.rstudio.com/
2. Mandatory for all participants—RStudio Desktop software for Mac and Windows users: https://www.rstudio.com/products/rstudio/download/#download
3. Mandatory for Windows participants (Mac users skip)—WSL and Ubuntu terminal: https://ubuntu.com/tutorials/ubuntu-on-windows#1-overview
4. Mandatory for all participants—We will also be using the Rsubread and edgeR tools in R, both of which may be installed using the BiocManager: https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/BiocManager/vignettes/BiocManager.html.

Presented by: Elizabeth Brooks, NFCDS Pedagogy Fellow, graduate student, Department of Biological Sciences

Learn more about the NFCDS Pedagogy Fellowship.