
R is one of the most important scripting languages for both experimental and computational biologists. It is well-designed, efficient, widely adopted and has a very large base of contributors who add new functionality for all modern aspects of data analysis and visualization. Moreover, it is free and open source. However, R’s great power and expressiveness can at first be difficult to approach without guidance, especially for those who are new to programming. This workshop introduces the essential ideas and tools of R. Although this workshop will cover running statistical tests in R, it does not cover statistical concepts.
After the course, participants should be able to:
- Apply basic conventions of data handling, including organization and analysis.
- Break down, and compose solutions to computing tasks in R.
- Identify and implement key R syntax, functions and packages.
Graduates, postgraduates, and PIs who design and execute strategies for data analysis but have little or no familiarity with the R statistical workbench.
You will require your own laptop computer. Minimum requirements: 1024×768 screen resolution, 1.5GHz CPU, 2GB RAM, 10GB free disk space, recent versions of Windows, Mac OS X or Linux (Most computers purchased in the past 3-4 years likely meet these requirements).
This workshop requires participants to complete pre-workshop tasks and readings.
Module 1: Foundations of R and RStudio
Practical 1: Introduction to Base R & RStudio
Module 2: Data Manipulation and Exploration
- Practical 2: Data Wrangling
- Practical 3: Introduction to Statistics in R
Lecture 1: Health Policy Simulation in R – Dr. Alton Russell
Module 3: Data Visualization and Dimensional Analysis
- Practical 4: Data Visualization
Lecture 2: Factor Analysis for Human Spatial Vision – Dr. Alexandre Reynaud
Module 4: Reproducible Research and Reporting
- Practical 5: Working with Rmarkdown & Quarto
Lecture 3: Smoothing Curves for DNA Methylation – Dr. Celia Greenwood
Module 5: Collaborative and Version-Controlled Workflows
Practical 6: Using Git with R
Duration: 2 days
Start: Oct 01, 2025
End: Oct 02, 2025
Status: Application Open
ApplyCanadian Bioinformatics Workshops promotes open access. Past workshop content is available under a Creative Commons License.
Posted on: