Computers are increasingly essential to the study of all aspects of biology. Data management skills are needed for entering data without errors, storing it in a usable way, and extracting key aspects of the data for analysis. Basic programming is required for everything from accessing and managing data, to statistical analysis, to modeling. This course will provide an introduction to data management, manipulation, and analysis, with an emphasis on biological data problems. Class will typically consist of short introductions or question & answer sessions, followed by hands on computing exercises. The course will be taught using git/Github, R/RStudio, RMarkdown, and SQLite, but the concepts learned will easily apply to all programming languages and database management systems. No background in programming of databases or R/computational experience is required.
Prerequisite Knowledge and Skills A willingess to practice and a knowledge of basic biology.
Purpose of Course In this course you will learn all of the fundamental aspects of computer programming that are necessary for conducting biological research. By the end of the course you will be able to use these tools to import data into R, perform analysis on that data, write reports/CV’s in RMarkdown, export results to graphs, text files, and databases, as well as collaborate on Github with version-controlled projects.
The focus of this course is to provide graduate students with training that develops and teaches the tools applicable to the entire process of reproducible data-driven research. By learning how to get the computer to do your work for you, you will be able to do more science faster, and your future self will thank you.
Course Goals and Objectives Students completing this course will be able to:
Obtain, Read, Import/Export Data into R Tidy/summarize and analyze data Write simple computer programs in R Automate data analysis Apply these tools to address biological questions Apply general data management and analysis concepts to other programming languages and database management systems