CARNIVAL

The aim of TCGAbiolinks is : i) facilitate the GDC open-access data retrieval, ii) prepare the data using the appropriate pre-processing strategies, iii) provide the means to carry out different standard analyses and iv) to easily reproduce earlier research results. In more detail, the package provides multiple methods for analysis (e.g., differential expression analysis, identifying differentially methylated regions) and methods for visualization (e.g., survival plots, volcano plots, starburst plots) in order to easily develop complete analysis pipelines.

bambu is a R package for multi-sample transcript discovery and quantification using long read RNA-Seq data. You can use bambu after read alignment to obtain expression estimates for known and novel transcripts and genes. The output from bambu can directly be used for visualisation and downstream analysis such as differential gene expression or transcript usage.

SpatialFeatureExperiment (SFE) is a new S4 class for working with spatial single-cell genomics data. The voyager package implements basic exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA) methods for SFE. Univariate methods include univariate global spatial ESDA methods such as Moran's I, permutation testing for Moran's I, and correlograms. Bivariate methods include Lee's L and cross variogram. Multivariate methods include MULTISPATI PCA and multivariate local Geary's C recently developed by Anselin. The Voyager package also implements plotting functions to plot SFE data and ESDA results.

Single-cell RNA-seq (scRNA-seq) is widely used to investigate the composition of complex tissues since the technology allows researchers to define cell-types using unsupervised clustering of the transcriptome. However, due to differences in experimental methods and computational analyses, it is often challenging to directly compare the cells identified in two different experiments. scmap is a method for projecting cells from a scRNA-seq experiment on to the cell-types or individual cells identified in a different experiment.

Single-cell mRNA sequencing can uncover novel cell-to-cell heterogeneity in gene expression levels in seemingly homogeneous populations of cells. However, these experiments are prone to high levels of technical noise, creating new challenges for identifying genes that show genuine heterogeneous expression within the population of cells under study. BASiCS (Bayesian Analysis of Single-Cell Sequencing data) is an integrated Bayesian hierarchical model to perform statistical analyses of single-cell RNA sequencing datasets in the context of supervised experiments (where the groups of cells of interest are known a priori, e.g. experimental conditions or cell types). BASiCS performs built-in data normalisation (global scaling) and technical noise quantification (based on spike-in genes). BASiCS provides an intuitive detection criterion for highly (or lowly) variable genes within a single group of cells. Additionally, BASiCS can compare gene expression patterns between two or more pre-specified groups of cells. Unlike traditional differential expression tools, BASiCS quantifies changes in expression that lie beyond comparisons of means, also allowing the study of changes in cell-to-cell heterogeneity. The latter can be quantified via a biological over-dispersion parameter that measures the excess of variability that is observed with respect to Poisson sampling noise, after normalisation and technical noise removal. Due to the strong mean/over-dispersion confounding that is typically observed for scRNA-seq datasets, BASiCS also tests for changes in residual over-dispersion, defined by residual values with respect to a global mean/over-dispersion trend.

This package provides functionality to combine the existing pieces of the transcriptome data and results, making it easier to generate insightful observations and hypothesis. Its usage is made easy with a Shiny application, combining the benefits of interactivity and reproducibility e.g. by capturing the features and gene sets of interest highlighted during the live session, and creating an HTML report as an artifact where text, code, and output coexist. Using the GeneTonicList as a standardized container for all the required components, it is possible to simplify the generation of multiple visualizations and summaries.