Overview & Goals:
In this practical, interactive course, you'll learn to create engaging, scientifically accurate visualizations specifically tailored for biological research. Using programming tools like R and Python, along with graphic editing software such as Inkscape, you'll gain essential skills for clearly and effectively visualizing genomic and biological data.
This course is designed for PhD students, postdocs and early-career researchers in biology, bioinformatics, and related fields. While the concepts and skills taught are broadly applicable across the life sciences, our use cases and datasets are primarily drawn from genomics.
For further information, click here.
What to Bring / Requirements
- A laptop (Windows, macOS or Linux) with R and Python installed. Alternatively, Google Colab can be used for Python and R exercises.
- Access to your preferred AI assistant (e.g. ChatGPT, Gemini, or another system) for coding support and troubleshooting (or a Google account)
- Inkscape (a free, open-source vector graphics editor)
Prerequisite: Some programming experience is expected.
Schedule Highlights
- Tue, Nov 18, 10:00–17:00 — Foundations & Basic Plotting: scatter plots, bar plots, violin plots, boxplots, histograms; data handling and annotations.
- Wed, Nov 19, 10:00–17:00 — Advanced Techniques: dimensionality reduction (PCA), annotated heatmaps (e.g. via ComplexHeatmap in R), color theory, layout strategies.
- Thu, Nov 20, 10:00–17:00 — Publication-Ready Graphics: polishing visualizations, using Inkscape, handling DPI and formats, assembling multi-panel figures
Registration
Registration deadline: 02 November 2025
If you are interested, please consider applying soon, as spaces are limited (Register here).
We hope you can join us for this exciting opportunity to improve your data visualization skills!
