Using R for Computer Simulation and Data Analysis in Biochemistry, Molecular Biology, and Biophysics

摘要

Modern biology has become a much more quantitative science, so there is a need to teach a quantitative approach to students. I have developed a course that teaches students some approaches to constructing computational models of biological mechanisms, both deterministic and with some elements of randomness; learning how concepts of probability can help to understand important features of DNA sequences; and applying a useful set of statistical methods to analysis of experimental data. The free, open-source, cross-platform program R serves well as the computer tool for the course, because of its high-level capabilities, excellent graphics, superb statistical capabilities, extensive contributed packages, and active development in bioinformatics.