Facilitating the Analysis of Immunological Data with Visual Analytic Techniques

Summary

Visual analytics (VA) is a new approach of analyzing data interactively. In this video, we discuss the data overload problem brought on by high-throughput biological experiments, and propose VA as a solution to such problem. The video demonstrates analysis within and between immunological datasets using a VA tool called Tableau.

Abstract

Visual analytics (VA) has emerged as a new way to analyze large dataset through interactive visual display. We demonstrated the utility and the flexibility of a VA approach in the analysis of biological datasets. Examples of these datasets in immunology include flow cytometry, Luminex data, and genotyping (e.g., single nucleotide polymorphism) data. Contrary to the traditional information visualization approach, VA restores the analysis power in the hands of analyst by allowing the analyst to engage in real-time data exploration process. We selected the VA software called Tableau after evaluating several VA tools. Two types of analysis tasks analysis within and between datasets were demonstrated in the video presentation using an approach called paired analysis. Paired analysis, as defined in VA, is an analysis approach in which a VA tool expert works side-by-side with a domain expert during the analysis. The domain expert is the one who understands the significance of the data, and asks the questions that the collected data might address. The tool expert then creates visualizations to help find patterns in the data that might answer these questions. The short lag-time between the hypothesis generation and the rapid visual display of the data is the main advantage of a VA approach.

Protocol

1. Exploration-based Analysis on Tableau

1. You have a dataset and you want to explore the various relationships between columns within the data.
   1. (Figure 1) Import the dataset by clicking on 'Connect to data'. Choose the data source type and follow instructions to import your dataset.
   2. (Figure 1) Make sure that the dimensions shelf contains categorical columns while the measures shelf contains numerical columns from your dataset. Sometimes a dimension column such as subject identifier may be listed as measure if it is numerated. Change it to dimensions by right-clicking on it and select 'Convert to Dimension'. In Figure 1, categorical co....

Discussion

The advent of high-throughput technology in modern biomedical research led to an explosion of research data that requires a more efficient way of analysis. Visual analytics (VA) is the science of analytical reasoning facilitated by interactive visual interfaces (1). The VA approach restores the analytical power in the hands of human analyst, contrary to the traditional approach to detect patterns by computer. Visual analytics has been applied to research in various fields, such as defense research (1) and hurricane tren.......