R Beginners Course 2026

Introduction to the R Workshop Series

Dr. Debasish Mukherjee, Dr. Ulrike Goebel, Dr. Ali Abdallah

Bioinformatics Core Facility CECAD

2026-05-13

Welcome to the R Workshop Series!

Programming+Statistics+Biology
  • Learning R step-by-step

Welcome to the R Workshop Series!

Programming+Statistics+Biology
  • Learning R step-by-step
  • Focus: Molecular Biology and Data Analysis

Welcome to the R Workshop Series!

Programming+Statistics+Biology
  • Learning R step-by-step
  • Focus: Molecular Biology and Data Analysis
  • Building reproducible research skills (at data level)

Workshop Goals

Five Goals

Why Learn R as a Biologist?

  • Handle biological data (e.g., gene expression, sequencing)

Why Learn R as a Biologist?

  • Handle biological data (e.g., gene expression, sequencing)
  • Access and use bioinformatics packages (Bioconductor!)

Why Learn R as a Biologist?

  • Handle biological data (e.g., gene expression, sequencing)
  • Access and use bioinformatics packages (Bioconductor!)
  • Automate and streamline analyses

Why Learn R as a Biologist?

  • Handle biological data (e.g., gene expression, sequencing)
  • Access and use bioinformatics packages (Bioconductor!)
  • Automate and streamline analyses
  • Reproducibility and transparency

Why Learn R as a Biologist?

  • Handle biological data (e.g., gene expression, sequencing)
  • Access and use bioinformatics packages (Bioconductor!)
  • Automate and streamline analyses
  • Reproducibility and transparency
  • Create publication-ready graphs

Workshop Schedule

  • Beginner Workshop: May
  • Intermediate Workshop: September
  • Advanced Workshop: October

Practice between workshops is key!

Timeline

timeline
    title R Workshop Series 2026
    May 14-15  : Beginner Workshop (2 days)
    Sep 18-19 : Intermediate Workshop (2 days)
    Nov 20-21 : Advanced Workshop (2 days)

Learning Between Workshops

AI generated

Learning Between Workshops

  • Learning R = Learning a language: Use it often!

AI generated

Learning Between Workshops

  • Learning R = Learning a language: Use it often!
  • Practice exercises, small projects

AI generated

Learning Between Workshops

  • Learning R = Learning a language: Use it often!
  • Practice exercises, small projects
  • Apply R to your own data

AI generated

Learning Between Workshops

  • Learning R = Learning a language: Use it often!
  • Practice exercises, small projects
  • Apply R to your own data
  • Prepare questions for next workshop

AI generated

What You’ll Learn in This Workshop (revisted)

  • Basics of R and RStudio
  • Variables, data types, and structures
  • Data input/output and reshaping
  • Basic plotting with base R
  • control flows and apply functions
  • Introduction to reproducible reports (R Markdown)

🛠 Focus: Base R only — no extra packages yet!

Why Start with Base R?

  • Learn R’s core concepts: data types, operations, programming basics

Why Start with Base R?

  • Learn R’s core concepts: data types, operations, programming basics
  • Build strong foundations for any R analysis

Why Start with Base R?

  • Learn R’s core concepts: data types, operations, programming basics
  • Build strong foundations for any R analysis
  • Understand how R handles data internally

Why Start with Base R?

  • Learn R’s core concepts: data types, operations, programming basics
  • Build strong foundations for any R analysis
  • Understand how R handles data internally
  • Prepare for more advanced workflows later

Why Start with Base R?

  • Learn R’s core concepts: data types, operations, programming basics
  • Build strong foundations for any R analysis
  • Understand how R handles data internally
  • Prepare for more advanced workflows later

In future workshops, we will explore modern tools like the tidyverse — but good base R skills come first!

Tools We’ll Use

  • R (The software)
  • RStudio (Integrated development environment)
  • R Markdown (Literate programming)
  • Base R functions and structures (The language)

Structure of Each Workshop

  • Lectures combined with live demonstrations
  • Hands-on exercises
  • Mini projects
  • Open Q&A sessions

Learning by doing!

Workshop Norms

  • No bad questions
  • Practice actively — typing > watching
  • Help/encourage each other
  • Respect different learning paces

The Journey Ahead

  • Beginner: Base R Foundations
  • Intermediate: Advanced Concepts, Tools and Applications
  • Advanced: Reproducible Research and Bioinformatics

Step-by-step towards good data analysis skills!

Let’s Get Started!

🎯 Setting up RStudio and exploring R basics…

Slides & Code

  • [f] Full screen
  • [o] Slide Overview
  • [c] Notes
  • [h] help

git repo

R-Basic


Clone repo

git clone https://github.com/CECADBioinformaticsCoreFacility/Beginners_R_Course_2026.git


Slides Directly

https://cecadbioinformaticscorefacility.github.io/Beginners_R_Course_2026/