Science Cartoons - 5 (RNA-Seq)

This is the last science cartoon I did for my poster. I was pretty happy with the pictures, although if I were to do it over again, I've learned a few more tricks that I'd have used instead.

Anyhow, my favorite effect on this picture is the "text to path", where you can make any string follow any line - who knew graphic design could be so much fun. It definitely makes for some interesting graphics. I'd definitely use this effect in an RNA folding paper, if I ever got the chance to do another one. (-;

Science cartoons - 4 (ChIP-Seq)

I suppose this cartoon doesn't need an introduction...

Science Cartoons - 3

I wasn't going to do more than one comic a day, but since I just published it into the FindPeaks 4.0 manual today, I may as well put it here too, and kill two birds with one stone.

Just to clarify, under copyright laws, you can certainly re-use my images for teaching purposes or your own private use (that's generally called "fair use" in the US, and copyright laws in most countries have similar exceptions), but you can't publish it, take credit for it, or profit from it without discussing it with me first. However, since people browse through my page all the time, I figure I should mention that I do hold copyright on the pictures, so don't steal them, ok?

Anyhow, Comic #3 is a brief description of how the compare in FindPeaks 4.0 works. Enjoy!

Science Cartoons - 2

Comic #2/5. This one, obviously is about aligners. I've added in the copyright on the far right, this time. If I expect people to respect my copyright, I really do need to put it on there, don't I?

Science Cartoons - 1

I've been busy putting together a poster for a student conference I'm attending next week in Winnipeg, which has distracted me from just about everything else I had planned to accomplish. Not to worry, though, I'll be back on it in a day or two.

Anyhow, part of the fun this time around is that the poster competition includes criteria for judging that involve how pretty the poster is - so I decided to go all out and learn to draw with inkscape. Instead of the traditional background section on a poster, I went with a comic theme. It's a great way to use text and figures to get across complex topics very quickly. So, for the next couple days, I thought I'd post some of them, one at a time.

Here's the first, called "Second Generation Sequencing". It's my least favorite of the bunch, since the images feel somewhat sloppy, but it's not a bad try for a first pass. Yes, I do own the copyrights - and you do need to ask permission to re-use them.

5 way venn diagrams

I'm rather pleased with myself, though it's hardly deserved. I was working on 4-data set Venn diagrams about a month ago and told Steve that "this is as high as I think we can go. We won't be able to visualize any higher order data set overlaps", and then managed to prove myself wrong today.

Taking inspiration from another site on the web showing triangular based Venn diagrams for 5-data sets, I came up with a much cleaner representation:



It's not like I invented a new branch of math or anything, but hey, that's pretty darn cool. The triangle sizes are roughly proportional with the size of the datasets, which I didn't even think i could approximate, and I even like the look of it. While I knew this wouldn't be possible with circles (I had played briefly with rhomboids and triangles before), I was stuck until I saw this picture, and then realized that there was a much cleaner way to assemble the triangles using parallel edges, and tada, we had a winner.

Obviously, the more generalized version using identical sized triangles can be done as well. In inkscape, it's relatively easy make a 3 sided polygon, copy it 4 times and then rotate each one by 72 degrees and layer them with some opacity. Aren't Venn diagrams fun?

I hear the chorus calling me a geek, so I'll move on to other topics.

I'm currently planning on resuming my blogging with more frequent updates. The last month was a good break, giving me a bit more time to catch up on other things (research), but I've saved up several topics, and I'm ready to get going again. I'll try for at least 3 a week for the next while. Wish me luck.