From Cell line to Command Line

How you can transform from a wet biologist to a computational biologist as I did.

I had zero computation experience 4 years into my Ph.D. I learned computational biology the hard way.

This is my timeline:

I started my Ph.D. in 2008 in a wet lab—first author wet lab papers: PNAS (2011), JBC (2013). I began to learn programming in April 2012.

I joined MD Anderson for a computational biology postdoc in March 2015. I learned a ton but did not have any first-author papers until 2018. but I did write a biostars handbook ChIP-seq chapter (2017).

Dry lab: two co-first author papers: cancer cell (2020), cell reports (2021). computational work at MD Anderson was published when I was working at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Dry lab: two first-author/co-corresponding author papers: Bioinformatics (2020), F1000research (2021). First author: Nature communications (end of 2021). I still have two co-first-author computational papers in the making.

It took me almost ten years to make the transformation. I hope this book can shorten your time!

“The best time to start learning is ten years ago; the second best time to start learning is right now."

What you will learn:

• Essential skills you need for biological or any data analysis
• Tips and mistakes that I have learned from my ten years of computational experience
• Resource for further reading and learning
• Even if you are an experienced bioinformatician, I am sure you will learn something useful from the book
• A peek at the contents of the book 👇

What is it all about?

The learning curve was steep for me when I started to learn computation. During my Ph.D., I was the only one on the floor who was learning bioinformatics. I took many detours and hope to share my experience and tips to help you avoid them.

​
I will be balancing the technical part and general suggestions. This book is not a programming book and will not teach you deep in many of the topics I will talk about, but it will serve as a compass to guide your learning directions.
​
It does cover many essential analysis skills such as bash, EDA, PCA, heatmap, matrix factorization, Snakemake, and regression etc, using real examples that you can follow.

​
Once you pass the initial steep learning slope, you will get into full swing. You will be able to learn anything with determination and discipline!​

If I can do it, you can too!

I want to help you to make the same transformation that I had!

What you will get

A zip file of all the HTML files so you can browse through them. Click the index.html, and you will be able to read it. A 440-page PDF file and an epub file will also be included. The HTML files are preferred for the best reading experience.

It is going to be a dynamic book that I will update regularly after your feedback. You will get all the newer version for free once you buy the first version.

Money-back guarantee

If $49.99 is a lot in your country, email me tommy@divingintogeneticsandgenomics.com or DM me on twitter, I will get you a $20 discount. I really want you to be on the same journey as I did.
​
If you bought the book and think it is not what you want, email me within 7 days. I will return the money, and you keep the book.

What others say

​