Here is a glossary to help you understand the main concepts and vocabulary used on the Data Analysis Toolkit. Based on biological experimentation’s nomenclature.
EDD (Experimental Data Depot)
It is an open-source bioinformatic software and web tool designed as a standardized repository of experimental biological data and metadata. It was developed by Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL) and Sandia National Lab (SNL) and inspired TESELAGEN to create the Data Analysis Toolkit.
Lab
Represents a shared and secure work environment between different users within the application. Every data or information stored within the scope of a Lab will only be accessible within it.
Experiment
Used to describe and store data from a particular experiment focused on studying a specific phenomenon. Each experiment is associated with a single Lab.
Assay
It refers to a particular test within an experiment (an experimental run) with the scope of measuring a particular behavior or characteristic of one or many assay subjects. Each assay is associated with a single Experiment.
Assay Subject (Subject)
A subject corresponds to a measurable entity of experimentation or experimental unit. A subject could be submitted to different experimentations and correspond to the highest level in the hierarchy. An assay subject could be studied by many different experiments through many assays.
Descriptor
Represents one or multiple features or characteristics which describes a Subject.
Measurement
Represents a measurement made during a certain assay (experimental run) of a specific subject. These measurements can be included in upload files with their corresponding measurement unit. Each measurement is associated with one Assay Subject.
Parser
Allows configure and save data load process. Each upload process must go through stages that structure and standardize the data. The parsers are used to automatically apply this structuring once it has been done.
Unit
Each measurement is associated with its respective unit. This corresponds to the "metric" or "unit" defined in the data model.
Unit scale
Each measurement unit is associated with a unit system. Two of the most important are: the metric and imperial systems.
Unit dimension
The measurement unit is associated with its respective dimension. For example: the unit “second” has the “time” dimension; the unit “g/L” has the “density” dimension and so on. Store this kind of information is useful to know how to treat different types of data and measurements, to visualize and analyze them.