Nature Methods: Points of Significance
Martin Krzywinski is a staff scientist at Canada’s Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre.
Naomi Altman is a Professor of Statistics at The Pennsylvania State University.
contributing authors
Paul Blainey is an Assistant Professor of Biological Engineering at MIT and Core Member of the Broad Institute.
Danilo Bzdok is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Psychiatry, RWTH Aachen University, Germany, and a Visiting Professor at INRIA/Neurospin Saclay in France.
Kiranmoy Das is a faculty member at the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata, India.
Luca Greco is an Assistant Professor of Statistics at the University of Sannio in Benevento, Italy.
Jasleen Grewal is a graduate student in the Jones lab at Canada's Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre.
Anthony Kulesa is a graduate student in the Department of Biological Engineering at MIT.
Christoph Kurz is a researcher at Novartis Pharma GmbH, Munich, Germany.
Jake Lever is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Bioengineering at Stanford University in Stanford, California, USA.
Geroge Luta Associate Professor of Biostatistics at the Georgetown University in Washington, DC, USA.
Jorge López Puga is a Professor of Research Methodology at UCAM Universidad Católica de Murcia.
Byran Smucker is an Associate Professor of Statistics at Miami University in Oxford, OH, USA.
Bernhard Voelkl is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Division of Animal Welfare at the Veterinary Public Health Institute, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
Hanno Würbel is a Professor in the Division of Animal Welfare at the Veterinary Public Health Institute, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
Symmetric alternatives to the ordinary least squares regression
What immortal hand or eye, could frame thy fearful symmetry? — William Blake, "The Tyger"
This month, we look at symmetric regression, which, unlike simple linear regression, it is reversible — remaining unaltered when the variables are swapped.
Simple linear regression can summarize the linear relationship between two variables `X` and `Y` — for example, when `Y` is considered the response (dependent) and `X` the predictor (independent) variable.
However, there are times when we are not interested (or able) to distinguish between dependent and independent variables — either because they have the same importance or the same role. This is where symmetric regression can help.
Luca Greco, George Luta, Martin Krzywinski & Naomi Altman (2025) Points of significance: Symmetric alternatives to the ordinary least squares regression. Nat. Methods 22:1610–1612.
Beyond Belief Campaign BRCA Art
Fuelled by philanthropy, findings into the workings of BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes have led to groundbreaking research and lifesaving innovations to care for families facing cancer.
This set of 100 one-of-a-kind prints explore the structure of these genes. Each artwork is unique — if you put them all together, you get the full sequence of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 proteins.
Propensity score weighting
The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. —Mr. Spock (Star Trek II)
This month, we explore a related and powerful technique to address bias: propensity score weighting (PSW), which applies weights to each subject instead of matching (or discarding) them.
Kurz, C.F., Krzywinski, M. & Altman, N. (2025) Points of significance: Propensity score weighting. Nat. Methods 22:638–640.
Happy 2025 π Day—
TTCAGT: a sequence of digits
Celebrate π Day (March 14th) and sequence digits like its 1999. Let's call some peaks.
