Statistics and Data Analysis for Microarrays Using R and Bioconductor, 2nd Edition

Chapter 15

Experiment design

One day when I was a junior medical student, a very important Boston

surgeon visited the school and delivered a great treatise on a large number

of patients who had undergone successful operations for vascular recon-

structions. At the end of the lecture, a young student at t he back of the

room timidly asked, “Do you have any controls?” Well, the great sur-

geon drew himself up to his full height, hit t he desk, and said, “Do you

mean did I not operate on half the patients?” The hall grew very quiet

then. The voice at the back of the room very hesitantly replied, “ Yes,

that’s what I had in mind.” Then the visitor’s fist