Outliers Matter: Bradford Shifts Data From Statistical ‘Noise’ to Biological Mechanism
Book Urges a New View of Variation in Almost Everything
Kent Bradford is offering a new way of looking at biological data that, he says, “radically alters what we can see.”
Traditionally, scientists see things in terms of averages to understand the behavior of plants, cells, molecules – all kinds of things. But now, the UC Davis distinguished professor emeritus argues, new technologies allow us to see data points as individuals and take a closer look at the statistical outliers. Usually dismissed as “noise” and “error,” they in fact offer a goldmine of new insights about how things respond to a stimulus.
That’s because, Bradford proposes, individual things in a population respond to any given input along a range of trigger points, and life has harnessed that variation to its advantage.
To read more of the Department of Plant Sciences article about Kent's book “Populations of Individuals: Understanding Biological Variation from Molecules to Ecosystems", click the link below:
Click here to read the full article
Click here to purchase your copy Use promo code AUFLY30 to save 30% !