Controls

Controls analysis tool

Overview

The Controls analysis tool allows aggregation of the control data for a layout and calculation of some associated statistics, notably the Z' or Z-factor and the window (ratio between the average of two controls).
This tool can be explored using the Screening and Screening2 examples. See the [Examples] page.

The tool loads the layout and result files from PlateEditor and exposes the available result plates (1) and controls (2) in its menu panel.
All control combinations with concentration data will be computed and each unique combination exposed as a single new control.
Result plates can be browsed using the plate selection control (1a). For each plate visited, the Z' and window parameters will be cached and exposed in the Plate Summary panel. Pairing is indicated for information but is not used, as name resolution from definitions is not required in this tool.
Clicking the Compute All button (1b) starts the analysis process for all the plates available in the selected result file. Plates are analyzed one at a time, so it may take some time with bigger result files.
Controls can be selected or unselected by clicking them on the control tables (2b). Two attached buttons allow quick selection/unselection of all controls at once (2a).

In the main panel, parameters associated with the selected result file will be available for browsing (1) and preceded by the result index (#) from the result table. Parameters from other files are locked but the computed data are kept in cache.
For each parameter, several data tables are computed (2). Each table has a set of controls for data export (2a):

• Export: click to download the table as a text (tab-separated) file.
• Printable version: click to display the table in a new browser window/tab, which facilitates copy/print operations

Available tables in the Control analysis tool:

• Values: this tab shows the aggregated values of each selected control, for the selected plate, along with some statistics: average, SD, total number of values (2b).
• Z-factors: this tab shows the summary of the Z-factor and window calculation for the selected plate, as a 2-entry table. Negative controls are listed as rows, positive controls as columns, and all combination are computed.
• Plate Summary: this tab caches the Z' and window values calculated for each visited plate. Data are aggregated by control combination (negative vs positive). Statistics are computed for the values found accross plates: average, SD, total number of values. Note that this panel will not be displayed if the selected result file has only one plate defined, but clicking the Compute All button will force it to appear.

Note: CV (%) statistical data can also be displayed by ticking the corresponding option, see [Analysis].

Specific details

Color coding
Z' and window values reported are color-coded using the following conventions:
For Z':

• Z' > 0.4: green (good)
• 0.2 < Z' < 0.4: yellow (average to low)
• Z' < 0.2: orange (poor)

For window (W):

• W > 2: green (good)
• 1 < W < 2: yellow (average to low)
• W < 1: orange (poor)

Cached data
Even if they are not displayed, some information in the Plate Summary panel are computed and kept in cache. This includes the CV (%) values, as well as the Z'/Window values for unselected control combinations.
This means there is no need to re-compute the Z'/Window values for visited plates even if some controls were unselected.

Export all
When exporting all the data using the Export All option (see [Analysis]), only values for the selected positive and negative controls will be exported. However, all three data tables (Values, Z-factors, Plate summary) will be exported, even if they are hidden in the main panel.
The zip file provided will have the following structure:

Result_File\Parameter_Name\Data_table.txt

As in the figure below: