BIOS601 AGENDA: Friday September 02, 2011
[updated August 29, 2011]
Agenda for Friday Sept 02, 2011
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Exercise on Measurement: re-creating survival curves by digitization
Although the details and tasks are described under the "homework" link, we have, in an effort
to standardize the measurement context, arranged for the exercise to be carried out at a fixed
time (2 pm Fri Sept 02, before the Stats-Biostats gathering) in the computer lab in Purvis Hall.
That way, all of the measurements will be made on computer screens with the same resolution, and under
standardized supervision by an assistant [Biostat PhD student Zhihui(Amy) Liu]. In actual applications of
the digitizing software, there would be of course be less standardization, and thus more observer
and technical variation.
The 2 files containing the curves to be digitized are
Exemestane.png and CRP.png
Notes:
The choice of this year's measurement exercise is motivated in part by JH's research interests in the data
'behind' Kaplan-Meier survival curves (see Biostatistics seminar on Sept 06) but also by the fact that it
provides a practical and useful 'object' to be measured --and we need to quantify the limits of digitization.
In other years, we have 'measured' other objects, some physical (such as student heights, estimated by eye
from the back of the classroom while the student presented at 'break the ice' sessions), some abstract
(such as the 'readability' of books used as readers in elementary and high school -- we used computer tools
such as those found in Microsoft Word. See the Readability Indices section in the Resources for Measurement).