Introduction to Data Science: Data Analysis and Prediction Algorithms with R introduces concepts and skills that can help you tackle real-world data analysis challenges. It covers concepts from probability, statistical inference, linear regression, and machine learning. It also helps you develop skills such as R programming, data wrangling, data visualization, predictive algorithm building, file organization with UNIX/Linux shell, version control with Git and GitHub, and reproducible document preparation.

This book is a textbook for a first course in data science. No previous knowledge of R is necessary, although some experience with programming may be helpful. The book is divided into six parts: R, data visualization, statistics with R, data wrangling, machine learning, and productivity tools. Each part has several chapters meant to be presented as one lecture.

The author uses motivating case studies that realistically mimic a data scientist's experience. He starts by asking specific questions and answers these through data analysis so concepts are learned as a means to answering the questions. Examples of the case studies included are: US murder rates by state, self-reported student heights, trends in world health and economics, the impact of vaccines on infectious disease rates, the financial crisis of 2007-2008, election forecasting, building a baseball team, image processing of hand-written digits, and movie recommendation systems.

The statistical concepts used to answer the case study questions are only briefly introduced, so complementing with a probability and statistics textbook is highly recommended for in-depth understanding of these concepts. If you read and understand the chapters and complete the exercises, you will be prepared to learn the more advanced concepts and skills needed to become an expert.

A complete solutions manual is available to registered instructors who require the text for a course.

About the Author

Rafael A. Irizarry is professor of data sciences at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, professor of biostatistics at Harvard, and a fellow of the American Statistical Association. Dr. Irizarry is an applied statistician and during the last 20 years has worked in diverse areas, including genomics, sound engineering, and public health. He disseminates solutions to data analysis challenges as open source software, tools that are widely downloaded and used. Prof. Irizarry has also developed and taught several data science courses at Harvard as well as popular online courses.

Reviews

"I think the book would be perfect for schools looking to make a transition to a model where introduction to data science takes the place of introduction to statistics and maybe introductory computer science." ~Arend Kuyper, Northwestern University

"A great introduction to data science and modern R programing, with tons of examples of application of the R abilities throughout the whole volume. The book suggests multiple links to the internet websites related to the topics under consideration that makes it an incredibly useful source of contemporary data science and programing, helping to students and researchers in their projects." ~Technometrics

"Introduction to Data Science will teach you to juggle with your data and get maximum results from it using R. I highly recommended this book for students and everybody taking the first steps in data science using R." ~ Maria Ivanchuk, ISCB News

Book Information
ISBN 9780367357986
Author Martina Topic
Format Hardback
Page Count 713
Imprint Chapman & Hall/CRC
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 1720g