Skip to content
cccskills
FreePublished on GitHub

bioconductor-enhancedvolcano

Volcano plots represent a useful way to visualise the results of differential expression analyses. Here, we present a highly-configurable function that produces publication-ready volcano plots. EnhancedVolcano will attempt to fit as many po

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

Run score Not tested

See how to install

Files included (1)

  • SKILL.md5.1 KB

SKILL.md (original)

Review the instructions the agent will receive before you install.

EnhancedVolcano

Dependencies & Environment

Package-intrinsic requirements from the Bioconductor landing page — reproduce in any R environment.

  • Version: 1.30.0 · Bioconductor: 3.23 · R: ≥ 4.6
  • Depends: ggplot2, ggrepel
  • Imports: scales
  • Install: BiocManager::install("EnhancedVolcano")

When to Use

  • Publication-Ready Visualization: Creating highly-configurable volcano plots from differential expression results using the EnhancedVolcano() function.
  • Targeted Gene Labeling: Visualizing specific genes of interest by supplying a vector of variables to the selectLab parameter.
  • Highlighting Key Variables: Emphasizing specific points by encircling them or shading them using the encircle and shade parameters.

When NOT to Use

  • For performing differential expression analysis: Use DESeq2 (e.g., DESeq() and results()) instead, because EnhancedVolcano only visualizes the statistical output.
  • For mapping gene identifiers: Use mapIds() from AnnotationDbi instead, as EnhancedVolcano requires the labels to be pre-formatted and mapped before plotting.

Data Requirements

  • A data-frame, data-matrix, or tibble of test results containing point labels, log2 fold changes, and adjusted or unadjusted P values.

Key Parameters

  • lab: A vector of point labels (e.g., rownames(res)).
  • x: The column name in the results object containing log2 fold changes (e.g., 'log2FoldChange').
  • y: The column name in the results object containing P values (e.g., 'pvalue').
  • pCutoff (10e-6): The statistical significance threshold for P values.
  • FCcutoff (2.0): The threshold for absolute log2 fold changes.
  • drawConnectors: A logical indicating whether to add connectors from labels to points to maximize free space.
  • colCustom: A named vector of custom key-value pairs to over-ride the default colour scheme.
  • boxedLabels: A logical indicating whether to draw simple boxes around the plot's labels to improve clarity.

Best Practices

  • Use lfcShrink() from DESeq2 to obtain moderated 'shrunk' estimates of log2FC differences before plotting.
  • Set drawConnectors = TRUE to fit more labels in the plot window without overcrowding the points.
  • Use parseLabels = TRUE along with italic() to parse and present labels as italicised text.
  • Disable default gridlines (gridlines.major = FALSE, gridlines.minor = FALSE) to make extra threshold lines (hline, vline) more visible.

Common Pitfalls

  • Overcrowded labels: Too many significant genes can clog up the plot. Fix: Use the selectLab parameter to only label key variables of interest.
  • Legend taking up too much space: The default legend might obscure data. Fix: Change legendPosition to 'none' to make the legend completely invisible.
  • Missing dependencies for encircling: Attempting to encircle points without the required dependencies will fail. Fix: Ensure the ggalt package is installed before using the encircle parameter.

Alternatives

  • ggplot2: The underlying engine for EnhancedVolcano, which can be used directly for fully custom plots but requires more manual configuration for label repulsion and cutoffs.
  • ggrepel: Provides the label repulsion engine used internally by EnhancedVolcano, useful if building a custom volcano plot from scratch.

Citations

References

<!-- biomate-cta -->

Run this on BioMate

This skill is the knowledge layer — when, why, and how to use enhancedvolcano. To run this analysis on your own data with managed compute, automated QC, and reproducible outputs, use BioMate — free to start.

▶ Open enhancedvolcano on BioMate →

Reviews

No reviews yet. Tell others what you thought.

Comments

No login needed. Share how it worked for you, ask a question, or note where it did not run.

No comments yet. Be the first to write one.

Comments are published right away. Do not include personal information such as email addresses or phone numbers. Up to 2 URLs.

0 / 1,000 characters

This form is protected by reCAPTCHA, and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

More skills from this repository

The package contains functions for exploratory oligonucleotide array analysis. The dependence on tkWidgets only concerns few convenience functions. 'affy' is fully functional without it.

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

bioMate-AI/biomate-bioconductor-kb793Updated Jun 21, 2026

This tool uses the label-tree function from HyPhy to annotate a phylogenetic tree. It allows users to select a subset of leaves using either a regular expression or a list of sequence names, and then apply a specified label to these selecte

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

bioMate-AI/biomate-bioconductor-kb793Updated Jun 21, 2026

This package provides a client for the Bioconductor AnnotationHub web resource. The AnnotationHub web resource provides a central location where genomic files (e.g., VCF, bed, wig) and other resources from standard locations (e.g., UCSC, En

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

bioMate-AI/biomate-bioconductor-kb793Updated Jun 21, 2026

apeglm provides Bayesian shrinkage estimators for effect sizes for a variety of GLM models, using approximation of the posterior for individual coefficients.

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

bioMate-AI/biomate-bioconductor-kb793Updated Jun 21, 2026

ASURAT is a software for single-cell data analysis. Using ASURAT, one can simultaneously perform unsupervised clustering and biological interpretation in terms of cell type, disease, biological process, and signaling pathway activity. Inputting a single-cell RNA-seq data and knowledge-based databases, such as Cell Ontology, Gene Ontology, KEGG, etc., ASURAT transforms gene expression tables into original multivariate tables, termed sign-by-sample matrices (SSMs).

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

bioMate-AI/biomate-bioconductor-kb793Updated Jun 21, 2026

AUCell allows to identify cells with active gene sets (e.g. signatures, gene modules...) in single-cell RNA-seq data. AUCell uses the "Area Under the Curve" (AUC) to calculate whether a critical subset of the input gene set is enriched with

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

bioMate-AI/biomate-bioconductor-kb793Updated Jun 21, 2026

See all skills by bioMate-AI

Report a problem with this skill