---
title: "**Analyses of high-throughput data from heterogeneous samples with TOAST**"
shorttitle: "TOAST guide"
author:
- name: Ziyi Li
  email: ziyi.li@emory.edu
- name: Hao Wu
  email: hao.wu@emory.edu
package: TOAST
abstract: >
  This vignette introduces the usage of the 
  R package TOAST (TOols for the Analysis of 
  heterogeneouS Tissues). It is designed for 
  the analyses of high-throughput data from 
  heterogeneous tissues
  that are mixtures of different cell types.  
  TOAST offers functions for detecting cell-type 
  specific differential expression (csDE) or 
  differential methylation (csDM),
  as well as improving reference-free deconvolution 
  based on cross-cell type differential analysis. 
  TOAST is based on rigorous staitstical framework, 
  and provides great flexibility and superior computationl performance. 

vignette: >
  %\VignetteIndexEntry{The TOAST User's Guide}
  %\VignetteEngine{knitr::rmarkdown}
  %\VignetteEncoding{UTF-8}
output:
  BiocStyle::html_document:
    toc_float: FALSE
---

\tableofContents


# Introduction

High-throughput technologies have revolutionized 
the genomics research.  The early
applications of the technologies were largely on 
cell lines. However, there is an increasing number 
of larger-scale, population level clinical studies 
in recent years, hoping to identify diagnostic 
biomarkers and therapeutic targets.  The samples 
collected in these studies, such as blood, tumor, 
or brain tissue, are mixtures of a number of different
cell types.  The sample mixing complicates data analysis
because the experimental data from the high-throughput 
experiments are weighted averages of signals from multiple
cell types. For these data, traditional analysis methods that ignores
the cell mixture 
will lead to results with low resolution,  biased, or
even errorneous results. 
For example, it has been discovered that in epigenome-wide 
association studies (EWAS), the mixing proportions 
can be confounded with the experimental factor of 
interest (such as age). Ignoring the cell mixing 
will lead to  false positives. 
On the other hand, cell type specific changes 
under different conditions could be associated
with disease pathogenesis and progressions, which are of
great interests to researchers.

For heterogeneous samples, it is possible to profile the
pure cell types through experimental techniques.
They are, however, laborious and expensive that cannot
be applied to large scale studies.
Computational tools for analzying the mixed data have been developed 
for proportion estimation and cell type 
specific signal detection. 
<!-- deconvolution of signals and detection of signals.  -->
<!-- Without the experimental tools,  -->
There are two fundamental questions in this type of analyses: 
<!-- that are  for conducting in-silico 
deconvolution of signals and detection of signals.  -->

1. How to estimate mixing proportions?  

There are a number of existing methods 
devoted to solve this question. These methods mainly can be categorized 
to two groups: **reference-based** (require
pure cell type profiles) and **reference-free**
(does not require pure cell type profiles).
It has been found that reference-based 
deconvolution is more accurate and reliable
than reference-free deconvolution. 
However, the reference panels required 
for reference-based deconvolution can be 
difficult to obtain, thus reference-free method has wider application. 

<!-- * As subsequence of the first question, we ask,
how to construct reference panels from available 
single-cell studies if reference-based deconvolution
is used?   -->

2. with available mixing proportions, 
how to detect cell-type specific DE/DM?

TOAST is a package designed to answer these 
questions and serve the research communities 
with tools for the analysis of heterogenuous 
tissues.  Currently TOAST provides functions 
to detect cell-type specific DE/DM, as well 
as differences across different cell types. 
TOAST also has functions to improve the 
accuracy of reference-free deconvolutions through better feature selection.
If cell type-specific markers (or prior knowledge of cell compositions)
are available, TOAST provides partial reference-free
deconvolution function, which is more accuracte than RF methods
and works well even for very small sample size (e.g.<10).

<!-- In future works, we plan to add more 
components and expand our answers to the above questions.   -->


# Installation and quick start

## Install TOAST
To install this package, start R (version "3.6") and enter:

```{r install, eval = FALSE}
if (!requireNamespace("BiocManager", quietly = TRUE))
    install.packages("BiocManager")

BiocManager::install("TOAST") 
```

## How to get help for TOAST

Any TOAST questions should be posted
to the GitHub Issue section of TOAST 
homepage at https://github.com/ziyili20/TOAST/issues.

## Quick start on detecting cell type-specific differential signals

Here we show the key steps for a cell 
type-specific different analysis. This 
code chunk assumes you have an expression
or DNA methylation matrix called `Y_raw`,
a data frame of sample information called
`design`, and a table of cellular composition
(i.e. mixing proportions) 
called `prop`. Instead of a data matrix, 
`Y_raw` could also be a `SummarizedExperiment` object. 
If the cellular composition
is not available, the following sections 
will discuss about how to obtain mixing 
proportions using reference-free deconvolution 
or reference-based deconvolution.

```{r quick_start, eval = FALSE}
Design_out <- makeDesign(design, Prop)
fitted_model <- fitModel(Design_out, Y_raw)
fitted_model$all_coefs # list all phenotype names
fitted_model$all_cell_types # list all cell type names
# coef should be one of above listed phenotypes
# cell_type should be one of above listed cell types
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, coef = "age", 
                    cell_type = "Neuron", contrast_matrix = NULL)
head(res_table)
```



# Example dataset

TOAST provides two sample dataset.

The first example dataset is 450K 
DNA methylation data. We obtain and process 
this dataset based 
on the raw data provided by GSE42861. This
is a DNA methylation 450K data for Rheumatoid
Arthiritis patients and controls. 
The original dataset has 485577 features
and 689 samples. We have reduced the dataset
to 3000 CpGs for randomly selected 50 RA patients
and 50 controls. 
```{r loadData}
library(TOAST)
data("RA_100samples")
Y_raw <- RA_100samples$Y_raw
Pheno <- RA_100samples$Pheno
Blood_ref <- RA_100samples$Blood_ref
```

Check matrix including beta values for 
3000 CpG by 100 samples.
```{r checkData}
dim(Y_raw) 
Y_raw[1:4,1:4]
```

Check phenotype of these 100 samples.
```{r checkPheno}
dim(Pheno)
head(Pheno, 3)
```

Our example dataset also contain blood 
reference matrix for the matched 3000 
CpGs (obtained from bioconductor 
package `r Biocpkg("FlowSorted.Blood.450k")`.
```{r checkRef}
dim(Blood_ref)
head(Blood_ref, 3)
```

The second example dataset is microarray gene
expression data. We obtain and process 
this dataset based 
on the raw data provided by GSE65133. This
microarary data is from 20 PBMC samples.
The original dataset has 47323 probes. We mapped 
the probes into 21626 genes and then further 
reduced the dataset to 511 genes by
selecting the genes that have matches 
in reference panel.
```{r loadDataCBS}
data("CBS_PBMC_array")
CBS_mix <- CBS_PBMC_array$mixed_all
LM_5 <- CBS_PBMC_array$LM_5
CBS_trueProp <- CBS_PBMC_array$trueProp
prior_alpha <- CBS_PBMC_array$prior_alpha
prior_sigma <- CBS_PBMC_array$prior_sigma
```

Check the PBMC microarray gene expression
data and true proportions
```{r checkDataCBS}
dim(CBS_mix) 
CBS_mix[1:4,1:4]
head(CBS_trueProp, 3)
```

Check reference matrix for 5 immune cell types
```{r checkLM5}
head(LM_5, 3)
```

Check prior knowledge for the 5 cell types
```{r checkPrior}
prior_alpha
prior_sigma
```

The third example dataset is a list containing two matrices, one of 
which is methylation 450K array data of 3000 CpG sites on 50 samples, the other is
methylation 450K array data of 3000 matched CpG sites on three immune cell types.
The first dataset is generated by simulation. It originally has 459226 features and 50 samples.We reduce it to 3000 CpGs by random selection.

```{r loadDatabeta}
data("beta_emp")
Ybeta = beta_emp$Y.raw
ref_m = beta_emp$ref.m
```

Check matrix including beta values for 
3000 CpG by 50 samples.
```{r checkDatabeta}
dim(Ybeta) 
Ybeta[1:4,1:4]
```

Check reference matrix for 3000 CpGs by three immune cell types
```{r checkDataRef}
head(ref_m, 3)
```
# Estimate mixing proportions

If you have mixing proportions available, 
you can directly go to Section \@ref(section:csDE).

In many situations, mixing proportions 
are not readily available. There are a number of deconvolution methods
available to solve this problem. To name a few:

* For DNA methylation: `r CRANpkg("RefFreeEWAS")`
(Houseman et al. 2016) is reference-free,  
and `r Biocpkg("EpiDISH")` (Teschendorff et al. 2017)
is reference-based.  

* For gene expression: qprog (Gong et al. 2011), 
deconf (Repsilber et al. 2010),  
lsfit (Abbas et al. 2009) 
and `r CRANpkg("DSA")` (Zhong et al. 2013).

In addition, [CellMix](https://github.com/rforge/cellmix)
package has summarized a number of deconvolution
methods and is a good resource to look up.  

Here we demonstrate two ways to estimate 
mixing proportions, one using 
`r CRANpkg("RefFreeEWAS")` (Houseman et al. 2016), representing the
class of reference-free methods, and the other
using `r Biocpkg("EpiDISH")` (Teschendorff et al. 2017) as a 
representation of reference-based methods. 

We also provide function to improve reference-free
deconvolution performance in Section \@ref(section:ImpRF), which
works for both gene expression data and DNA methylation data.
The example in Section \@ref(section:ImpRF) demonstrates
the usage of this. Note that we have only 
3000 features in the Y_raw from RA_100samples dataset, 
thus the proportion estimation 
is not very accurate. Real 450K dataset should 
have around 485,000 features. More features generally
lead to better estimation, because there 
are more information in the data. 

In Secion \@ref(section:PRF), we demonstrate the usage of partial
reference-free (PRF) deconvolution. Compared to RB methods,
PRF does not require reference panel thus can be more
wdiely applied. Compared to RF methods, PRF uses additional
biological information, which improves the estimation accuracy
and automatically assign cell type labels. 

## Reference-based deconvolution using least square method {#section:RB}

1. Select the top 1000 most variant 
features by `findRefinx()`. 
To select the top features with 
largest coefficients of variations, 
one can use `findRefinx(..., sortBy = "cv")`.
Default `sortBy` argument is `"var"`. Here, instead of 
a data matrix, `Y_raw` could 
also be a `SummarizedExperiment` object. 
```{r SelFeature}
refinx <- findRefinx(Y_raw, nmarker = 1000)
```

2. Subset data and reference panel.

```{r Subset}
Y <- Y_raw[refinx,]
Ref <- as.matrix(Blood_ref[refinx,])
```

3. Use EpiDISH to solve cellular 
proportions and use post-hoc constraint.
```{r DB2}
library(EpiDISH)
outT <- epidish(beta.m = Y, ref.m = Ref, method = "RPC")
estProp_RB <- outT$estF
```

_**A word about Step 1**_ 

For step 1, one can also use `findRefinx(..., sortBy = "cv")` 
to select features based on coefficient of variantion. 
The choice of `sortby = "cv"` and `sortBy = "var"`
depends on whether the feature variances of your data
correlates with the means. 
For RNA-seq counts, the variance-mean correlation is strong, 
thus `sortBy = "cv"` is recommended.
For log-counts, the variance-mean correlation 
largely disappears, so both `sortBy = "cv"` and `sortBy = "var"`
would work similarly. In DNA methylation data, this correlation is not 
strong, either `sortBy = "cv"` or `sortBy = "var"`
can be used. In this case, we recommend `sortBy = "var"` because we find it
has better feature selection for DNA methylation 
data than `sortBy = "cv"` (unpublished results).
```{r, DB3}
refinx = findRefinx(Y_raw, nmarker=1000, sortBy = "var")
```


## Reference-free deconvolution using RefFreeEWAS

1. Load `r CRANpkg("RefFreeEWAS")`.

```{r DF, message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
library(RefFreeEWAS)
```

2. Similar to Reference-based deconvolution 
we also select the top 1000 most variant 
features by `findRefinx()`. And then subset data.
```{r DF2}
refinx <- findRefinx(Y_raw, nmarker = 1000)
Y <- Y_raw[refinx,]
```

3. Do reference-free deconvolution on the RA dataset.

```{r, DF3, results='hide', message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
K <- 6
outT <- RefFreeCellMix(Y, mu0=RefFreeCellMixInitialize(Y, K = K))
estProp_RF <- outT$Omega
```

4. Comparing the reference-free method versus 
reference-base method

```{r compareRFRB}
# first we align the cell types from RF 
# and RB estimations using pearson's correlation
estProp_RF <- assignCellType(input=estProp_RF,
                             reference=estProp_RB) 
mean(diag(cor(estProp_RF, estProp_RB)))
```

## Improve reference-free deconvolution with cross-cell type differential analysis {#section:ImpRF}

Feature selection is an important step 
before RF deconvolution and is directly
related with the estimation quality of 
cell composition.  `findRefinx()` and
`findRefinx(..., sortBy = "var")` simply select the markers
with largest CV or largest variance, 
which may not always result in a good 
selection of markers.  Here, we propose
to improve RF deconvolution marker 
selection through cross-cell type 
differential analysis.  We implement
two versions of such improvement, 
one is for DNA methylation microarray 
data using `RefFreeCellMix` from `r CRANpkg("RefFreeEWAS")` 
package, the other one is for gene 
expression microarray data using `deconf`
from [CellMix](https://github.com/rforge/cellmix) package. 
To implement both, `r CRANpkg("RefFreeEWAS")` 
and [CellMix](https://github.com/rforge/cellmix) 
need to be installed first.

### Improved-RF with RefFreeCellMix {#section:RFimp}

1. Load TOAST package.

```{r IRB-RFCM1, message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
library(TOAST)
```

2. Do reference-free deconvolution using 
improved-RF implemented with RefFreeCellMix. 
The default deconvolution function implemented
in `csDeconv()` is `RefFreeCellMix_wrapper()`.
Here, instead of 
a data matrix, `Y_raw` could 
also be a `SummarizedExperiment` object.

```{r IRB-RFCM2, results='hide', message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
K=6
set.seed(1234)
outRF1 <- csDeconv(Y_raw, K, TotalIter = 30, bound_negative = TRUE) 
```

3. Comparing udpated RF estimations versus RB results.

```{r IRB-RFCM3, message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
## check the accuracy of deconvolution
estProp_RF_improved <- assignCellType(input=outRF1$estProp,
                                      reference=estProp_RB) 
mean(diag(cor(estProp_RF_improved, estProp_RB)))
```


__***A word about Step 2***__

For step 2, initial features (instead of automatic
selection by largest variation) can be provided to
function `RefFreeCellMixT()`. For example

```{r initFeature, eval = FALSE}
refinx <- findRefinx(Y_raw, nmarker = 1000, sortBy = "cv")
InitNames <- rownames(Y_raw)[refinx]
csDeconv(Y_raw, K = 6, nMarker = 1000, 
         InitMarker = InitNames, TotalIter = 30)
```

__***A word about bounding the negative estimators***__

Since all the parameters represent the mean observation levels for
each cell type, it may not be reasonable to have negative estimators.
As such, we provide options to bound negative estimated parameters to zero
through the `bound_negative` argument in `csDeconv()` function. Although
we find bounding negative estimators has minimum impact on the performance,
the users could choose to bound or not bound the negative values in the function.
The default value for `bound_negative` is FALSE.

### Improved-RF with use-defined RF function

In order to use other RF functions, users can 
wrap the RF function a bit first to make it 
accept Y (raw data) and K (number of cell types)
as input, and return a N (number of cell types) 
by K proportion matrix. We take `RefFreeCellMix()`
as an example. Other deconvolution methods can be
used similarly.

```{r, eval = FALSE}
mydeconv <- function(Y, K){
     if (is(Y, "SummarizedExperiment")) {
          se <- Y
          Y <- assays(se)$counts
     } else if (!is(Y, "matrix")) {
          stop("Y should be a matrix
               or a SummarizedExperiment object!")
     }
     
     if (K<0 | K>ncol(Y)) {
         stop("K should be between 0 and N (samples)!")
     }
     outY = RefFreeEWAS::RefFreeCellMix(Y, 
               mu0=RefFreeEWAS::RefFreeCellMixInitialize(Y, 
               K = K))
     Prop0 = outY$Omega
     return(Prop0)
}
set.seed(1234)
outT <- csDeconv(Y_raw, K, FUN = mydeconv, bound_negative = TRUE)
```

## Partial reference-free deconvolution (TOAST/-P and TOAST/+P) {#section:PRF}

Similar to DSA, our PRF method requires 
the knowledge of **cell type-specific markers**.
Such markers can be selected from pure 
cell type gene expression
profiles from same or different platforms (through
function `ChooseMarker()`). They can also 
be manually specified 
(see function manual `?MDeconv` for more explanation).
The **prior knowledge of cell compositions**
are optional, but
highly recommended. We find prior 
knowledge of cell compositions (`alpha` and `sigma`)
help calibrate the scales of the estimations, 
and reduce estimation bias. Such information 
can be estimated from previous cell sorting 
experiments or single cell study.
We currently provide prior knowledge for five 
tissue types: "human pbmc","human
liver", "human brain", "human pancreas", "human skin",
which can be directly specified in `MDeconv()` function.

### Choose cell type-specific markers

We provide functions to choose cell type-specific markers
from pure cell type profiles or single cell RNA-seq data.
Here we demonstrate how to select markers from 
PBMC pure cell type gene expression profile.
```{r chooseMarker}
## create cell type list:
CellType <- list(Bcells = 1,
                 CD8T = 2,
                 CD4T = 3,
                 NK = 4,
                 Monocytes = 5)
## choose (up to 20) significant markers 
## per cell type
myMarker <- ChooseMarker(LM_5, 
                         CellType, 
                         nMarkCT = 20,
                         chooseSig = TRUE,
                         verbose = FALSE)
lapply(myMarker, head, 3)
```

### PRF deconvolution without prior (TOAST/-P)

```{r PRFwithoutPrior}
resCBS0 <- MDeconv(CBS_mix, myMarker,
                epsilon = 1e-3, verbose = FALSE)
diag(cor(CBS_trueProp, t(resCBS0$H)))
mean(abs(as.matrix(CBS_trueProp) - t(resCBS0$H)))
```

### PRF deconvolution with prior (TOAST/+P)
We allow manually input the prior knowledge of all cell types,
or select from currently supported tissues ("human pbmc","human
liver", "human brain", "human pancreas", "human skin"). Note
that order of cell types in prior knowledge here should
match the order in marker list. 

Here is an example of manually specifying alpha and sigma:
```{r manualalpha}
prior_alpha <- c(0.09475, 0.23471, 0.33232, 0.0969, 0.24132)
prior_sigma <- c(0.09963, 0.14418, 0.16024, 0.10064, 0.14556)
names(prior_alpha) <- c("B cells", "CD8T", "CD4T",
                        "NK cells", "Monocytes")
names(prior_sigma) <- names(prior_alpha) 
```

Here is to see alpha and sigma for supported tisuses using 
`GetPrior()`:
```{r getprior}
thisprior <- GetPrior("human pbmc")
thisprior
```

Deconvolution using manually input alpha and sigma:
```{r PRFwithPrior}
resCBS1 <- MDeconv(CBS_mix, myMarker,
                alpha = prior_alpha,
                sigma = prior_sigma,
                epsilon = 1e-3, verbose = FALSE)
diag(cor(CBS_trueProp, t(resCBS1$H)))
mean(abs(as.matrix(CBS_trueProp) - t(resCBS1$H)))
```

For supported tissues, you can directly specify tissue type
as alpha input:
```{r PRFwithPrior2}
resCBS2 <- MDeconv(CBS_mix, myMarker,
                   alpha = "human pbmc",
                   epsilon = 1e-3, verbose = FALSE)
diag(cor(CBS_trueProp, t(resCBS2$H)))
mean(abs(as.matrix(CBS_trueProp) - t(resCBS2$H)))
```

## Complete deconvolution using a geometric approach {#section:Tsisal}

Tsisal is a complete deconvolution method
which estimates cell compositions from DNA methylation data without
prior knowledge of cell types and their proportions. 
Tsisal is a full pipeline to estimate number of cell types, 
cell compositions, find cell-type-specific CpG sites, 
and assign cell type labels when (full or part of) reference panel is available.

Here is an example of manually specifying K and reference panel:
```{r expKRef,results='hide',message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
out = Tsisal(Ybeta,K = 4, knowRef = ref_m)
out$estProp[1:3,1:4]
head(out$selMarker)
```

Here is an example where both K and reference panel are unknown:
```{r expAllNULL,results='hide',message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
out = Tsisal(Ybeta,K = NULL, knowRef = NULL, possibleCellNumber = 2:5)
out$estProp[1:3,1:out$K]
head(out$selMarker)
out$K
```

Here is an example where K is unknown and reference panel is known:
```{r expKNULL,results='hide',message=FALSE, warning=FALSE}
out = Tsisal(Ybeta, K = NULL, knowRef = ref_m, possibleCellNumber = 2:5)
out$estProp[1:3,1:out$K]
head(out$selMarker)
out$K
```



# Detect cell type-specific and cross-cell type differential signals {#section:csDE}

The csDE/csDM detection function requires 
a table of microarray or RNA-seq measurements
from all samples, a table of mixing proportions, 
and a design vector representing the status of 
subjects.  

We demonstrate the usage of TOAST in three common settings.

## Detect cell type-specific differential signals under two-group comparison {#section:csDEbasic}

1. Assuming you have TOAST library and dataset loaded, 
the first step is to generate the study design based on the 
phenotype matrix. Note that all the binary 
(e.g. disease = 0, 1) or categorical
variable (e.g. gender = 1, 2) should be transformed
to factor class. Here we use the proportions 
estimated from step \@ref(section:RFimp) as
input proportion.

```{r csDE2}
head(Pheno, 3)
design <- data.frame(disease = as.factor(Pheno$disease))

Prop <- estProp_RF_improved
colnames(Prop) <- colnames(Ref) 
## columns of proportion matrix should have names

```

2. Make model design using the design (phenotype)
data frame and proportion matrix. 
```{r csDE3}
Design_out <- makeDesign(design, Prop)
```

3. Fit linear models for raw data and the 
design generated from `Design_out()`. `Y_raw` 
here is a data matrix with dimension P (features) 
by N (samples). Instead of 
a data matrix, `Y_raw` could 
also be a `SummarizedExperiment` object. 
```{r csDE4}
fitted_model <- fitModel(Design_out, Y_raw)
# print all the cell type names
fitted_model$all_cell_types
# print all phenotypes
fitted_model$all_coefs
```

TOAST allows a number of hypotheses to be 
tested using `csTest()` in two group setting.

### Testing one parameter (e.g. disease) in one cell type.

For example, testing disease (patient versus controls) 
effect in Gran.

```{r}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "disease", 
                    cell_type = "Gran")
head(res_table, 3)
Disease_Gran_res <- res_table
```

### Testing one parameter in all cell types.

For example, testing the joint effect of age in all cell types:

```{r, eval = FALSE}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "disease", 
                    cell_type = "joint")
head(res_table, 3)
```

Specifying cell_type as NULL or not specifying 
cell_type will test the effect in each cell type
and the joint effect in all cell types.
```{r joint, eval = FALSE}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "disease", 
                    cell_type = NULL)
lapply(res_table, head, 3)

## this is exactly the same as
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, coef = "disease")
```

## Detect cell type-specific differential signals from a general experimental design

1. Assuming you have TOAST library and dataset loaded,
generate the study design based on the phenotype
matrix. Note that all the binary variable 
(e.g. disease = 0, 1) or categorical variable 
(e.g. gender = 1, 2) should be transformed 
to factor class. 

```{r general2}
design <- data.frame(age = Pheno$age,
                     gender = as.factor(Pheno$gender),
                     disease = as.factor(Pheno$disease))

Prop <- estProp_RF_improved
colnames(Prop) <- colnames(Ref)  
## columns of proportion matrix should have names
```

2. Make model design using the design (phenotype)
data frame and proportion matrix. 
```{r general3}
Design_out <- makeDesign(design, Prop)
```

3. Fit linear models for raw data and the 
design generated from `Design_out()`.
```{r general4}
fitted_model <- fitModel(Design_out, Y_raw)
# print all the cell type names
fitted_model$all_cell_types
# print all phenotypes
fitted_model$all_coefs
```

TOAST allows a number of hypotheses to be 
tested using `csTest()` in two group setting.

### Testing one parameter in one cell type

For example, testing age effect in Gran.

```{r general5}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "age", 
                    cell_type = "Gran")
head(res_table, 3)
```

We can test disease effect in Bcell.

```{r general6}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "disease", 
                    cell_type = "Bcell")
head(res_table, 3)
```

Instead of using the names of single coefficient, 
you can specify contrast levels, i.e. the comparing
levels in this coefficient. For example, using male
(gender = 1) as reference, testing female (gender = 2)
effect in CD4T:
```{r}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = c("gender", 2, 1), 
                    cell_type = "CD4T")
head(res_table, 3)
```

### Testing the joint effect of single parameter in all cell types.

For example, testing the joint effect of age in all cell types:

```{r, eval = FALSE}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "age", 
                    cell_type = "joint")
head(res_table, 3)
```

Specifying cell_type as NULL or not specifying
cell_type will test the effect in each cell type
and the joint effect in all cell types.
```{r, eval = FALSE}
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "age", 
                    cell_type = NULL)
lapply(res_table, head, 3)

## this is exactly the same as
res_table <- csTest(fitted_model, 
                    coef = "age")
```


## Detect cross-cell type differential signals

1. Assuming you have TOAST library and dataset loaded,
first step is to generate the study design based on the 
phenotype matrix. We allow general design
matrix such as the following:
```{r crossCellType2}
design <- data.frame(age = Pheno$age,
                     gender = as.factor(Pheno$gender),
                     disease = as.factor(Pheno$disease))

Prop <- estProp_RF_improved
colnames(Prop) <- colnames(Ref)  ## columns of proportion matrix should have names
```

Note that if all subjects belong to one group, 
we also allow detecting cross-cell type differences.
In this case, the design matrix can be specified as:
```{r crossCellType3, eval = FALSE}
design <- data.frame(disease = as.factor(rep(0,100)))
```

2. Make model design using the design (phenotype) 
data frame and proportion matrix. 
```{r crossCellType4}
Design_out <- makeDesign(design, Prop)
```

3. Fit linear models for raw data and the 
design generated from `Design_out()`.
```{r crossCellType5}
fitted_model <- fitModel(Design_out, Y_raw)
# print all the cell type names
fitted_model$all_cell_types
# print all phenotypes
fitted_model$all_coefs
```

For cross-cell type differential signal detection, 
TOAST also allows multiple ways for testing. 
For example

### Testing cross-cell type differential signals in cases (or in controls).

For example, testing the differences between 
CD8T and B cells in case group
```{r}
test <- csTest(fitted_model, 
               coef = c("disease", 1), 
               cell_type = c("CD8T", "Bcell"), 
               contrast_matrix = NULL)
head(test, 3)
```

Or testing the differences between 
CD8T and B cells in control group
```{r}
test <- csTest(fitted_model, 
               coef = c("disease", 0), 
               cell_type = c("CD8T", "Bcell"), 
               contrast_matrix = NULL)
head(test, 3)
```

### Testing the overall cross-cell type differences in all samples.

For example, testing the overall differences 
between Gran and CD4T in all samples, 
regardless of phenotypes.

```{r}
test <- csTest(fitted_model, 
               coef = "joint", 
               cell_type = c("Gran", "CD4T"), 
               contrast_matrix = NULL)
head(test, 3)
```

If you do not specify `coef` but only 
the two cell types to be compared, TOAST 
will test the differences of these 
two cell types in each coef parameter 
and the overall effect.

```{r}
test <- csTest(fitted_model, 
               coef = NULL, 
               cell_type = c("Gran", "CD4T"), 
               contrast_matrix = NULL)
lapply(test, head, 3)
```


### Testing the differences of two cell types over different values of one phenotype (higher-order test).

For example, testing the differences 
between Gran and CD4T in disease patients 
versus in controls.
```{r}
test <- csTest(fitted_model, 
               coef = "disease", 
               cell_type = c("Gran", "CD4T"), 
               contrast_matrix = NULL)
head(test, 3)
```

For another example, testing the differences 
between Gran and CD4T in males versus females.

```{r}
test <- csTest(fitted_model, 
               coef = "gender", 
               cell_type = c("Gran", "CD4T"), 
               contrast_matrix = NULL)
head(test, 3)
```

## A few words about variance bound and Type I error.

### Variance bound
There is an argument in `csTest()` called 
`var_shrinkage`. `var_shrinkage` is whether
to apply shrinkage on estimated mean squared
errors (MSEs) from the regression. 
Based on our experience, extremely 
small variance estimates sometimes cause
unstable test statistics. In our implementation,
use the 10% quantile value to bound the smallest MSEs.
We recommend to use the default opinion 
`var_shrinkage = TRUE`. 

### Type I error
For all the above tests, we implement them 
using F-test. In our own experiments, we 
observe inflated type I errors from using 
F-test. As a result, we recommend to perform
a permutation test to validate the significant
signals identified are "real". 

# Session info {.unnumbered}

```{r sessionInfo, echo=FALSE}
sessionInfo()
```
