I’m thrilled to announce the release of toxdrc on CRAN, (https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/toxdrc/index.html), an extension of the drc package currently available in R. The drc package has long been used to support dose-response analysis in R, but it is challenging to use efficiently with large, complex datasets that require the analysis of many dose-response curves simultaneously, either in the form of different experiments, replicates, or different endpoints within the same test. Workflows can often become quite complex to work around these challenges. The newly deployed toxdrc aims to alleviate these pinch points by offering a pipeline function, `runtoxdrc`. This function is a one-stop shop for dose response modelling, point estimation, and can handle preliminary data transformations (blank correction, relative response calculation, validity criteria, solvent effects, etc). This package was designed to have a simple interface and transparent calculation; all intermediate steps of these functions can be viewed and are stored throughout the pipeline function. Additionally, this package does not make any assumptions about column names, allowing it to adapt to any long-form data. If you are interested in using this package, we invite you to read the publicly available readme at https://github.com/jsalole/toxdrc. Similarly, bug reports can also be made at the same repository https://github.com/jsalole/toxdrc/issues.

While outside of the designed scope, this package is also able to analyze enzyme activity data, which will interest users who generate large in vitro datasets.

Toxdrc is one of the practical outputs of the MSc of Jack Salole, who has returned to the WilsonToxLab for his PhD!