Thinking out loud
about R&D data

Réflexions sur
la data en R&D

Articles on statistics, data engineering, and AI applied to pharmaceutical, biotech, and cosmetic research. In French and English.

· 7 min read

Scaling scRNA-seq beyond the bench: where the data pipeline breaks

Single-cell RNA sequencing workflows break in predictable ways when you scale beyond one site, one batch, or one analyst.

· 8 min read

Why your Phase 1 data will become a bottleneck before Phase 2

Most early-stage biotech teams treat data infrastructure as a Phase 2 problem — until it costs three times as much to fix.

· 7 min read

Fermentation data from bench to pilot: why your KPIs don't transfer

Bench and pilot KPIs look similar on paper but were measured under different definitions — a data infrastructure problem, not a scientific one.

· 8 min read

Clinical data management for device trials: the FDA 21 CFR Part 11 checklist nobody reads early enough

Medical device teams discover FDA 21 CFR Part 11 requirements too late. Here is the six-question checklist before your first patient is enrolled.

· 7 min read

Your AI model is only as good as your experimental data pipeline

In AI-driven drug discovery, the model is rarely the limiting factor. The experimental data pipeline is.

· 7 min read

The reproducibility trap: when your R&D analysis depends on who runs it

Most biotech R&D analyses live in one person's head. When that person leaves, the analysis leaves with them.

· 6 min read

Your PowerPoint deck is not audit-ready: what regulators actually expect

ICH E6(R2) requires that clinical trial data be traceable, reproducible, and attributable. A PowerPoint deck with manually pasted numbers satisfies none of those requirements. Most R&D teams do not realize their internal

· 6 min read

ADC programs: managing conjugation and efficacy data

ADC programs generate a data complexity that is qualitatively different from classical biologics: DAR distribution, plasma stability, conjugation site heterogeneity, multi-analyte PK, and tumor efficacy all need to be an

· 6 min read

Organ-on-chip data: why your in vitro results deserve a real pipeline

OoC platforms generate multi-parameter data (MEA recordings, live imaging, viability assays, cytokine panels) that most teams store in disconnected spreadsheets. This article explains why that creates a reproducibility a

· 5 min read

NGS and molecular diagnostics: from raw data to clinical report

ctDNA, liquid biopsy, ddPCR. Molecular diagnostic teams generate sequencing volumes their analytical infrastructure cannot keep up with. Most of the bottleneck is not the biology. It is the absence of a reproducible pipe

· 9 min read

How to build a reproducible R&D data pipeline from scratch

Most R&D data pipelines start as ad hoc scripts and accumulate technical debt until they become unmaintainable. Building reproducibility in from day one is not harder than building without it, it just requires different

· 5 min read

Preclinical data for IND/CTA: the 3 mistakes that slow down a submission

Most preclinical data delays before an IND or CTA submission are not caused by the biology. They are caused by how the data was structured - or wasn't. Three recurring patterns account for the majority of these delays, a

· 7 min read

AI in drug discovery: what the hype gets wrong

AlphaFold solved a well-defined prediction problem. Most of drug discovery is not a well-defined prediction problem. The gap between "AI predicted a protein structure" and "AI discovered a drug" is where most AI drug dis

· 8 min read

Biological computing vs SNNs: what Cortical Labs CL1 means for computational neuroscience

Cortical Labs' CL1 uses living cortical neurons on a silicon chip to perform computation. Brian2 simulates spiking neural networks in software. On MNIST, both achieve similar accuracy. The comparison reveals what biologi

· 6 min read

Can a Shiny app replace a CRO for early-phase exploratory analysis?

For early-phase exploratory work, not pivotal, not submission-bound, a well-built Shiny application can do most of what a CRO statistician does. Not because Shiny is a statistics engine, but because early-phase analysis

· 6 min read

What a pharma R&D team actually needs from a freelance data scientist

Most pharma R&D teams do not need another data scientist who can train models. They need someone who understands GxP constraints, can translate between statisticians and engineers, and delivers work that is audit-ready o

· 5 min read

Why I build interactive tools instead of sending static reports

A static report answers the questions you anticipated. An interactive tool answers the questions you could not anticipate. For R&D teams who need to explore data, not just read summaries, the difference is the difference

· 7 min read

CDISC in practice: common mistakes and how to avoid them

Most CDISC compliance issues are not caused by missing knowledge of the standard. They are caused by decisions made before anyone looks at the CDISC guide, in the data collection design, the database structure, and the m

· 8 min read

CDISC compliance without a SAS team: what's possible in 2026

SAS is the traditional tool for CDISC submissions. It is also expensive, requires specialist skills, and is increasingly unnecessary. R and Python can produce FDA-acceptable SDTM and ADaM datasets, if you know how to do

· 6 min read

The hidden cost of manual statistical reporting in drug development

Every time an analyst copies a p-value from SAS output into a Word table, a small error becomes possible. Across a drug development program, these small errors compound into a significant liability. Automated reporting e

· 7 min read

The GxP data science stack for a 5-person biotech team

GxP compliance does not require enterprise infrastructure. With S3, dbt, renv, signed Git tags, and Quarto, a 5-person biotech team can build an audit-ready analytical stack in two weeks. This article walks through each

· 9 min read

How to automate your NCA workflow in R: from raw data to CDISC-ready output

Non-compartmental analysis done manually in Excel is a liability. A reproducible R pipeline using PKNCA reduces errors, produces CDISC PC domain output automatically, and runs in minutes instead of days.

· 8 min read

PK/PD modeling for non-statisticians: a visual introduction

Pharmacokinetics is not black magic. One-compartment models, half-life, and AUC can be understood visually without a single equation. This article builds intuition for PK/PD concepts that every drug development professio

· 8 min read

Reproducible statistical analysis plans with R and Quarto

A statistical analysis plan that exists only as a Word document is half a plan. When the SAP and the analysis code are the same document, via Quarto, you eliminate the drift between what you said you would do and what yo

· 7 min read

Handling quasi-complete separation in CLMM: a practical guide

Quasi-complete separation occurs when a predictor perfectly or near-perfectly predicts an outcome category. The model will run, but the estimates are unreliable, often inflated to extreme values with huge standard errors

· 9 min read

Proportional odds in ordinal outcomes: how to test it and what to do when it fails

The proportional odds assumption underlies every cumulative logit model. Most analysts never test it. When it fails, which is common, the reported odds ratios are meaningless averages. This article explains the assumptio

· 8 min read

Kaplan-Meier vs Cox regression: when to use which in clinical research

Kaplan-Meier describes survival. Cox regression explains it. They answer different questions and should be used together, not chosen between. Understanding when each is appropriate, and when Cox assumptions fail, is fund

· 8 min read

Mixed models for panelist data: why ANOVA is not enough

Repeated-measures ANOVA was designed for balanced, complete data from identical subjects. Cosmetic and clinical panel studies violate all three assumptions. Linear mixed models handle the real world correctly, and they a

· 10 min read

How to statistically validate a cosmetic claim under EU Regulation 655/2013

EU Regulation 655/2013 sets six common criteria for cosmetic claims. Criterion 2 (truthfulness) and criterion 5 (fairness) impose specific statistical requirements that most cosmetics companies get wrong. This article ex

· 7 min read

From efficacy trial to marketing claim: the data pipeline that connects them

A cosmetic efficacy trial produces numbers. A marketing claim is a sentence. The gap between them is filled by decisions, about which endpoints to report, how to round, which subgroups to highlight. A transparent data pi

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