Description
Measure and compare microbial community diversity
The Microbiome Alpha & Beta Diversity Practical guides you through the essential methods used to quantify diversity within samples and compare community composition across samples or groups.
You will explore alpha-diversity measures, calculate beta-diversity distances, visualize relationships using ordination, and evaluate community differences with PERMANOVA.
This practical emphasizes responsible analysis and interpretation. You will learn what each method measures, how analytical choices affect the results, and how to avoid overstating biological conclusions.
What you will practice
- Calculate and interpret alpha-diversity measures
- Compare richness and diversity across samples
- Calculate beta-diversity distance matrices
- Visualize community relationships using ordination
- Test community differences with PERMANOVA
- Review assumptions and potential limitations
- Communicate diversity results responsibly
- Build a reproducible analysis workflow
Who this practical is for
This practical is designed for students, researchers, laboratory scientists, and data analysts who want hands-on experience measuring and comparing microbial community diversity.
Some familiarity with biological data and basic statistical concepts is helpful. Completing Practical 001: Microbiome Community Profiling first is recommended.
Continue your microbiome analysis journey
Continue with Practical 003: Microbiome Differential Abundance to identify taxa associated with differences between study groups or conditions.
