Dotmatics, an R&D scientific software company connecting science, data, and decision-making, announces a major new release of its popular GraphPad Prism application, the world’s leading analysis and graphing solution for scientific research. Prism 10 introduces several features including a new, more open file format (.prism), a variety of core graphing and analysis improvements, and a beta for Prism Cloud. The enhanced functionality makes it easier for scientists using Prism to collaborate and integrate diverse data into their scientific workflows and applications. Learn more about the new capabilities here.

For more than 25 years, Prism has provided comprehensive analysis and simplified, powerful statistics exclusively for the scientific community. Prism is an advanced statistical analysis software designed to help scientists create graphs to visualize and analyze data. In February, Dotmatics announced that its R&D platform was the very first to integrate directly with Prism. That means scientists and researchers can export assay data directly to Prism from the latest release of Dotmatics’ cloud-based platform, a critical step towards ensuring that all information shared meets FAIR data principles.

“Scientists working to discover and develop life-saving therapies must be able to navigate mountains of complex data, yet they are impeded by technologies and processes that hinder openness, reproducibility, and collaboration,” said Trajen Head, PhD, and head of product strategy for Prism at Dotmatics. “The industry is moving towards adopting FAIR standards to address these challenges and Dotmatics is committed to helping organizations extract greater value from their data. This update is a massive leap forward for the 750,000 scientists who use Prism in their workflows.”

A first look at Prism 10

The new, more open Prism file format helps organizations connect scientific workflows that allow for greater collaboration and interdisciplinary research. That means that any data that goes into Prism can be programmatically extracted for further insights beyond the scope of a single study. The announcement coincides with the launch of Dotmatics Luma, a revolutionary scientific data platform that flexibly aggregates all relevant data into intelligent structures enabling clean, reliable data analysis that paves the way for meta-analysis and AI & ML-based algorithms. The Prism file format will allow for future integration into Luma, helping scientists and administrators in life sciences unify and analyze large volumes of data for better decision-making.

The .prism file format stores raw data, analysis parameters, and results, in an accessible industry-standard format like CSV, PNG, and JSON. This means ever-growing and increasingly complex data sets can be used both inside and outside of Prism through modern scientific workflows. By leveraging the data collected in previous experiments or analyses, scientists can facilitate efficient data reuse and promote transparency in research to make more informed decisions in future experiments. In the spirit of safeguarding interoperability and reusability, the new file format allows Prism customers to embrace FAIR data principles.

The Prism Cloud beta simplifies collaboration by allowing users to share their projects (graphs, layouts, data tables, and results) with their colleagues within a shared workspace. With Prism Cloud, users can publish their projects to the cloud with a single click. They can quickly engage in discussions and acquire feedback, allowing them to work and iterate in a more agile manner, and without having to send files back and forth.

“Prism is my go-to program for scientific graphs, and I strongly recommend it,” said Maarten Boers, MD, PhD, MSc, Emeritus Professor of Clinical Epidemiology at Amsterdam UMC. “It has all the necessary graph types, an intuitive interface, and default settings that produce proper graphs right out of the box. In addition, its stats module allows you to do quite extensive analyses without resorting to other programs. My publications and teaching on this topic both lean heavily on this program. I’m excited about the possibility of a cloud version that will allow better collaboration.”

Other new functionality in Prism 10 includes:

• Graph Inspector: Provides a new level of control over data visualization by combining scientists’ favorite customization tools in one location for multiple variable graphs. Offers real-time changes and visualization updates, and the ability to craft bubble plots more quickly and intuitively.
• Simplified interpretation of results: Features a new responsive “One or None” P-value summary style for a simpler and clearer interpretation of statistical significance. Assigns a single asterisk if it is lower than the statistical threshold (alpha), and no asterisk if it is greater, no matter what value of alpha is chosen.
• Expanded data capabilities: Faster performance and support for larger data sets than previous versions. The number of columns in a single data sheet has doubled. Users can have data in up to 2048 columns (with up to 512 subcolumns in each) — this means Prism can now handle over 1 million values in a single row.
• Single data point selection: Enables users to select a single data point from a multiple variables graph, and then highlight the selected point to provide information on the variable values used for plotting. Automatically selects other points belonging to the same group on subsequent clicks.
• More comprehensive analysis: A new default multiple comparison method has been added for two-way ANOVA. This simultaneously compares rows and columns while properly correcting the results for the number and types of comparisons being conducted. This feature can provide significant time savings and reduce the need for conducting separate analyses.

Current, active subscribers can upgrade to Prism 10 at no cost. For further details about this release and the new file format, visit graphpad.com.