Sorting Enhancers According To Transcription Factors In R

Question

[Diana]

Hi everyone,

I have a file like this with enhancers from 4 different genes with their TFs:

gene1            gene2            gene3            gene4            TF
gene1Enhancer1    gene2Enhancer1    gene3Enhancer2    Gene4Enhancer1    V$GSH1
gene1Enhancer2    gene2Enhancer2    gene3Enhancer3    Gene4Enhancer2    V$GSH1
gene1Enhancer3    gene2Enhancer3    gene3Enhancer4    Gene4Enhancer3    V$GSH1
gene1Enhancer1    gene2Enhancer1    gene3Enhancer2    Gene4Enhancer1    V$REF
gene1Enhancer3    gene2Enhancer3    gene3Enhancer4    Gene4Enhancer3    V$AB
gene1Enhancer6    gene2Enhancer6    gene3Enhancer7    Gene4Enhancer6    V$LEF1

I want the output to be sorted such that the first 4 columns are sorted so that same enhancers from 4 columns are put together with their transcription factors so it should look like this:

gene1            gene2            gene3            gene4            TF
gene1Enhancer1    gene2Enhancer1    gene3Enhancer2    Gene4Enhancer1    V$GSH1
gene1Enhancer1    gene2Enhancer1    gene3Enhancer2    Gene4Enhancer1    V$REF
gene1Enhancer3    gene2Enhancer3    gene3Enhancer4    Gene4Enhancer3    V$GSH1
gene1Enhancer3    gene2Enhancer3    gene3Enhancer4    Gene4Enhancer3    V$AB
gene1Enhancer2    gene2Enhancer2    gene3Enhancer3    Gene4Enhancer2    V$GSH1
gene1Enhancer6    gene2Enhancer6    gene3Enhancer7    Gene4Enhancer6    V$LEF1

I was thinking of using aggregate function in R but that didn't help. Any advice?

Thanks a lot!!!

Answer 1

[zx8754]

Sorting example based on multiple columns:

m <- matrix( sample(1:5, 20, rep=TRUE), nc=2)
m[ order(m[,1],m[,2]), ]

Also have a look at this How to sort a dataframe by column(s) in R

Answer 2

[Anthony Mathelier]

Just in case you need it outside of R, only one line is necessary in your terminal:

$ sort -k4,4 [input file] > [output file]