How can I make multiple density plots from data inside a nested list

Question

I have a nested list containing 15 datasets (also lists), each of which has 3 columns but a variable number of rows (thousands each). The top of the last dataset looks like this in the console:

[[15]]
           Object.Number            Internal                      Membrane
1                0                 8.275335e+03                   2575.41042
2                2                 1.225267e+04                   5813.50000
3                3                 9.554725e+03                   2483.51172

I would like to make a 5x3 grid of density plots, created using the values in the 2nd column of each of 15 datasets.

I thought I could do this with lapply (myFiles, densityplot(args)) but I can't find a way to reference the column within the arguments for densityplot.

Would be grateful for any insights on how this can be achieved.

Answer 1

I would use dplyr::bind_rows with argument .id to row-bind all data.frames into a single data.frame; then use ggplot2 with facet_wrap to plot densities in a 3x5 grid layout.

Here is an example using the mtcars sample data:

# Create sample data
lst <- replicate(15, mtcars, simplify = F)

# Plot
library(tidyverse)
bind_rows(lst, .id = "id") %>%
    mutate(id = factor(id, levels = as.character(1:15))) %>%
    ggplot(aes(mpg)) +
    geom_density() +
    facet_wrap(~ id, nrow = 3, ncol = 5)