Configuration Reference

PhenoCluster is configured via a YAML file with nested sections. All parameters have sensible defaults; only data.continuous_columns and/or data.categorical_columns are strictly required.

Note

Default values shown below are from the base profile template. Python dataclass defaults (used when instantiating PhenoClusterConfig programmatically without a profile) may differ for some parameters.

Generate a starter config from any profile (see Configuration Profiles):

phenocluster create-config -p <profile> -o config.yaml

global

Project-level settings.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
project_name	str	"PhenoCluster"	Project identifier shown in report titles and headers
output_dir	str	"results"	Directory where all output files, plots, and cached artifacts are written
random_state	int	42	Global random seed, automatically propagated to model selection, data splitting, and feature selection for full reproducibility

data

Dataset schema and train/test splitting.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
continuous_columns	list[str]	[]	Names of continuous (numeric) feature columns used for phenotype discovery
categorical_columns	list[str]	[]	Names of categorical (discrete) feature columns used for phenotype discovery
split.test_size	float	0.2	Fraction of data held out for testing (0 to 1 exclusive)
split.stratify_by	str | null	null	Column name to stratify the train/test split by (ensures balanced representation); null for random split
split.shuffle	bool	true	Whether to shuffle the data before splitting

Note

The train/test split is performed before any preprocessing. Imputation, outlier handling, encoding, and scaling are fit on the training set only for model selection. Once K is chosen, the full pipeline is refitted on the entire cohort for final analysis.

preprocessing.row_filter

Row-level missing data filtering, applied before any imputation.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable row filtering
max_missing_pct	float	0.30	Maximum fraction of missing values allowed per row; rows exceeding this threshold are dropped

preprocessing.imputation

Missing data imputation for remaining missing values after row filtering.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	false	Enable imputation. When disabled, StepMix handles missing values natively via FIML
method	str	"iterative"	Imputation strategy: iterative (multivariate chained equations), knn (k-nearest neighbours), simple (mean/mode)
estimator	str	"bayesian_ridge"	Regression estimator for iterative imputation: bayesian_ridge or random_forest
max_iter	int	10	Maximum number of imputation rounds (iterative method only)

preprocessing.categorical_encoding

Categorical variable encoding applied before LCA/LPA.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
method	str	"label"	Encoding strategy: label (ordinal integers), onehot (one-hot dummy variables), frequency (replace categories with their frequency)
handle_unknown	str	"ignore"	Behaviour when encountering unseen categories at test time: ignore produces zeros (one-hot) or maps to mode (label)

preprocessing.outlier

Outlier detection and handling for continuous features.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable outlier handling
method	str	"winsorize"	Strategy: winsorize (clip extreme values to percentile bounds) or isolation_forest (detect and remove anomalous observations)
contamination	float | “auto”	"auto"	Expected proportion of outliers in the data (isolation forest only); "auto" lets the algorithm decide
winsorize_limits	[float, float]	[0.01, 0.01]	Lower and upper percentile bounds for winsorization (e.g., [0.01, 0.01] clips the bottom 1% and top 1%)

preprocessing.feature_selection

Optional feature selection to reduce dimensionality before LCA/LPA.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	false	Enable feature selection
method	str	"lasso"	Selection method: variance (remove low-variance features), correlation (remove highly correlated pairs), mutual_info (rank by mutual information with target), lasso (L1-penalised logistic regression), combined (apply all filters sequentially)
variance_threshold	float	0.01	Minimum variance required to keep a feature (variance method)
frequency_threshold	float	0.99	Drop features where a single value accounts for more than this fraction of observations
correlation_threshold	float	0.9	Maximum allowed pairwise Pearson correlation; one feature from each correlated pair is dropped
n_features	int | null	null	Target number of features to select (mutual info and lasso methods); null uses method-specific defaults
percentile	float	50.0	Percentile threshold for feature ranking (mutual info method)
lasso_alpha	float | null	null	L1 regularisation strength for lasso; null selects automatically via cross-validation
target_column	str | null	null	Target column name required by supervised methods (mutual_info, lasso)

model

Latent Class / Profile Analysis model parameters and automatic selection.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
n_clusters	int	3	Fixed number of latent classes; only used when selection.enabled is false
selection.enabled	bool	true	Enable automatic model selection by searching over a range of cluster counts
selection.min_clusters	int	2	Minimum number of clusters to evaluate during model selection
selection.max_clusters	int	6	Maximum number of clusters to evaluate during model selection
selection.criterion	str	"BIC"	Information criterion used to rank models: BIC, AIC, ICL, CAIC, SABIC, ENTROPY
selection.min_cluster_size	int | float	0.05	Minimum acceptable cluster size; integer for absolute count, float in (0, 1) for proportion of total samples. Models with any cluster below this threshold are rejected
selection.n_init	list[int]	[100]	Number of random EM initialisations per cluster count to avoid local optima
selection.n_jobs	int	-1	Number of parallel jobs; -1 uses all available CPU cores
selection.refit	bool	true	Refit best model on full training data after selection
stepmix.max_iter	int	1000	Maximum number of EM algorithm iterations per fit
stepmix.abs_tol	float	1e-7	Absolute convergence tolerance for the EM log-likelihood
stepmix.rel_tol	float	1e-5	Relative convergence tolerance for the EM log-likelihood

outcome

Binary outcome association analysis. When enabled, a logistic regression is fitted for each outcome column, comparing each phenotype against the reference.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable outcome association analysis
outcome_columns	list[str]	[]	Names of binary (0/1) outcome columns in the dataset

stability

Consensus clustering stability analysis via repeated subsampled LCA/LPA fits.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable stability analysis
n_runs	int	100	Number of subsampled LCA/LPA fits; higher values give more reliable stability estimates
subsample_fraction	float	0.8	Fraction of training data randomly sampled for each run
n_jobs	int	-1	Number of parallel jobs; -1 uses all available CPU cores

survival

Survival analysis with Kaplan-Meier curves, Nelson-Aalen estimators, log-rank tests, and Cox PH hazard ratios.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable survival analysis
use_weighted	bool	false	Weight survival curves by class membership probabilities instead of hard assignments
targets	list	[]	List of survival endpoints, each with name (label), time_column (follow-up duration), and event_column (censoring indicator, 1 = event)

multistate

Multistate transition modelling with transition-specific Cox PH models, hazard ratios, and Monte Carlo trajectory simulation.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	false	Enable multistate analysis
states	list	[]	State definitions, each with id (integer), name, state_type (initial, transient, absorbing), and optionally event_column / time_column for transient states
transitions	list	[]	Allowed transitions between states, each with name, from_state (id), to_state (id)
baseline_confounders	list[str]	[]	Column names of baseline covariates to adjust for in the Cox models
min_events_per_transition	int	3	Minimum observed events required to fit a model for a given transition
default_followup_time	float	30	Maximum follow-up horizon (in the same time unit as your data) for Monte Carlo simulation
monte_carlo.n_simulations	int	1000	Number of Monte Carlo patient trajectories simulated per phenotype
monte_carlo.time_points	list[float]	[5,10,15,20,25,30]	Time points at which state occupation probabilities are evaluated
monte_carlo.max_transitions_per_path	int	10	Safety limit on the maximum number of transitions in a single simulated trajectory

inference

Statistical inference settings for outcome, survival, and multistate analyses.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable statistical inference (logistic regression, Cox PH, log-rank tests)
confidence_level	float	0.95	Width of confidence intervals (e.g., 0.95 for 95% CI)
fdr_correction	bool	true	Apply Benjamini-Hochberg FDR correction for multiple comparisons
outcome_test	str	"auto"	Test for binary outcomes: auto (selects based on expected cell counts), chi-square, fisher
cox_penalizer	float	0.0	L2 penalizer for Cox PH models (survival and multistate analyses); helps with convergence when events are sparse

reference_phenotype

Strategy for selecting the reference phenotype against which all other phenotypes are compared in outcome and survival analyses.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
strategy	str	"largest"	Selection strategy: largest (most patients), healthiest (lowest rate of a specified outcome), specific (user-specified ID)
specific_id	int | null	null	Phenotype ID to use as reference; required when strategy is specific
health_outcome	str | null	null	Outcome column name used to determine the healthiest phenotype; required when strategy is healthiest

external_validation

External validation on an independent cohort. When enabled, the fitted model is applied to an external dataset to assess phenotype reproducibility.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	false	Enable external validation on an independent cohort
external_data_path	str | null	null	Path to the external cohort CSV file

cache

Artifact caching for incremental re-runs. Cached artifacts allow skipping completed pipeline steps when re-running with the same data and config.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable caching of intermediate pipeline results to artifacts/
compress_level	int	3	Gzip compression level for cached files (0 = no compression, 9 = maximum)

visualization

Plot output settings.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
save_plots	bool	true	Save generated plots to the output directory
dpi	int	300	Resolution in dots per inch for raster plot formats

logging

Logging configuration.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
level	str	"INFO"	Minimum log level: DEBUG, INFO, WARNING, ERROR, CRITICAL
format	str	"detailed"	Log message format: minimal (message only), standard (level + message), detailed (timestamp + level + module + message)
log_to_file	bool	true	Write log messages to a file in the output directory
log_file	str	"phenocluster.log"	Name of the log file
quiet_mode	bool	false	Suppress all console output (log file is still written if enabled)

data_quality

Automated data quality assessment run before preprocessing.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
enabled	bool	true	Enable data quality checks
missing_threshold	float	0.15	Flag columns with more than this fraction of missing values in the report
correlation_threshold	float	0.9	Flag feature pairs with Pearson correlation exceeding this value
variance_threshold	float	0.01	Flag features with variance below this value as near-constant
generate_report	bool	true	Include a data quality summary section in the HTML report

categorical_flow

Categorical variable flow visualisation settings.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
group_by_prefix	bool	true	Group variables by name prefix for cleaner visualisation
prefix_separator	str	"_"	Character used to split variable names into prefix groups
custom_groups	dict	{}	Manual variable groupings (e.g., Recipient: [R_*])
show_sankey	bool	false	Show Sankey diagrams (can be cluttered with many variables)
show_proportion_heatmap	bool	true	Show proportion heatmap (recommended)
min_category_pct	float	0.03	Group categories below this proportion as “Other”

feature_characterization

Descriptive feature characterisation settings for the report.

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
group_by_prefix	bool	true	Group features by name prefix
prefix_separator	str	"_"	Character used to split feature names into prefix groups
custom_groups	dict	{}	Manual feature groupings (e.g., Recipient: [R_*])
n_top_per_group	int	5	Number of top features to show per group per cluster
n_top_overall	int	20	Number of top features overall (when grouping is disabled)