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Shoshana Marcus

Publications and source records attributed to Shoshana Marcus.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

Third-generation sequencing and the future of genomics

Third-generation long-range DNA sequencing and mapping technologies are creating a renaissance in high-quality genome sequencing. Unlike second-generation sequencing, which produces short reads a few hundred base-pairs long, third-generation single-molecule technologies generate over 10,000 bp reads or map over 100,000 bp molecules. We analyze how increased read lengths can be used to address longstanding problems in de novo genome assembly, structural variation analysis and haplotype phasing.

Bioinformatics

Error correction and assembly complexity of single molecule sequencing reads.

Third generation single molecule sequencing technology is poised to revolutionize genomics by enabling the sequencing of long, individual molecules of DNA and RNA. These technologies now routinely produce reads exceeding 5,000 basepairs, and can achieve reads as long as 50,000 basepairs. Here we evaluate the limits of single molecule sequencing by assessing the impact of long read sequencing in the assembly of the human genome and 25 other important genomes across the tree of life. From this, we develop a new data-driven model using support vector regression that can accurately predict assembly performance. We also present a novel hybrid error correction algorithm for long PacBio sequencing reads that uses pre-assembled Illumina sequences for the error correction. We apply it several prokaryotic and eukaryotic genomes, and show it can achieve near-perfect assemblies of small genomes (< 100Mbp) and substantially improved assemblies of larger ones. All source code and the assembly model are available open-source.

Bioinformatics

SplitMEM: Graphical pan-genome analysis with suffix skips

Motivation: With the rise of improved sequencing technologies, genomics is expanding from a single reference per species paradigm into a more comprehensive pan-genome approach with multiple individuals represented and analyzed together. One of the most sophisticated data structures for representing an entire population of genomes is a compressed de Bruijn graph. The graph structure can robustly represent simple SNPs to complex structural variations far beyond what can be done from linear sequences alone. As such there is a strong need to develop algorithms that can efficiently construct and analyze these graphs. Results: In this paper we explore the deep topological relationships between the suffix tree and the compressed de Bruijn graph. We introduce a novel O(n log n) time and space algorithm called splitMEM, that directly constructs the compressed de Bruijn graph for a pan-genome of total length n. To achieve this time complexity, we augment the suffix tree with suffix skips, a new construct that allows us to traverse several suffix links in constant time, and use them to efficiently decompose maximal exact matches (MEMs) into the graph nodes. We demonstrate the utility of splitMEM by analyzing the pan- genomes of 9 strains of Bacillus anthracis and 9 strains of Escherichia coli to reveal the properties of their core genomes. Availability: The source code and documentation are available open- source at http://splitmem.sourceforge.net

Bioinformatics