Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Studholme, David J
• MacLean, Daniel
• Jones, Jonathan D. G

Titel

Application of 'next-generation' sequencing technologies to microbial genetics

Ist Teil von

• Nature reviews. Microbiology, 2009-04, Vol.7 (4), p.287-296

Ort / Verlag

London: Nature Publishing Group UK

Erscheinungsjahr

2009

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Key Points New sequencing technologies, such as Solexa, 454 pyrosequencing and SOLiD, developed by Illumina, Roche and Applied Biosystems, respectively, are set to revolutionize microbiology by dramatically increasing throughput and reducing costs of DNA sequencing. These new technologies present new technical and computational challenges, as well as new research opportunities. Applications include de novo genome sequence assembly, metagenomics, sRNA discovery, detection of polymorphisms, expression profiling and epigenetics. Many freely available software packages are available for dealing with the large datasets generated by these applications. As well as sequence alignment and assembly, there is a need for downstream processing of data into a form that is accessible to biologists. Standards are emerging for analysis and archiving of data generated by the new technologies. New sequencing methods have enabled the assembly of whole microbial genomes in a matter of days, greatly expanding the volume and scope of microbial sequencing efforts. This article reviews the current capabilities of the various high-throughput sequencing technologies and data analysis tools in the context of their application to microbial genomics. New sequencing methods generate data that can allow the assembly of microbial genome sequences in days. With such revolutionary advances in technology come new challenges in methodologies and informatics. In this article, we review the capabilities of high-throughput sequencing technologies and discuss the many options for getting useful information from the data.