BOL: Related items

nf-core/mag v5: Advancing Genome-Resolved Metagenomics

LEGE — Sat, 12 Sep 2026 20:27:51 -0500

Metagenomics is rapidly moving beyond short-read sequencing. With the increasing adoption of long-read technologies, researchers can generate more contiguous assemblies—but converting these reads into reliable metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) remains computationally challenging.

nf-core/mag v5 (https://github.com/nf-core/mag) addresses this challenge by extending its reproducible Nextflow-based workflow for modern genome-resolved metagenomics.

A key addition is support for long-read-only metagenomic assembly and bin refinement, enabling long-read data to be processed through an integrated workflow. The release also introduces five additional binning tools, providing complementary strategies for recovering genomes from complex microbial communities.

The workflow has also expanded beyond conventional bacterial and archaeal MAGs, with improved classification of viruses and eukaryotes, together with enhanced genome-quality assessment.

Conceptually, the workflow brings together:

Reads → QC → Assembly → Binning → Bin refinement → Taxonomic classification → MAG quality assessment

The real strength of nf-core/mag is not any single algorithm, but the integration and reproducibility of multiple tools within a standardized workflow. This is particularly important for large-scale metagenomic studies where software versions, parameters, databases and computational environments can strongly influence results.

After seven years of development involving multiple curator teams and the wider nf-core community, v5 demonstrates how community-driven workflow development can keep metagenomic analysis aligned with rapidly evolving sequencing technologies.

The future of genome-resolved metagenomics is not simply longer reads—it is better integration of assembly, binning, refinement and quality control within reproducible computational workflows.

Read the full paper in Bioinformatics https://academic.oup.com/bioinformatics/article/42/9/btag628/8770536?

A guide for complete R beginners :- Installing R packages

Archana Malhotra — Tue, 24 Feb 2015 20:23:34 -0600

Part of the reason R has become so popular is the vast array of packages available at the cran and bioconductor repositories. In the last few years, the number of packages has grown exponentially!

This is a short post giving steps on how to actually install R packages. Let’s suppose you want to install the ggplot2 package. Well nothing could be easier. We just fire up an R shell and type:
> install.packages("ggplot2")

In theory the package should just install, however:

if you are using Linux and don’t have root access, this command won’t work.
you will be asked to select your local mirror, i.e. which server should you use to download the package.

Installing packages without root access

First, you need to designate a directory where you will store the downloaded packages. On my machine, I use the directory /data/Rpackages/ After creating a package directory, to install a package we use the command:
> install.packages("ggplot2", lib="/data/Rpackages/") > library(ggplot2, lib.loc="/data/Rpackages/")

It’s a bit of a pain having to type /data/Rpackages/ all the time. To avoid this burden, we create a file .Renviron in our home area, and add the line R_LIBS=/data/Rpackages/ to it. This means that whenever you start R, the directory /data/Rpackages/ is added to the list of places to look for R packages and so:

> install.packages("ggplot2") > library(ggplot2)

just works!

Setting the repository

Every time you install a R package, you are asked which repository R should use. To set the repository and avoid having to specify this at every package install, simply:

create a file .Rprofile in your home area.
Add the following piece of code to it:

cat(".Rprofile: Setting UK repositoryn") r = getOption("repos") # hard code the UK repo for CRAN r["CRAN"] = "http://cran.uk.r-project.org" options(repos = r) rm(r)

I found this tip in a stackoverflow answer .

320000 viruses in mammals yet to sequenced in future!!!

Rahul Agarwal — Tue, 03 Sep 2013 08:35:30 -0500

With current biological technique improvements, finally it is now possible to look at millions of unknown viruses at genomic level and understand the mechanism. According to available data, close to 70 per cent of emerging viral diseases such as HIV/AIDS, West Nile, Ebola, SARS, and influenza, are zoonoses - infections of animals that cross into humans.

To address the challenges of describing and estimating virodiversity, a team of investigators from Center for Infection and Immunity (CII) and EcoHealth Alliance began in jungles of Bangladesh - home to the flying fox.

Reference:

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/et-cetera/mammals-harbour-at-least-320000-new-viruses/articleshow/22253268.cms

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23932400

Research Associate Bioinformatics job position in Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute (IASRI)

Tue, 31 Mar 2015 20:45:14 -0500

Research Associate Bioinformatics job position in Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute (IASRI)

Qualification : Ph.D. in Bioinformatics/ Agricultural Statistics/ Statistics/ Computer Science/ Computer Application/ Life Science/ Biotechnology/ Agricultural Science or equivalent. Desirable: Knowledge of Statistical and Computational Genomics/ Proteomics/ Bioinformatics OR Post-Graduation in Bioinformatics/ Agricultural Statistics/ Statistics/ Computer Science/ Computer Application/ Life Science/ Biotechnology/ Agricultural Science or equivalent with 1st Division or 60% marks or equivalent with at least two years of research experience. Desirable:Expertise on use of various software/ tool.

No.of Post: 2

Emoluments for RA: Consolidated Rs. 24000/- per month + 30% HRA for Ph.D holders and consolidated Rs. 23000/- per month + 30% HRA for Master Degree.

Age Limit : Age should not be more than 40 years for the post of Research associate (5 years relaxation for SC/ST/ women candidates) and 3 years for OBC candidates as on date of interview.
How to apply

Interested candidates are invited to appear for Walk-In interview at Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute, Library Avenue, Pusa, New Delhi -110012, along with filled in application form , all the original certificates from matriculation onwards, Ph.D. or M.Sc. certificate (as the case may be) must be produced at the time of interview in either original or provisional, Bio-Data, attested copies of all experience certificates, testimonials etc., one passport size photograph and one set of the self-attested photocopies of all the required certificates from matriculation onwards and an attested copy of recent passport size photograph pasted onto the application form. Walk-in interview will be held on 16th April, 2015 at 10:30 a.m.

Click Here for Job Details & Application Form http://www.iasri.res.in/employment/employment.htm

Tools to detect synteny blocks regions among multiple genomes

Jitendra Narayan — Mon, 16 Sep 2013 17:12:02 -0500

The synteny block (which etymologically means “on the same ribbon”) is a collection of contiguous genes located on the same chromosome. These block regions have mostly been preserved by genome rearrangements, and so synteny blocks from two related species (e.g., humans and mice) will be roughly similar but flipped around on the respective genomes. Ovcharenko et. al. define it as ‘any conserved sequence blocks, regardless of whether it encompasses multiple genes, an area containing single genes, or areas devoid of known genes to be considers as synteny block as long as there is conservation at the sequence level. Today, however, biologists usually refer to synteny as the conservation of blocks of order within two sets of chromosomes that are being compared with each other. This concept can also be referred to as shared synteny. The NHBLI/NCBI Glossary define synteny as “Two genes which occur on the same chromosome are syntenic; however, syntenic genes may or may not be "linked."

Now a day, geneticists have developed a language of their own. They are pouring lots of money and energy to read the entire genomic text and understand the gods own code ATGC. It is somewhat fascinating, not only for geneticist but also for non-biologist to know that there are several conserved blocks in genome which remain conserved over hundreds of millions of years. There have been several researches on conserved blocks and non-conserved regions to understand the mechanism and importance of all these regions (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2675965/). The finding indicates conservation and rearrangements of certain evolutionary important genes play an important role in evolution/adaptive changes (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v491/n7424/abs/nature11622.html https://academic.oup.com/gbe/article/8/8/2442/2198198/Novel-Insights-into-Chromosome-Evolution-in-Birds , http://science.sciencemag.org/content/346/6215/1311).

But the puzzle remains open, how to correctly define the synteny (presence of two or more genes on the same chromosome) and conserved synteny (presence of two or more genes on chromosome of each of the two species) on several genomes.

Figure: Image generated with Evolution Highway (EH) tool http://eh-demo.ncsa.illinois.edu/

Keeping the new approach to define conserved synteny in mind there have been various algorithms developed to identify the conserved homologous synteny blocks (HSB) amongst species. Some of them which were commonly used for synteny detections are:

SyntenyTracker ( http://www-app.igb.uiuc.edu/labs/lewin/donthu/Synteny_assign/html/),

SyntenyTracker was shown to be an efficient and accurate automated tool for defining HSBs using datasets that may contain minor errors resulting from limitations in map construction methodologies.

CoGe (http://genomevolution.org/CoGe/SynFind.pl )

Satsuma (http://evomics.org/learning/genomics/satsuma/)

Cinteny (http://cinteny.cchmc.org/) ,

Cinteny server can be used for finding regions syntenic across multiple genomes and measuring the extent of genome rearrangement using reversal distance as a measure.

OrthoCluster (http://krono.act.uji.es/noticias/orthocluster-a-new-tool-for-mining-syntenic-blocks)

A new tool for mining syntenic blocks in comparative genomics

SynMap (http://genomevolution.org/wiki/index.php/SynMap),

SyMAP (http://www.symapdb.org/)

SyMAP (Synteny Mapping and Analysis Program) v4.0 is an automated system for identifying and displaying genome synteny alignments. The genomes may be represented by sequenced chromosomes (pseudomolecules), by draft sequence contigs, or by FPC physical maps (with BAC-end or marker sequence).

http://genomevolution.org/CoGe/SynMap.pl

RegionMiner (http://www.genomatix.de/online_help/help_regionminer/orthologous.html)

SyntenyMiner is being developed as an application to visualize and interrogate comparisons among multiple complete genome sequences. http://syntenyminer.sourceforge.net/

AutoGRAPH ( http://autograph.genouest.org/),

AutoGRAPH is an integrated web server for multi-species comparative genomic analysis. It is designed for constructing and visualizing synteny maps between two or three species, determination and display of macrosynteny and microsynteny relationships among species, and for highlighting evolutionary breakpoints.

SynChro(http://www.lgm.upmc.fr/CHROnicle/SynChro.html)

SynChro is a tool designed to define conserved synteny blocks. It reconstructs synteny blocks between pairwise comparison of multiple genomes. The reconstructed synteny blocks may overlap each other, be included in one another or duplicated due to micro-rearrangements.

SyntenyView ( http://www.cbs.dtu.dk/dtucourse/cookbooks/nikob/exercises/gf1_output_5.html),

Ensembl 'SyntenyView' shows conservation of large-scale gene order between species pairs. A brief summary of the calculation method appears at the bottom of this help page. The left of a 'SyntenyView' page displays a diagram of chromosomes with blocks of conserved synteny. The right of a page shows homology matches between individual genes within syntenic blocks.

SynBrowse ( http://www.synbrowse.org/),

SynBrowse (Synteny Browser) is a generic sequence comparison tool for visualizing genome alignments both within and between species. It is intended to help scientists study and analyze synteny, homologous genes and other conserved elements between sequences. This software is useful in studying genome duplication and evolution. It can also aid in identifying uncharacterized genes, putative regulatory elements and novel structural features of study species by comparing to a well annotated reference sequence, thus enabling genome curators to refine and edit annotations of species that have incomplete genome annotations.

Sibelia (http://arxiv.org/abs/1307.7941).

A comparative genomic tool: It assists biologists in analysing the genomic variations that correlate with pathogens, or the genomic changes that help microorganisms adapt in different environments. Sibelia will also be helpful for the evolutionary and genome rearrangement studies for multiple strains of microorganisms.

GSV (http://cas-bioinfo.cas.unt.edu/gsv/homepage.php)

Genome Synteny Viewer allows users to upload files which contain synteny regions between two or more genomes and interactively visualize the synteny between them. GSV also allows users to upload annotation files to visualize annotated regions in addition to synteny regions.

MicroSyn (http://www.lgm.upmc.fr/CHROnicle/SynChro.html)

MicroSyn software as a means of detecting microsynteny in adjacent genomic regions surrounding genes in gene families. MicroSyn searches for conserved, flanking colinear homologous gene pairs between two genomic fragments to determine the relationship between two members in a gene family.

SynOrth (http://synorth.genereg.net/)

Synorth [s n ôrth], named in combination of "synteny" and "ortholog", is designed for the study of evolutionary changes of genomic regulatory blocks (GRBs) in vertebrate genomes, and especially the changes following the whole-genome duplication in teleost fish, by tracing the ortholog genes gain and loss in ancient synteny blocks.

SyDiG (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21441096)

Uncovering Synteny in Distant Genomes.

MapSynteny (http://www.automatizacionysistemas.com/download.html)

MapSynteny is a macro in MS Excel® able to create images to show the relationship between genetic maps and large sequences (scaffolds, chromosomes, BACs, etc.). Based on tab – delimited BLAST results and some formulas, a suitable image of syntenic relationships or physical mapping can be obtained. http://www.automatizacionysistemas.com/Poster_MapSynteny.pdf

One of the best synteny tutorial for beginer @ http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/synteny-inferring-ancestral-genomes-44022

Reference:

http://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/synteny-inferring-ancestral-genomes-44022

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v491/n7424/full/nature11622.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synteny

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2675965/

List of universities offering Bachelor, Master or PhD bioinformatics degree in Malaysia

sahabuddin — Thu, 22 Jun 2017 01:34:02 -0500

Bioinformatics is a newly emerging interdisciplinary research area, which may be defined as the ―interface between biological and computational sciences. Most of the Bioinformatics work that is done can be described as analyzing biological data, although a growing number of projects deal with the organization of biological information. The global Bioinformatics industry has grown at a double-digit growth rate in the past and is expected to follow the same pattern in the next four years. US remains the largest market in the world, but Asia-Pacific countries, particularly India and China, are witnessing the fastest growth and are anticipated to emerge as the dominating forces in future. The Comparison of Bioinformatics Industry between Malaysia, India and other countries are discussed in this http://ijbssnet.com/journals/Vol.%202_No._10;_June_2011/11.pdf paper.

Bioinformatics is full of opportunities. The sector is poised to open new avenues for the other related sectors also. But the biggest opportunity area in the Bioinformatics market will be in the drug discovery sector. Reduction of both the cost and time taken to discover a new drug due to fast development in the Bioinformatics tools and software zone is also making drug discovery an attractive field to venture in. Malaysian bioinformatics growth and future are discuss in this https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2723929/ paper. Keeping all such inportance in mind, following universities in Malaysia offering bioinformatics cources:

3 program(s) at AIMST University, Malaysia

Master of Science in Biotechnology (MSc) - Bioinformatics by Research

Master of Science (M.Sc) in Medical Microbiology (Bioinformatics) by Research

Doctor of Philosophy in Biotechnology (PhD) - Bioinformatics by Research

1 program(s) at INTI International University and Colleges, Malaysia

American Degree Transfer Program (Biosciences) in Bioinformatics

3 program(s) at Management and Science University (MSU), Malaysia

Master in Bioinformatics (By Research)

PhD in Bioinformatics

Bachelor in Bioinformatics (Hons)

1 program(s) at Multimedia University (MMU), Malaysia

Bachelor of Science (Honours) Bioinformatics

1 program(s) at Universiti Industri Selangor (UNISEL) Bestari Jaya Campus, Malaysia

Bachelor of Bioinformatics (Hons)

2 program(s) at Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS), Malaysia

PhD - Doctor of Philosophy in Bioinformatics (By Research)

MSc - Master of Science in Bioinformatics (By Research)

6 program(s) at Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), Malaysia

MSc - Master of Science in Bioinformatics by Research

Master of Science in Bioinformatics and System Biology by Research

Master of Science (M.Sc) in Bioinformatics and Systems Biology (With Thesis)

PhD - Doctor of Philosophy in Bioinformatics by Research

PhD - Doctor of Philosophy in Bioinformatics and Systems Biology (With Thesis)

PhD - Doctor of Philosophy in Bioinformatics and System Biology by Research

1 program(s) at Universiti Selangor (UNISEL), Malaysia

Bachelor of Bioinformatics (Hons)

3 program(s) at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), Malaysia

M.Sc - Master of Science (Bioscience) in Bioinformatics Research Group (BIRG) By Research

PhD - Doctor of Philosophy (Bioscience) in Bioinformatics Research Group (BIRG) By Research

Bachelor of Computer Science (BioInformatics)

4 program(s) at University of Malaya (UM), Malaysia

MSc - Master of Science in Bioinformatics by Research

Master in Bioinformatics by Coursework

PhD - Doctor of Philosophy in Bioinformatics by Research

Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Bioinformatics

3 program(s) at Perdana University, Malaysia

Master in Bioinformatics (By Research)

PhD in Bioinformatics

Bachelor in Bioinformatics (Hons)

3 program(s) at Monash University, Malaysia

Master in Bioinformatics (By Research)

PhD in Bioinformatics

Bachelor in Bioinformatics (Hons)

The real bioinformatics scope lies if there are research labs which work in this field. One has to take account of that. If so then try to get information of those labs and visit them to get a hang of the work they pursue. For detail Bioinformatics in Malaysia: Hope, Initiative, Effort, Reality, and Challenges are discussed in https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2723929/ paper.

Bioinformatician duties and jobs !!!

Jitendra Narayan — Wed, 05 Mar 2014 14:32:26 -0600

Needle in a haystack ... ohh yes this is what bioinformatician do. We handle and analyse, Terabytes and Petabytes of genomic data on daily basis.

UIAR Short-Term Training/Final Year Dissertation Project in Life Sciences/Bioinformatics/Biotech

Mon, 16 Mar 2015 23:56:25 -0500

Short-term training/Final year dissertation project

Candidates desirous of doing a short-term training / final year dissertation project for MSc (Life Sciences/Bioinformatics/Biotechnology or any science discipline) at UIAR Biophysics and Bioinformatics department may please drop an email atanju@iiar.res.in along with their resume.

Selected candidates will be further intimated. There will be a fees charged for doing the project at UIAR. The projects will be experimental or computational or involve both.

The training scope will be in the following areas but not limited to:

Bioinformatics analysis, Docking and Virtual screening, Molecular Dynamics simulation, Cloning, expression and purification of proteins, Biophysical and Biochemical characterisation of proteins, Crystallization and Structural Studies.

Advertisement: www.iiar.res.in/?q=node/450

Alignment of closely related whole genomes/scaffolds

Rahul Nayak — Fri, 29 Jan 2016 10:37:27 -0600

With the relative ease and low cost of current generation sequencing technologies has led to a dramatic increase in the number of sequenced genomes for species across the tree of life. This increasing volume of data requires tools that can quickly compare multiple whole-genome sequences, millions of base pairs in length, to aid in the study of populations, pan-genomes, and genome evolution.This bookmaks have been created to report new tools for whole genome alignments.

Please report new whole genome alignment tools under comment sections.

Address of the bookmark: http://www.cs.utoronto.ca/~brudno/721.full.pdf

Bioinformatics Engineer -- Algorithm Development

Wed, 01 Apr 2015 21:39:05 -0500

Centrillion Biosciences is a venture backed life sciences company located in Palo Alto, California. The company provides high quality genomic services to academic and industrial customers including top universities and research institutes. Centrillion Biosciences has an immediate opening for a full-time Bioinformatics Engineer. We're looking for an energetic, innovative, and motivated person who works well independently and on teams. The ideal candidate will have experience designing and implementing efficient algorithms to process large datasets. The role will involve collaborating with research scientists and other engineers, so strong communication skills are a must.

Job Description

• Work within a fast-paced, collaborative environment with small project teams working on a variety of tasks ranging from new product development to DNA data processing
• Collaborate with Centrillion research scientists in order to bridge the gap between the laboratory and the digital world
• Develop tools to enable research projects to cope with the enormous amounts of data produced by modern DNA sequencing experiments
• Build simulation algorithms to help guide and analyze research done in the lab
• Solve challenging engineering problems that require the development of innovative algorithms

Requirements

• Strong background in mathematics/statistics with a degree in a related field
• Strong analytical, coding, communication, and organizational skills
• Experience with algorithm development, simulations, and data analysis
• Proficiency in at least one modern programming language (like Python or Perl)
• Experience analyzing genetic and biological data sets (e.g., DNA data analysis and image analysis)
• Experience with machine learning and pattern recognition is preferred

Please submit your resume at https://www.centrillionbio.com/career/ to apply for this position.