Longas Technologies Pty Ltd (‘Longas’), a developer of Next Generation
Sequencing (NGS) technologies, has provided details on its Morphoseq™
library prep and associated software technology at the ‘Sequencing,
Finishing and Analysis in the Future’ meeting, May 21 – 23, Santa
Fe, NM, USA, that enables long read sequencing on short read NGS
platforms.
Developed over the last few years by a team led by world-leading
computational biologist and Longas co-founder and CSO Professor Aaron
Darling, Morphoseq is a disruptive technology designed to dramatically
improve the long read performance of industry-standard NGS platforms,
for increased accuracy and cost efficiency.
In a presentation entitled ‘Introducing Morphoseq: high accuracy long
reads from short read platforms’ on 21 May 4.30 MDT (22 May 8.30am
Sydney), Professor Aaron Darling provided an overview of the technology
and its development, together with results from use of the technology on
Illumina and BGI platforms.
The founders of Longas from the ithree institute at the University of
Technology Sydney (UTS) had been exploring new ways to create long
sequence reads. Originally, driven by a need for better 16S rDNA
sequence-based resolution for microbial community profiling, the team
quickly recognised the much broader applicability of their invention to
increasing the effective read length from established NGS platforms.
Results presented at the meeting demonstrate long reads up to 15kbp with
modal accuracy 100% and 92% of reads >Q40 when measured against
independent reference genomes. These results, on a set of 60 multiplexed
bacterial isolates show that genomic coverage is highly uniform with the
data yielding finished-quality closed circle assemblies for bacterial
genomes across the entire GC content range.
The Morphoseq chemistry works by creating unique identifiers for every
long DNA template molecule in a sample via highly uniform random
mutagenesis. Short read sequences can then be assigned to long
templates, with the sophisticated data processing algorithms
reconstructing the original unmutated long template molecules. It thus
transforms short read sequencers into ‘virtual long read’ sequencers,
enabling finished-quality genome assemblies with high accuracy,
including resolution of difficult-to-assemble genomic regions.
Morphoseq works with as little as 10ng of DNA and has the flexibility to
scale to large genomes and large sample batches.
“Morphoseq makes high quality long read DNA sequencing accessible and
cost-effective. It delivers highly accurate long DNA sequences at a
fraction of the cost of existing long read platforms. With modest DNA
input requirements and a standard short read DNA sequencer, Morphoseq
can produce finished de novo genome assemblies, including through
repetitive regions in genomes such as tandem repeats and transposable
elements. Sample preparation can be carried out with standard molecular
biology consumables and equipment, and our cloud-based end-to-end
analysis pipeline returns best in class long reads at the push of a
button,” said Professor Darling.
Further studies have demonstrated the ability to accurately assemble and
phase these DNA reads into individual chromosomes for humans as well as
microorganisms, with important scientific, clinical and public health
applications.
Having recently launched, after developing the technology in stealth
mode for the past few years, Longas is seeking partners and
collaborators to support commercialization.
Nick McCooke, renowned NGS leader, leads the company as CEO. The Company
has an extensive portfolio of international patent filings covering the
Morphoseq technology.
-Ends-
For full press release and notes to editors, please click here.
For further information please visit www.longastech.com
Twitter @longastech
LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/company/longas
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