Assessing graph-based read mappers against a novel baseline approach highlights strengths and weaknesses of the current generation of methods, bioRxiv, 2019-02-02

AbstractGraph-based reference genomes have become popular as they allow read mapping and follow-up analyses in settings where the exact haplotypes underlying a high-throughput sequencing experiment are not precisely known. Two recent papers show that mapping to graph-based reference genomes can improve accuracy as compared to methods using linear references. Both of these methods index the sequences for most paths up to a certain length in the graph in order to enable direct mapping of reads containing common variants. However, the combinatorial explosion of possible paths through nearby variants also leads to a huge search space and an increased chance of false positive alignments to highly variable regions.We here assess three prominent graph-based read mappers against a novel hybrid baseline approach that combines an initial path determination with a tuned linear read mapping method. We show, using a previously proposed benchmark, that this simple approach is able to improve accuracy of read-mapping to graph-based reference genomes.Our method is implemented in a tool Two-step Graph Mapper, which is available at <jatsext-link xmlnsxlink=httpwww.w3.org1999xlink ext-link-type=uri xlinkhref=httpsgithub.comuio-bmitwo_step_graph_mapper>httpsgithub.comuio-bmitwo_step_graph_mapper<jatsext-link> along with data and scripts for reproducing the experiments.

biorxiv bioinformatics 0-100-users 2019

 

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