BioSB Course: Advanced de novo assembly and resolving complex genomic regions

This course is targeted at PhD students and Postdocs in Life Sciences or Bioinformatics with basic knowledge of next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology and data analysis. This course covers topics on what every biologist should know about de novo assembly and study design, overview of available technologies and sampling strategies, methodologies and framework for de novo assembly (haploid and polyploid genomes), gap closure, quality assessment and functional annotation. In addition, we will showcase recent achievements, novel discoveries and current limitations in resolving complex genomes. The practical sessions are designed in such a way to promote lively discussions on how to design your study, the best practices, dos and don’ts, and provide you with an outlook on how to move from sequencing data to high-quality assembly and meaningful biological interpretation. After following this course, participants will gain insights on how to design a genome assembly study and will have an overview of challenges and various techniques to choose the most fitting strategy in order to produce a high-quality genome assembly.

This course is primarily targeted at academic researchers such as PhD students and Postdocs in Life Sciences or Bioinformatics with experience in genomics or NGS data analysis. However, participants from private sector are also welcome. Participants are expected to have experience in NGS data analysis or to have followed the NGS data analysis course.

This course is part of the Education Programme of BioSB, the Netherlands Bioinformatics and Systems Biology Research School, which offers training and education for in bioinformatics and systems biology.

More information about BioSB can be found at www.biosb.nl.