Dr Nick Loman from the University of Birmingham has looked at de novo assembly of e coli data from a single run with approximately 10x coverage from Ion Torrent's Personal Genome Machine (PGM).
The experiment compares several commercial and open-source de novo assemblers, and in this experiment CLC Genomics Workbench was not only the fastest assembler, but also had the highest N50 value, according to the company.
As part of the Ion PGM Sequencer Grant programme, the University of Birmingham was announced as one of the award winners on 18 February 2011 and was awarded an Ion PGM.
Dr Pallen, professor of microbial genomics at the University of Birmingham, was awarded the grant for his proposal to identify, profile and type the healthcare-associated bacterial pathogens in hospital environments.
