Most of the posts I've written recently have involved next-generation DNA sequencing in one way or another, which may have left some readers scratching their heads - keeping track of the different technologies, how they work, and their strengths and weaknesses is a challenge even for those immersed in this fast-moving field.
Fortunately, help is at hand for readers who don't know their SOLiD from their 454. Luke Jostins (who wrote a guest post here on Genetic Future a while back) has a great new post up on his blog Genetic Inference providing some background on second-generation sequencing. Luke's post focuses mainly on the Illumina platform, currently the most widely-used instrument in the game; but there's a promise of a future post on third-generation technologies.
Another very helpful resource for next-generation newbies is Mun-Keat Looi's article over at the Wellcome Trust website, which comes with detailed animations explaining first-generation ("Sanger") sequencing and both the 454 and Illumina second-generation platforms.
If anyone has other online next-gen resources that would be useful to newcomers please post a link in the comments and I'll add them to the post.
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My dad had me (his firstborn) when he was 28. I had my first kid when I was 26. I'm a second-generation university graduate, first generation PhD.
Nearly two months ago, we spoke here of the surprising use of arsenic trioxide (Trisenox) in treating various cancers.
Not exactly for the beginner, but a very interesting website on Second Generation Sequencing can be found here:
http://seq.molbiol.ru/
It is half in Russian, hasn't been updated since December, is terribly badly put together, and I have no idea who wrote it or where it came from. But it is also the most bizarrely in-depth website on Second Generation sequencing I have ever seen. It contains a load of very detailed comparisons, protocols for SOLiD and Illumina library prep, even a chart entitled "Chemical&thermal resistance of different types of plastic".
Plus, this comparison of Next Gen sequencing to cutting up and reconstructing 20x 50cm-thick books of Journal articles:
http://seq.zbio.net/next.html
I think it might be some sort of collaborative, wiki-style affair (it has 'login' and 'register' in the corner, but they don't seem to work). It is, to me, a rather entertaining mystery.
SEQanswers is a great resource.
Hi Daniel,
We've been writing quite a bit about Next Generation DNA Sequencing in our company blog, FinchTalk, www.geospiza.com/finchtalk. And, I just wrote a chapter on it for the September issue of Current Protocols in Bioinformatics. But you're right, I should write more about it, here at ScienceBlogs, too.
The current issue of AJHG has a review Massively Parallel Sequencing: The Next Big Thing in Genetic Medicine
Thank you for sharing your blog with us all.
I had posted myself this presentation on SlideShare: Here.
By chance this is not Russian, but....French. Easy french btw.
It is not updated (I'm working on that) but gives a full overview on the 3 major NGS providers. Cheers.