title: Using Tablet for visual exploration of second-generation sequencing data.
abstract: The advent of second-generation sequencing (2GS) has provided a range of significant new challenges for the visualization of sequence assemblies. These include the large volume of data being generated, short-read lengths and different data types and data formats associated with the diversity of new sequencing technologies. This article illustrates how Tablet-a high-performance graphical viewer for visualization of 2GS assemblies and read mappings-plays an important role in the analysis of these data. We present Tablet, and through a selection of use cases, demonstrate its value in quality assurance and scientific discovery, through features such as whole-reference coverage overviews, variant highlighting, paired-end read mark-up, GFF3-based feature tracks and protein translations. We discuss the computing and visualization techniques utilized to provide a rich and responsive graphical environment that enables users to view a range of file formats with ease. Tablet installers can be freely downloaded from http://bioinf.hutton.ac.uk/tablet in 32 or 64-bit versions for Windows, OS X, Linux or Solaris. For further details on the Tablet, contact tablet@hutton.ac.uk.
authors.affiliation: Information & Computational Sciences, The James Hutton Institute JHI, Dundee DD2 5DA, Scotland, UK. iain.milne@hutton.ac.uk
authors.forename: Iain
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Milne
authors.forename: Gordon
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Stephen
authors.forename: Micha
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bayer
authors.forename: Peter J A
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Cock
authors.forename: Leighton
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pritchard
authors.forename: Linda
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Cardle
authors.forename: Paul D
authors.initials: PD
authors.lastname: Shaw
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Marshall
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D019295:Computational Biology; D003196:Computer Graphics; D003626:Data Display; D030541:Databases, Genetic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D023281:Genomics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D059014:High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D017421:Sequence Analysis / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012984:Software