title: The value of new genome references.
abstract: Genomic information has become a ubiquitous and almost essential aspect of biological research. Over the last 10-15 years, the cost of generating sequence data from DNA or RNA samples has dramatically declined and our ability to interpret those data increased just as remarkably. Although it is still possible for biologists to conduct interesting and valuable research on species for which genomic data are not available, the impact of having access to a high quality whole genome reference assembly for a given species is nothing short of transformational. Research on a species for which we have no DNA or RNA sequence data is restricted in fundamental ways. In contrast, even access to an initial draft quality genome (see below for definitions) opens a wide range of opportunities that are simply not available without that reference genome assembly. Although a complete discussion of the impact of genome sequencing and assembly is beyond the scope of this short paper, the goal of this review is to summarize the most common and highest impact contributions that whole genome sequencing and assembly has had on comparative and evolutionary biology.
authors.affiliation: Human Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, MS BCM226, Houston, TX 77030, USA; Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, Houston, TX 77030, USA. Electronic address: kworley@bcm.edu.
authors.forename: Kim C
authors.initials: KC
authors.lastname: Worley
authors.affiliation: Human Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, MS BCM226, Houston, TX 77030, USA; Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, Houston, TX 77030, USA.
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Richards
authors.affiliation: Human Genome Sequencing Center, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, MS BCM226, Houston, TX 77030, USA; Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza, Houston, TX 77030, USA.
authors.forename: Jeffrey
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Rogers
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence / Q000235:genetics*; D002874:Chromosome Mapping / Q000191:economics; D019295:Computational Biology / Q000379:methods; D016678:Genome / Q000235:genetics*; D059014:High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing / Q000379:methods; D006801:Humans; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA / Q000379:methods
keywords: Gene family analysis; Genome assembly; Segmental duplications; Sequencing