Treatment of Massive Metagenomic Data with Graphs

Abstract

Among the de novo strategies to assemble metagenomic DNA fragments the application of de Bruijn graphs stands out. These graphs greatly reduce the computational complexity and overload that arises as a consequence of the huge data volume. An Eulerian cycle can be established on a de Bruijn graph that allows the assembly of sequence reads into longer fragments for genome reconstruction. This paper shows the theoretical principles of the computational schema applied. Also, the difficulties that appear in the practical application of the method and the algorithmic features of some of the available open source programs. Finally, the work of the authors research group is summarized.