CIDER-Seq: Tool To Sequence Circular DNA Developed At the University of Alberta
According to new research, biologists from the University of Alberta have designed a novel tool to sequence circular DNA. The tool will provide other researchers with abundant and accurate data on circular DNA in any type of type and the tool is named as CIDER-Seq.
Circular DNA prevails in the genomes of bacteria and viruses, while our own DNA is linear. Researchers have likewise discovered circular DNA called eccDNA – extrachromosomal circular DNA within the nuclei of human and plant cells. Research study has started to examine the role of eccDNA in human cancer cells, however, progression has been held up because of the absence of reliable approaches for studying and sequencing eccDNA.
Devang Mehta, lead author, a postdoctoral fellow, Department of Biological Sciences said, “Our key advancement is that researchers can finally gain an unbiased, high-resolution understanding of circular DNA in any cell type using our method”. “We can begin to understand the functions of these mystical circular DNAs in human and plant cells using CIDER-Seq”.
The DNA sequencing technology used by CIDER-Seq is known as PacBio. The technique consists of a web-lab protocol and a new computational pipeline as well. It is optimized to check both viral genomes as well as eccDNA and is also made accessible to various other scientists through the online portal.
Mehta described, “To get full-length sequences of eccDNA, we finally devised a new molecular biology approach and a new bioinformatics algorithm”. “This method allows us to These molecules can be sequenced entirely as well as offer us and also various other researchers a tool to comprehend in better a better way about what they really do in the cell”.
Herve Vanderschuren had also collaborated in this study, the University of Liege, Belgium.
The research study was funded by Mehta’s fellowships – the Swiss National Science Foundation and the European Commission’s Seventh Structure Program. The Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique and the LEAPAgri program of the European Union supported the Vanderschuren lab.
The research is published in the journal Nature Protocols.
Author: Sruthi S
