Assembly Polishing
Improve assembly accuracy by correcting errors using additional sequencing data.
Polishing Strategies
| Tool | Input Reads | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| Pilon | Illumina | Final polishing |
| medaka | ONT | ONT assemblies |
| Racon | Long reads | Quick polishing |
| NextPolish | Both | Combined approach |
Recommended Workflows
ONT Assembly
- •Racon (2-3 rounds with ONT)
- •medaka (1 round)
- •Pilon (2-3 rounds with Illumina)
PacBio CLR Assembly
- •Racon (2-3 rounds)
- •Pilon (2-3 rounds with Illumina)
PacBio HiFi Assembly
- •Often no polishing needed (>99% accuracy)
- •Optional Pilon if Illumina available
Pilon (Illumina Polishing)
Installation
bash
conda install -c bioconda pilon
Basic Usage
bash
# Map short reads to assembly bwa index assembly.fasta bwa mem -t 16 assembly.fasta R1.fq.gz R2.fq.gz | samtools sort -o aligned.bam samtools index aligned.bam # Run Pilon pilon --genome assembly.fasta --frags aligned.bam --output polished
Key Options
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
--genome | Input assembly |
--frags | Paired-end BAM |
--output | Output prefix |
--changes | Write changes file |
--vcf | Write VCF of changes |
--fix | What to fix (snps, indels, gaps, all) |
--threads | Threads for alignment |
--mindepth | Min depth for correction |
Multiple Rounds
bash
#!/bin/bash
ASSEMBLY=$1
R1=$2
R2=$3
ROUNDS=${4:-3}
current=$ASSEMBLY
for i in $(seq 1 $ROUNDS); do
echo "=== Pilon round $i ==="
bwa index $current
bwa mem -t 16 $current $R1 $R2 | samtools sort -o round${i}.bam
samtools index round${i}.bam
pilon --genome $current --frags round${i}.bam --output pilon_round${i} --changes
current=pilon_round${i}.fasta
changes=$(wc -l < pilon_round${i}.changes)
echo "Changes made: $changes"
if [ $changes -eq 0 ]; then
echo "No more changes, stopping"
break
fi
done
cp $current final_polished.fasta
Fix Specific Issues
bash
# Only fix SNPs and small indels pilon --genome assembly.fa --frags aligned.bam --output polished --fix snps,indels # Only fill gaps pilon --genome assembly.fa --frags aligned.bam --output polished --fix gaps
medaka (ONT Polishing)
Installation
bash
conda install -c bioconda medaka
Basic Usage
bash
medaka_consensus -i reads.fastq.gz -d assembly.fasta -o medaka_output -t 8
Key Options
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
-i | Input reads |
-d | Draft assembly |
-o | Output directory |
-t | Threads |
-m | Model name |
Model Selection
bash
# List available models medaka tools list_models # Use specific model (match your basecaller) medaka_consensus -i reads.fq.gz -d assembly.fa -o output -m r1041_e82_400bps_sup_v5.1.0
Models for Common Chemistries
| Chemistry | Model |
|---|---|
| R10.4.1 + SUP | r1041_e82_400bps_sup_* |
| R10.4.1 + HAC | r1041_e82_400bps_hac_* |
| R9.4.1 + SUP | r941_sup_* |
Output
code
medaka_output/ ├── consensus.fasta # Polished assembly ├── calls_to_draft.bam # Alignments └── *.hdf # Intermediate files
Racon (Long-Read Polishing)
Installation
bash
conda install -c bioconda racon
Basic Usage
bash
# Map reads to assembly minimap2 -ax map-ont assembly.fasta reads.fastq.gz > aligned.sam # Polish racon -t 16 reads.fastq.gz aligned.sam assembly.fasta > polished.fasta
Multiple Rounds
bash
#!/bin/bash
ASSEMBLY=$1
READS=$2
ROUNDS=${3:-3}
current=$ASSEMBLY
for i in $(seq 1 $ROUNDS); do
echo "=== Racon round $i ==="
minimap2 -ax map-ont $current $READS > round${i}.sam
racon -t 16 $READS round${i}.sam $current > racon_round${i}.fasta
current=racon_round${i}.fasta
done
cp $current racon_polished.fasta
Key Options
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
-t | Threads |
-m | Match score (default: 3) |
-x | Mismatch score (default: -5) |
-g | Gap penalty (default: -4) |
-w | Window size (default: 500) |
Complete Polishing Workflow
ONT Assembly Polishing
bash
#!/bin/bash
set -euo pipefail
ASSEMBLY=$1 # Flye assembly
ONT_READS=$2 # ONT reads
ILLUMINA_R1=$3 # Illumina R1
ILLUMINA_R2=$4 # Illumina R2
OUTDIR=$5
mkdir -p $OUTDIR
# Step 1: Racon polishing (2 rounds)
echo "=== Racon Polishing ==="
current=$ASSEMBLY
for i in 1 2; do
minimap2 -ax map-ont $current $ONT_READS > ${OUTDIR}/racon_${i}.sam
racon -t 16 $ONT_READS ${OUTDIR}/racon_${i}.sam $current > ${OUTDIR}/racon_${i}.fasta
current=${OUTDIR}/racon_${i}.fasta
done
# Step 2: medaka polishing
echo "=== medaka Polishing ==="
medaka_consensus -i $ONT_READS -d $current -o ${OUTDIR}/medaka -t 8
current=${OUTDIR}/medaka/consensus.fasta
# Step 3: Pilon polishing (2 rounds)
echo "=== Pilon Polishing ==="
for i in 1 2; do
bwa index $current
bwa mem -t 16 $current $ILLUMINA_R1 $ILLUMINA_R2 | samtools sort -o ${OUTDIR}/pilon_${i}.bam
samtools index ${OUTDIR}/pilon_${i}.bam
pilon --genome $current --frags ${OUTDIR}/pilon_${i}.bam --output ${OUTDIR}/pilon_${i}
current=${OUTDIR}/pilon_${i}.fasta
done
cp $current ${OUTDIR}/final_polished.fasta
echo "Done: ${OUTDIR}/final_polished.fasta"
NextPolish (Combined Approach)
Installation
bash
conda install -c bioconda nextpolish
Usage
bash
# Create config file cat > run.cfg << EOF [General] job_type = local job_prefix = nextPolish task = best rewrite = yes rerun = 3 parallel_jobs = 2 multithread_jobs = 8 genome = assembly.fasta genome_size = auto workdir = ./01_rundir [lgs_option] lgs_fofn = lgs.fofn lgs_options = -min_read_len 1k -max_depth 100 lgs_minimap2_options = -x map-ont [sgs_option] sgs_fofn = sgs.fofn sgs_options = -max_depth 100 EOF # File of filenames ls reads.fastq.gz > lgs.fofn ls R1.fq.gz R2.fq.gz > sgs.fofn # Run nextPolish run.cfg
Quality Assessment
After polishing, assess improvement:
bash
# Compare to reference (if available) quast.py -r reference.fa original.fa polished.fa -o quast_comparison # Check error rate minimap2 -ax map-ont polished.fa reads.fq.gz | samtools stats | grep "error rate"
Related Skills
- •long-read-assembly - Initial assembly
- •short-read-assembly - Source of polishing reads
- •assembly-qc - Assess polishing improvement
- •long-read-sequencing - medaka variant calling