microbiology, Vol 141, 345-350, Copyright © 1995 by Society for General Microbiology
Analysis of errors in finished DNA sequences: the surfactin operon of Bacillus subtilis as an example
C Fabret, Y Quentin, A Guiseppi, J Busuttil, J Haiech and F Denizot
Laboratoire de Chimie Bacterienne, Marseille, France.
Increased productivity in DNA sequencing would not be valid without a
straightforward detection and estimation of errors in finished sequences.
The sequence of the surfactin operon from Bacillus subtilis was obtained by
two different groups and by chance we were also working on the same
chromosome region. Taking advantage of this situation we report in this
paper, the number and nature of errors found in the overlapping part of the
DNA sequences obtained by the three laboratories. The coincidence of some
of the errors with compression in sequence ladders and with secondary DNA
structures as well as the detection of frameshift errors using computer
programs, are demonstrated. Finally we discuss the definition of a new
sequencing strategy that might minimize both the error rate and the cost of
sequencing.
