GoNL ready for the next level

The ​BBMRI-NL Rainbow Project Genome of the Netherlands project (GoNL) is ready for the next level. It has completed the alignment of all the DNA reads of the 750 individuals, producing a total of 350 billion reads. Based on these data, further analyses can be performed, enabling the development of new treatments and diagnostic techniques.

The GoNL project offers unique opportunities for science as it gives a close-up look at the DNA of 750 Dutch people—250 trio’s of two parents and an adult child—plus a global genetic profile of large numbers of Dutch people. This information will disclose a wealth of new insights and possible applications.

A reusable analysis pipeline has been assembled based on best practices in the field. Processing 250 trios represents a major computational challenge which was solved with hard work from the BBMRI-NL Biobank Bioinformatics project (eBioank) and with assistance from ​NBIC, ​CIT, ​SARA, ​Target and ​BigGrid. Using the storage and computation resources at large infrastructures of Target/CIT and Sara/BigGrid, as well as from the participating institutes, the GoNL project has already produced more than 300 TB of data.

With the GoNL project BBMRI-NL expects to increase knowledge about the genetic variation in the Netherlands and complement international resources like the 1000 Genomes and HapMap Projects. The Genome of the Netherlands is an open national consortium of the UMCG, LUMC, Erasmus MC, VUMC, Hubrecht, AMC, RUNMC and UMCU led by Professor Cisca Wijmenga (GoNL) and Paul de Bakker & Morris Swertz (eBiobank). The sequencing work is done by BGI Hong Kong. More information about the project can be found on ​http://www.nlgenome.nl/ (GoNL) and ​http://www.bbmriwiki.nl/ (Bioinformatics)