High resolution copy number inference in cancer using short-molecule nanopore sequencing

Genome copy number is an important source of genetic variation in health and disease. In cancer, clinically actionable Copy Number Alterations (CNAs) can be inferred from short-read sequencing data, enabling genomics-based precision oncology.

Emerging Nanopore sequencing technologies offer the potential for broader clinical utility, for example in smaller hospitals, due to lower instrument cost, higher portability, and ease of use. Nonetheless, Nanopore sequencing devices are limited in terms of the number of retrievable sequencing reads/molecules compared to short-read sequencing platforms. This represents a challenge for applications that require high read counts such as CNA inference. To address this limitation, we targeted the sequencing of short-length DNA molecules loaded at optimized concentration in an effort to increase sequence read/molecule yield from a single nanopore run.

We show that sequencing short DNA molecules reproducibly returns high read counts and allows high-quality CNA inference. We demonstrate the clinical relevance of this approach by accurately inferring CNAs in acute myeloid leukemia samples.

The data shows that, compared to traditional approaches such as chromosome analysis/cytogenetics, short molecule nanopore sequencing returns more sensitive, accurate copy number information in a cost-effective and expeditious manner, including for multiplex samples.

Our results provide a framework for the sequencing of relatively short DNA molecules on nanopore devices with applications in research and medicine, that include but are not limited to, CNAs.