Metassembler: merging and optimizing de novo genome assemblies

Genome assembly projects typically run multiple algorithms in an attempt to find the single best assembly, although those assemblies often have complementary, if untapped, strengths and weaknesses. We present our metassembler algorithm that merges multiple assemblies of a genome into a single superior sequence. We apply it to the four genomes from the Assemblathon competitions and show it consistently and substantially improves the contiguity and quality of each assembly. We also develop guidelines for meta-assembly by systematically evaluating 120 permutations of merging the top 5 assemblies of the first Assemblathon competition. The software is open-source at http://metassembler.sourceforge.net .