Metaphoric representation of a complicated exon-intron as a Nazca-line (see also Nazca tribe, Peru). A reconstruction from many partial images (short reads), spanning parts of the entire structure (left), captures adequately many aspects of the entire structure, but misses other aspects at the extremities and at

(exon-exon/image-image)-junctions. Increased distance (read length, right) allows an appreciation of the entire structure in a single image (read). While short reads have obvious advantages in terms of sequencing depth, longer reads offer advantages for a comprehensive view of entire transcripts.

Tilgner H, Raha D, Habegger L, Mohiuddin M, Gerstein M, Snyder M (2013) Accurate identification and analysis of human mRNA isoforms using deep long read sequencing. G3 (Bethesda). 2013 Mar;3(3):387-97.

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