Combining Short- and Long-Read Sequencing Technologies to Identify SARS-CoV-2 Variants in Wastewater.

ABSTRACT: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the monitoring of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater was used to track the evolution and emergence of variant lineages and gauge infection levels in the community, informing appropriate public health responses without relying solely on clinical testing. As more sublineages were discovered, it increased the difficulty in identifying distinct variants in a mixed population sample, particularly those without a known lineage. Here, we compare the sequencing technology from Illumina and from Oxford Nanopore Technologies, in order to determine their efficacy at detecting variants of differing abundance, using 248 wastewater samples from various Quebec and Ontario cities. Our study used two analytical approaches to identify the main variants in the samples: the presence of

SUBMITTER: Jayme G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11437403 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature