STS Maps
The purpose of the STS Maps Detail pages is to allow a comparison between the ordering of STS markers on the draft sequence and their corresponding positions on the genetic (assembly, TPF, merged map), YAC (assembly, TPF, merged map), and radiation hybridization (RH) (assembly, TPF, merged map) maps. Currently displayed are the Genethon and Marshfield genetic maps, the Whitehead Institute YAC map, and the GeneMap99 GB4, GeneMap99 G3, and Whitehead RH maps.

Each of the STS markers are placed on the assembled draft sequence and the individual accessioned clones which are available for a particular GenBank freeze. Phase 0 sequences in the freeze are not considered. For STS markers for which the full sequence is available, placement is done using Jim Kent's BLAT program. For markers without full sequences, placement is also done using BLAT with a FASTA sequence constructed using the known primer sequences for the STS.

The placements of the STS Markers on the assembled draft sequence can also be seen in the corresponding freeze version of the UCSC Human Genome Browser under the STS Markers track.

The STS Maps pages summarize the results of these placements in tables with the following columns:
  • Links - links to other pages with information for this accession - Summary(S), Genetic(G), YAC(Y), RH(R), BAC End Pairs(B), Overlaps(O)
  • Contig - name of contig
  • Accession - GenBank accession for clone.
  • Chr Start - base pair in chromosome where STS marker sequence starts, or beginning of accession if no markers placed on that clone.
  • Phs - phase of sequence in freeze.
  • STS Marker - name of the STS marker in the corresponding STS map
  • (map) Chr - chromosome the marker is placed on in the STS map
  • (map) - position the marker is placed at in the STS map
  • Plc - number of times this marker is placed on this clone map
  • Other Accessions - a list of the other accessions used in this clone map on which this STS marker is placed. Clicking on one of these will display the contig containing the corresponding accession. Not all accessions for a particular freeze are used in any of the clone maps due to redundancy
  • All Accessions - a list of all of the accessions in the Genebank freeze that this marker is placed on.
Each accession found on a clone map is required to appear at least once in the table, but may appear multiple times if more than one STS marker is placed on it.

There are separate tables for each of the contigs in a chromosome. Each line in the tables is colored in order to help identify agreements and disagreements between the clone map and the STS maps. To determine the colors, each contig is assigned a non-overlapping range of positions on an STS map. The ranges are required to be ascending, and the concatenation of the ranges of all contigs span all the possible positions in the STS map. Based on this alignment, rows in tables are given the following colors with the following interpretations:
  • White - no STS markers are placed on this accession.
  • Blue - the position of the STS marker on the STS map falls within the range of positions assigned to this contig
  • Green - the position of the STS marker on the STS map is slightly outside the range of positions assigned to this contig. For genetic maps, this is up to 3cM, for the YAC map, this is up to 3 YACs, and for the RH map this is up to 10 cR. Green lines near the edges of contigs are, in most cases, fine and are probably due to the inability of the STS map to correctly order markers at that resolution.
  • Pink - the position of the STS marker on the STS map differs from the range assigned to this contig, but the marker is placed on the same chromosome.
  • Red - the STS map places this marker on a different chromosome.
  • Yellow - this STS marker is not placed on an accession in this contig, but its position on the STS map falls within the range of positions assigned to this contig
This coloring is provided to help identify possible problematic areas in the assembly, and to verify the accuracy of others. Keep in mind that for each individual table, there are multiple sources of error that may color a particular area a misleading color such as -
  • A marker being incorrectly placed on a clone
  • An error in the STS map
  • An error in assigning STS map positions to a contig
Therefore, information should be used from all of the tables together to draw any conclusions.

The pages are designed so that you can view one contig at a time, or all contigs for a single chromosome at once. A header frame is provided on each page to allow for easier navigation through the table, to provide a reference for the meanings of the line colors, and to display the table column names for convenience when viewing longer contigs.

Warning: Many of the pages contain very large tables and may take a while to load, especially for the larger chromosomes. Please be patient.

Terry Furey
Last modified: Fri Mar 22 14:52:29 PST 2002