Genome browsers have become an intuitive and critical tool to visualize and analyze genomic features and data. Conventional genome browsers display data/annotations on a single reference genome/assembly; there are also genomic alignment viewer/browsers that help users visualize alignment, mismatch, and rearrangement between syntenic regions. However, there is a growing need for a comparative epigenome browser that can display genomic and epigenomic data sets across different species and enable users to compare them between syntenic regions. Here, we present the WashU Comparative Epigenome Browser. It allows users to load functional genomic data sets/annotations mapped to different genomes and display them over syntenic regions simultaneously. The browser also displays genetic differences between the genomes from single-nucleotide variants (SNVs) to structural variants (SVs) to visualize the association between epigenomic differences and genetic differences. Instead of anchoring all data sets to the reference genome coordinates, it creates independent coordinates of different genome assemblies to faithfully present features and data mapped to different genomes. It uses a simple, intuitive genome-align track to illustrate the syntenic relationship between different species. It extends the widely used WashU Epigenome Browser infrastructure and can be expanded to support multiple species. This new browser function will greatly facilitate comparative genomic/epigenomic research, as well as support the recent growing needs to directly compare and benchmark the T2T CHM13 assembly and other human genome assemblies.

中文翻译：

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使用华盛顿大学比较表观基因组浏览器比较不同物种的基因组和表观基因组特征


基因组浏览器已成为可视化和分析基因组特征和数据的直观且重要的工具。传统的基因组浏览器显示单个参考基因组/组合上的数据/注释；还有基因组比对查看器/浏览器，可帮助用户可视化同线性区域之间的比对、不匹配和重排。然而，对表观基因组比较浏览器的需求日益增长，该浏览器可以显示不同物种的基因组和表观基因组数据集，并使用户能够在同线性区域之间进行比较。在这里，我们介绍华盛顿大学比较表观基因组浏览器。它允许用户加载映射到不同基因组的功能基因组数据集/注释，并同时在同线区域上显示它们。该浏览器还显示基因组之间从单核苷酸变异 (SNV) 到结构变异 (SV) 的遗传差异，以可视化表观基因组差异和遗传差异之间的关联。它不是将所有数据集锚定到参考基因组坐标，而是创建不同基因组组装的独立坐标，以忠实地呈现映射到不同基因组的特征和数据。它使用简单、直观的基因组比对轨迹来说明不同物种之间的同线性关系。它扩展了广泛使用的 WashU Epigenome 浏览器基础设施，并且可以扩展以支持多个物种。这一新的浏览器功能将极大地促进比较基因组/表观基因组研究，并支持最近不断增长的直接比较和基准 T2T CHM13 组装和其他人类基因组组装的需求。