Birth of an ‘Asian cool’ reference genome: AK1

The human reference genome, maintained by the Genome Reference Consortium, is conceivably the most complete genome assembly ever, since its first construction. It has continually been improved by incorporating corrections made to the previous assemblies, thanks to various technological advances. Many currently-ongoing population sequencing projects have been based on this reference genome, heightening hopes of the development of useful medical applications of genomic information, thanks to the recent maturation of high-throughput sequencing technologies. However, just one reference genome does not fit all the populations across the globe, because of the large diversity in genomic structures and technical limitations inherent to short read sequencing methods. The recent success in de novo construction of the highly contiguous Asian diploid genome AK1, by combining single molecule technologies with routine sequencing data without resorting to traditional clone-by-clone sequencing and physical mapping, reveals the nature of genomic structure variation by detecting thousands of novel structural variations and by finally filling in some of the prior gaps which had persistently remained in the current human reference genome. Now it is expected that the AK1 genome, soon to be paired with more upcoming de novo assembled genomes, will provide a chance to explore what it is really like to use ancestry-specific reference genomes instead of hg19/hg38 for population genomics. This is a major step towards the furthering of genetically-based precision medicine.