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  • ksc
    Junior Member
    • Apr 2011
    • 4

    #1

    variant calling using samtools -v- bcftools

    I am new to samtools and have been trying out several protocols on the web for variant calling. Can someone please tell me what the main difference is between this step of the deprecated protocol:
    samtools view -u aln.sorted.bam | samtools pileup -vcf Ref.fa - > aln.sorted.raw.txt

    and this step of the new recommended protocol?:
    samtools mpileup -ugf Ref.fa aln.sorted.bam | bcftools view -bcvg - > aln.sorted.raw.bcf

    I thought that both of these steps should return the unfiltered set of putative variants; however, the first one gives me substantially more variants than the second. I just want to make sure I am solid about what exactly is happening at these steps so that I can make informed decisions about what filtering is necessary downstream.

    Thanks for your help!
  • swbarnes2
    Senior Member
    • May 2008
    • 910

    #2
    Mpileup by default adds a BAQ calculation, which pileup doesn't. Try the following, and see if the result is more like the pileup result

    samtools mpileup -Bugf Ref.fa aln.sorted.bam | bcftools view -bcvg - > aln.sorted.rawB.bcf

    Comment

    • ksc
      Junior Member
      • Apr 2011
      • 4

      #3
      Thanks swbarnes2. That helped out a bit. However, I am still only getting half the variants using mpileup that I was using pileup. It is most likely that these are ones that would be filtered out in later steps anyway; however, it would be nice to know what is happening for sure.

      Comment

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