An integrated pipeline for next-generation sequencing and annotation of mitochondrial genomes

Abstract

Mitochondrial (mt) genomics represents an understudied but important field of molecular biology. Increasingly, mt dysfunction is being linked to a range of human diseases, including neurodegenerative disorders, diabetes and impairment of childhood development. In addition, mt genomes provide important markers for systematic, evolutionary and population genetic studies. Some technological limitations have prevented the expanded generation and utilization of mt genomic data for some groups of organisms. These obstacles most acutely impede, but are not limited to, studies requiring the determination of complete mt genomic data from minute amounts of material (e.g. biopsy samples or microscopic ..