PRIMO: A primer design program that applies base quality statistics for automated large-scale DNA sequencing

Abstract

PRIMO is a computer program that designs walking primers for large-scale DNA sequencing projects. Oligonucleotide primers are predicted automatically, using quality information associated with each base call, eliminating the need for manually viewing the sequence traces or inspecting contig assemblies to determine appropriate locations for primer design. This allows PRIMO to run in batch mode on an arbitrarily large number of templates. For shotgun sequencing, PRIMO reads assembled sequence contigs with corresponding base quality statistics and automatically designs walking primers as needed to extend and join contigs, or improve their overall quality. In the opposite extreme of single-pass or completely directed sequencing, PRIMO reads the unassembled sequence for each template and designs walking primers for extending each read. If the base-calling software does not provide base quality statistics, PRIMO assigns its own measure of base quality determined by the shapes of individual peaks in the trace data for each template. In this way, PRIMO can be used in the finishing stages of a shotgun sequencing project, in sequencing by directed primer walking, or in some intermediate strategy. The code is written in ANSI C and maintained in two versions: one for the Macintosh and the other for UNIX.