Validated WGS and WES protocols proved saliva-derived gDNA as an equivalent to blood-derived gDNA for clinical and population genomic analyses

ABSTRACT

Whole exome sequencing (WES) and whole genome sequencing (WGS) have become standard methods in human clinical diagnostics as well as in population genomics (POPGEN). Blood-derived genomic DNA (gDNA) is routinely used in the clinical environment. Conversely, many POPGEN studies and commercial tests benefit from easy saliva sampling. Here, we evaluated the quality of variant call sets and the level of genotype concordance of single nucleotide variants (SNVs) and small insertions and deletions (indels) for WES and WGS using paired blood- and saliva-derived gDNA isolates employing genomic reference-based validated protocols.The genomic reference standard Coriell NA12878 was repeatedly analyzed using optimized WES and WGS protocols, and data calls were compared with the truth dataset