Greetings VarSeq users! VarSeq 2.4.0 has officially been released. VarSeq 2.4.0 is a significant release that focuses on enhancing the VSClinical ACMG workflow by introducing new features and noteworthy improvements. The major highlights of the release are: 1. Welcoming structural variant support to the VSClinical ACMG workflow 2. ACMG workflow automation has been enhanced via the application of evaluation scripts… Read more »
In our recent webcast, we discussed the exciting new features of VarSeq 2.4.0 and the updated VSClinical interface. The discussion was centered around three main topics: In summary, VarSeq 2.4.0 uniquely supports the analysis of all variant types in the clinical interpretation workflow. By incorporating structural variants, enhancing automation, and empowering users to handle complex data, it offers a comprehensive… Read more »
A new VSPipeline command, set_data_folder_path, designed to bolster consistent input usage. By introducing this innovative command, we aim to empower users with improved data organization, flexibility, and standardization for their clinical cases and analyses. Embracing this command will not only support reproducibility but also ensure accountability, ultimately paving the way for better-informed patient care decisions. Managing Annotations and References in… Read more »
Use the force of evaluation scripts to automate and customize your VSClinical ACMG workflow in VarSeq 2.4.0. VarSeq 2.3.0 came packed with new features! Most notably, VarSeq variant analysis expanded to support the import and annotation of structural variant files, and the AMP cancer workflow in VSClinical gained new functionality with the addition of evaluation scripts which help automate and… Read more »
Enhancing VarSeq Customization and Automation with Visual Studio Code: A Guide to Evaluation and Reporting Scripting Are you as excited as we are about the new automation and customization features we’ve been rolling out with VarSeq’s most recent release, VarSeq 2.3.0? Do your eyes light up at the prospect of automated integration of various data sources into VarSeq’s evaluation and… Read more »
Discover the Thrilling Automation Capabilities of VarSeq Suite for NGS Testing and Learn How We’re Tackling Contemporary Lab Challenges First off, I’d like to thank everyone who joined us for our February webcast on the automation capabilities of the VarSeq software suite through VSPipeline. For those of you who joined us, I’m sure it’s obvious that automation is a topic… Read more »
Discover the latest advancements in cancer genomic profiling with the release of VarSeq 2.3.0 We are very excited to announce the release of VarSeq 2.3.0! This release was one of the largest VarSeq releases yet, as it includes a large refactor to the VSClinical AMP cancer module. A primary motivation for the release was focused on the availability and increased… Read more »
Golden Helix provides extensive resources to help our users who are just getting started and address any issues they may encounter as they become more familiar with our software. Our resources are constantly updated and are tailored to the needs of our users. If you’re facing a problem, it’s likely that others have encountered it as well, and we’ve included… Read more »
Our FAS team would like to thank everyone who attended our December 2022 webcast, A User’s Perspective: Somatic Variant Analysis in VarSeq 2.3.0. This webcast allowed three members of our FAS team to give their unique insights concerning the improvements to our new VarSeq 2.3.0 release, which will be recapped here. Starting with template creation, our Technical Field Application Scientist,… Read more »
The Golden Helix team is headed off to Phoenix, AZ for the Association for Molecular Pathology Annual Meeting & Expo (AMP) 2022. We are enthusiastically awaiting a week of genetics discussions with new and familiar faces. If you are attending, please stop by our booth and say hello! We will be exhibiting at booth 1432. Golden Helix President & CEO,… Read more »
Thank you to those who attended our webcast on the user perspective of our automated AMP guidelines! Furthermore, let me express our appreciation for those particularly engaged users who posed some very thoughtful questions. While we weren’t able to answer all of them live, I hope to shed some light on some pertinent details of somatic analysis here. Let’s start… Read more »
Manually converting FASTQs to VCFs, importing these into VarSeq, and building projects from scratch is adequate when you have only a handful of cases per week. But as you start ramping up production, the key to your lab’s success quickly becomes how quickly and efficiently you can get to the reporting of your analysis. This blog will explain how you… Read more »
Next-gen sequencing (NGS) comprises many sophisticated steps that are often compressed into three major sections: library prep, sequencing, and data analysis. Obviously, the goal is to simplify each of these steps, but more often than not, there is a need for multiple tools to complete each one. Regarding the data analysis, Golden Helix seeks to provide simple yet comprehensive solutions… Read more »
One of the inherent realities of next-generation sequencing is the ongoing updates to the human reference genome—one of the strongest recommendations to take the original sequencing data and remap to the latest genome assembly. However, there are several reasons why remapping may be impractical. So, an alternative solution is needed to convert the data running through an initial mapping to… Read more »
I want to take this opportunity to highlight and briefly discuss some of the key features and updates that have been incorporated into VarSeq 2.2.3. Some of you may have attended the webcast that covered the prominent new features added to VarSeq, which are the updates to improve whole-exome analysis workflows, namely improved CNV calling in whole-exome datasets. However, there… Read more »
Didn’t catch the webcast live? No worries! We cover ‘VSClinical: A Complete Clinical Workflow Solution’ Q&A’s in this blog post. The webcast, ‘VSClinical: A Complete Clinical Workflow Solution’ demonstrated how solutions provided by Golden Helix can be implemented to cover all requirements of a clinical workspace. Specifically, this webcast focused on a detailed workflow from a bioinformatician, geneticist, and lab… Read more »
Webcast Recap In the recent webcast “Exploring New Features and Clinical Reports in the ACMG Guideline Workflow”, Gabe and I took viewers through an evaluation with CNVs and SNVs according to the ACMG Guidelines where we generated and customized a clinical report. Along the way, we highlighted many new features that will soon be available in the upcoming VarSeq release…. Read more »
VarSeq 2.2.1 was released on April 1st and features an upgraded gene annotation capability with new RefSeq genes tracks and an AMP workflow addition: the Drugs and Trials tab. The new RefSeq human genome genes tracks contain updated gene names and the recognition of any MANE (Matched Annotation from NCBI and EMBL-EBI) identified transcripts. VarSeq has been updated to be… Read more »
Thank you to everyone who joined me for yesterday’s webcast, I hope you all enjoyed it. If you missed the live event and are interested in knowing what we talked about, good news, you can watch the recorded version right here! There were so many great questions asked during our Live Q&A that I was unable to answer all of… Read more »
Introducing Drugs & Trials for Cancer Diagnostics VSClinical offers enormous simplicity and consistency in evaluating biomarkers and providing treatment options. Last month, we announced our newest feature to now include the automated collection of relevant clinical trials. The new capability was unveiled in our “Introducing Drugs & Trials for Cancer Diagnostics” webcast with Nathan Fortier, Ph.D., Director of Research, showing… Read more »
