[GMOD-devel] Re: [Open-bio-l] Schema for genes & features &mappings to assemblies

Hilmar Lapp hlapp@gnf.org
Tue, 30 Apr 2002 17:43:36 -0700


So Ensembl does have a Chromosome table and does store explicitly how contigs map to chromosomes position-wise. What's bad about that?

	-hilmar
-- 
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Hilmar Lapp                            email: lapp@gnf.org
GNF, San Diego, Ca. 92121              phone: +1-858-812-1757
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> -----Original Message-----
> From: Hilmar Lapp 
> Sent: Tuesday, April 30, 2002 5:03 PM
> To: 'Chris Mungall'; Lincoln Stein
> Cc: Elia Stupka; Thomas Down; Ewan Birney; GMOD Devel (E-mail); OBDA
> BioSQL (E-mail)
> Subject: RE: [GMOD-devel] Re: [Open-bio-l] Schema for genes & features
> &mappings to assemblies
> 
> 
> I like this proposal, but ...
> 
> > 9. project-centric column names like "chromosome" are avoided; eg
> >  drosophila has chromosome arms as top level sequences
> 
> So, I'm still confused about how I am supposed to store gene 
> predictions, EST, RefSeq, or whatever mappings to chromosomes 
> in an assembly, such that I can answer queries like 'show me 
> all exons of genes and their lines of evidence that map 
> between markers X and Y on chromosome 5 of mouse. Next, show 
> how human genes map to this region, and which human chromosomes.'
> 
> Maybe someone can help me lifting my confusion.
> 
> How is this done in GMOD and Ensembl, and how does that map 
> to BioSQL with the assembly proposal below?
> 
> 	-hilmar
> -- 
> -------------------------------------------------------------
> Hilmar Lapp                            email: lapp@gnf.org
> GNF, San Diego, Ca. 92121              phone: +1-858-812-1757
> -------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Chris Mungall [mailto:cjm@bdgp.lbl.gov]
> > Sent: Wednesday, April 24, 2002 6:31 PM
> > To: Lincoln Stein
> > Cc: Elia Stupka; Thomas Down; Ewan Birney; Hilmar Lapp; GMOD Devel
> > (E-mail); OBDA BioSQL (E-mail)
> > Subject: Re: [GMOD-devel] Re: [Open-bio-l] Schema for genes 
> & features
> > &mappings to assemblies
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > Here is an example of one way of doing things such that we can all
> > agree to disagree yet remain one happy family.
> > 
> > It's not perfect, but I think it's better than the alternative which
> > seems to be to solidify a compromise schema which no ones 
> really happy
> > with, or force everyone to use overcomplex adapters.
> > 
> > It's a component-based solution rather than a monolithic 
> one, the SQL
> > DDL follows the description below
> > 
> >  ------
> > 
> > 1. Definitions (up for debate)
> >    1 level assembly - features all stored on top level seqs
> >              assembly table may still be useful; eg for getting
> >              entry units - or seqfeatures could be used instead,
> >              e.g. like GGB
> >    2 level assembly - e.g. contigs on a chromosome. unspecified as
> >              to whether features live on contigs, or both levels
> >    n level assembly - e.g. chroms, contigs, reads. unspecified as
> >              to whether features live on mixed levels, and 
> to whether
> >              the depth is fixed or variable
> > 
> > 2. All client code can expect 2 relations to be present: 
> assembly, and
> >  dnafrag, defined below.
> > 
> > 3. Client code can assume 2 level assemblies by default. Adaptors
> >  should take care of transformations and/or the lite-client-bridge
> >  (see 5 below) can be used
> > 
> > 4. Client code written expecting flat assemblies (ie ignoring the
> >  assembly relation altogether) won't break, but they
> >  will display incomplete data (ie missing chrom features 
> from contigs
> >  or vice versa) IF the data is stored in a 2 level manner.
> > 
> > 5. An optional bridge layer is provided for lite-clients that 
> > expect all
> >  the data to be present in a flat assembly. This layer is sufficient
> >  for read-only, but currently not for updates (although it could be
> >  extended to do so). This layer is also useful for direct data
> >  exploration via SQL.
> > 
> > 6. n-level assemblies are not assumed as default. Code 
> > assuming n-level
> >  assemblies will obviously work as n-level subsumes 1/2 level. An
> >  n-level assembly component can be used, a view is used so that the
> >  core 2-level assembly model is supported, although specialized
> >  n-level assembly update code would be required.
> > 
> > 7. Views are utilized but this doesn't marginalise mysql 
> pre 4.1 - the
> >  views could be materialized in a read-only db, or they could act as
> >  specifications for a programmatic adapter layer.
> > 
> > 8. The GGB sequence shredding idea is used, via the dnafrag 
> > relation. This
> >  is necessary for large seqs with mysql. If you're DBMS is 
> happy with
> >  large seqs, then you still have to support the dnafrag 
> > relation, but you
> >  can use a view with virtually no loss in speed.
> > 
> > 9. project-centric column names like "chromosome" are avoided; eg
> >  drosophila has chromosome arms as top level sequences
> > 
> > ===========================
> > 
> > I have munged all the components into a single file with 
> ifdefs here,
> > in reality they would be in seperate component files.
> > 
> > These are the different builds possible:
> > 
> > core - a good choice for all metazoan s. this part should follow
> > ensembl rather well. assumes that you are doing data management such
> > that a 2 level assembly is beneficial.
> > 
> > smallseq - if either the genome consists of smallish unordered
> > contigs, or the fully sequence genome has smallish chromosomes.
> > 
> > 1-level  - all the features are flattened onto the biggest seq units
> > 
> > n-level  - will require extra code to fully utilise this
> > 
> > None of the table/colnames are set in stone, this is just to give a
> > flavour of a possible solution.
> > 
> > <ifdef core, 1-level-frag, smallseq>
> > 
> > # child seqs (eg clones/contigs) are expected to be
> > # all on the fwd strand in this example
> > 
> > CREATE TABLE assembly (
> >     assembly_id unsigned NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY auto_increment,
> >     integer parentseq_id not null,
> >     FOREIGN KEY parentseq_id REFERENCES seq(seq_id),
> >     parent_start integer not null,
> >     parent_end integer not null,
> >     integer childseq_id not null,
> >     FOREIGN KEY parentseq_id REFERENCES seq(seq_id),
> >     child_start integer not null,
> >     child_end integer not null
> > );
> > 
> > <ifdef>
> > 
> > <ifdef n-level>
> > 
> > CREATE TABLE assembly_nlevel (
> >     assembly_id unsigned NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY auto_increment,
> >     integer parentseq_id not null,
> >     foreign key parentseq_id references seq(seq_id),
> >     parent_start integer not null,
> >     parent_end integer not null,
> >     integer childseq_id not null,
> >     foreign key parentseq_id references seq(seq_id),
> >     child_start integer not null,
> >     child_end integer not null
> > );
> > 
> > CREATE VIEW assembly AS
> >   ....  <this is tricky - it depends on whether the level 
> is fixed or
> >   whether you can have mix and match 1, 2, 3 etc level in one db>
> > 
> > <ifdef>
> > 
> > <ifdef 1-level>
> > 
> > # for most genomes, it makes sense to 'shred' the sequence
> > 
> > # if you have a 1-level assembly (ie you have no need of
> > # an assembly table) but your sequences are too big to
> > # store directly, eg in mysql, then you will want to
> > # use this table to store them in smaller chunks
> > 
> > # getting subsequences as fast as possible is something
> > # that is core to all genome annotation databases, so this
> > # relation is expected; it could be implemented differently,
> > # see below.
> > 
> > # open question: how does the client decide when to use
> > # dnafrag and when to use the biosequence table? Should
> > # dnafrag be optional?
> > 
> > CREATE TABLE dnafrag (
> >     integer seq_id not null,
> >     foreign key seq_id references seq(seq_id),
> >     integer fstart not null,
> >     integer fend not null,
> >     biosequence_str mediumtext not null
> > );
> > 
> > <ifdef>
> > 
> > <ifdef core>
> > 
> > # use this component if you have a 2 or n level assemblies
> > # and the top level sequences are too big for your DBMS to
> > # handle well
> > 
> > # note; this is a slow implementation becuase of the
> > # substring; we could easily do it without
> > # and just extend the frag to include the full
> > # child (eg clone) boundaries
> > 
> > # open question: can client code assume dna fragments are abutting /
> > # have no overlap extent
> > 
> > # materialize the view for warehouse dbs for faster performance
> > 
> > CREATE VIEW dnafrag
> >  AS SELECT parentseq_id AS seq_id
> >            substring(sequence.biosequence_str,
> >                      child_start,
> >                      child_end) AS biosequence_str,
> >            parent_start AS fstart,
> >            child_start  AS fend
> >  FROM assembly, sequence
> >  WHERE sequence.sequence_id = assembly.childseq_id;
> > 
> > <ifdef>
> > 
> > <ifdef smallseq>
> > 
> > # if we have either a small genome, or
> > # a big genome for which there is no assembly,
> > # only unordered contigs of a small size
> > # (small defined as whatever is a scalable seq
> > #  size for your DBMS)
> > # then it doesn't make sense to 'shred' into
> > # manageable size pieces, but we should
> > # support the interface/relation
> > CREATE VIEW dnafrag
> >  AS SELECT sequence_id AS seq_id
> >            biosequence_str AS biosequence_str,
> >            1 AS fstart,
> >            seq_length  AS fend
> >  FROM sequence;
> > 
> > <ifdef>
> > 
> > <ifdef gff-l2>
> > 
> > # lite-clients may want a simple GFF view of
> > # the world, with everything in a flat coordinate
> > # system. this view would be used if your features
> > # were stored in the leaf nodes in your 2-level assembly;
> > # other views could be made e.g. for features stored
> > # on mixed levels
> > 
> > # this relation is intended to be conformant to
> > # the GGB fdata relation
> > 
> > # this is slightly convoluted because of
> > # the way sequences/locations work in biosql
> > 
> > # note the off-by-ones cancel eachother below
> > CREATE VIEW fdata
> >  AS SELECT seqfeature_id     AS fid,
> >            parententry.accession       AS fref,
> >            fl.seq_start + (a.parent_start - a.child_start)
> >                       AS fstart,
> >            fl.seq_end + (a.parent_start - a.child_start)
> >                       AS fstop,
> >            f.seqfeature_key_id   AS ftypeid,
> >            NULL              AS fscore,
> >            fl.seq_strand     AS fstrand,
> >            NULL              AS fphase,
> >            f.seqfeature_id   AS gid,
> >            NULL              AS ftarget_start,
> >            NULL              AS ftarget_stop
> >     FROM seqfeature f,
> >          seqfeature_location fl,
> >          assembly a,
> >          bioentry childentry,
> >          bioentry parententry,
> >          biosequence childseq,
> >          biosequence parentseq,
> >     WHERE
> >           a.childseq_id    = childseq.sequence_id                AND
> >           childseq.bioentry_id    = childentry.bioentry_id       AND
> >           a.parentseq_id    = parentseq.sequence_id         
>        AND
> >           parentseq.bioentry_id    = 
> parententry.bioentry_id       AND
> >           fl.seqfeature_id = f.seqfeature_id                     AND
> >           f.bioentry_id    = childentry.bioentry_id;
> > 
> > <ifdef>
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
>