Verkko2 is released!
We are excited to announce that Verkko2 is now available! Not only is it 4x faster than Verkko1, this version adds support for proximity ligation data (e.g. Hi-C, Pore-C) for T2T phasing and scaffolding without the need for trios. Our latest preprint describes the new methods and results: “Verkko2: Integrating proximity ligation data with long-read De Bruijn graphs for efficient telomere-to-telomere genome assembly, phasing, and scaffolding”. With these improvements, Verkko2 can now assemble, on average, around 40 out of 46 diploid human chromosomes as T2T scaffolds (and ~20 as T2T contigs), including the most difficult to assemble acrocentric chromosomes. However, these improvements are not limited to human genomes and Verkko2 should work well for any diploid or haploid genome (polyploids are a work in progress). We look forward to enabling many more T2T genomes in 2025!