METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR COMPACT REPRESENTATION OF BIOINFORMATICS DATA

1 . A computer-implemented method for the compression of genome sequence data produced by a sequencing machine, said genome sequence data comprising reads of sequences of nucleotides,

said method comprising the steps of:

aligning said reads to one or more reference sequences thereby creating aligned reads,

classifying said aligned reads according to whether a perfect mapping with said one or more reference sequences is found, the number of mismatches with said one or more reference sequences, the presence of substitutions of symbols, the presence of insertions or deletions or clipped symbols in said aligned reads with respect to said one or more reference sequences, the presence of unmapped reads, thereby creating classes of aligned reads, and

encoding said classified and aligned reads as a multiplicity of layers of syntax elements comprising descriptors which univocally represent said classified and aligned reads,

wherein encoding said classified aligned reads as a multiplicity of layers of syntax elements comprises selecting said syntax elements according to said classes of aligned reads,

wherein the encoding of said classified aligned reads as a multiplicity of layers of syntax elements is adapted according to the statistical properties of the data carried by the layer,

wherein the encoding of said classified aligned reads as a multiplicity of layers of syntax elements associates a specific source model and a specific entropy coder to each layer,

wherein there is decomposition of the sequence read data and metadata into homogeneous layers of syntax elements in order to obtain distinct information sources with reduced information entropy.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein said layers of syntax elements comprise a position along the reference sequence, a distance between two positions on the reference sequence and information indicating if sequence reads are reverse complemented.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein said layers of syntax elements further comprise the position of a variant with respect to the reference sequence, the type of variant, the position of a deletion with respect to the reference sequence, the position of one or more symbols not present in the reference sequence, but present in the aligned reads, the type of insertion at a given position.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein said entropy coder is a context adaptive arithmetic coder.

5 . A method for the decompression of a genomic stream compressed according to the method of claim 1 , said method comprising the steps of:

parsing said compressed genomic stream into genomic layers of syntax elements,

expanding said genomic layers into classified reads of sequences of nucleotides, and

selectively decoding said classified reads of sequences of nucleotides on one or more reference sequences so as to produce uncompressed reads of sequences of nucleotides.

6 . A genomic encoder for the compression of genome sequence data, said genome sequence data comprising reads of sequences of nucleotides, said genomic encoder comprising:

an aligner unit, configured to align said reads to one or more reference sequences thereby creating aligned reads,

a data classification unit, configured to classify said aligned reads according to whether a perfect mapping with said one or more reference sequences is found, the number of mismatches with said one or more reference sequences, the presence of substitutions of symbols, the presence of insertions or deletions or clipped symbols in said aligned reads with respect to said one or more reference sequences, the presence of unmapped reads, thereby creating classes of aligned reads; and

one or more layers encoding units, configured to encode said classified aligned reads as layers of syntax elements comprising descriptors which univocally represent said classified and aligned reads by selecting said syntax elements according to said classes of aligned reads,

wherein the encoding of said classified aligned reads as a multiplicity of layers of syntax elements is adapted according to the statistical properties of the data carried by the layer,

wherein the encoding of said classified aligned reads as a multiplicity of layers of syntax elements associates a specific source model and a specific entropy coder to each layer,

wherein there is decomposition of the sequence read data and metadata into homogeneous layers of syntax elements in order to obtain distinct information sources with reduced information entropy.

7 . A genomic decoder for the decompression of a genomic stream compressed by the genomic encoder of claim 6 , said genomic decoder comprising:

parsing means configured to parse said compressed genomic stream into genomic layers of syntax elements,

one or more layer decoders, configured to decode the genomic layers into classified reads of sequences of nucleotides, and

genomic data classes decoders configured to selectively decode said classified reads of sequences of nucleotides on one or more reference sequences so as to produce uncompressed reads of sequences of nucleotides.

8 . The genomic decoder of claim 7 , wherein the one or more reference sequences are stored in the compressed genome stream.

9 . The genomic decoder of claim 7 , wherein the one or more reference sequences are provided to the decoder via an out of band mechanism.

10 . The genomic decoder of claim 7 , wherein the one or more reference sequences are built at the decoder.

11 . A computer-readable medium comprising instructions that when executed cause at least one processor to perform the method of claim 1 .