NextOmics: the FIRST officially certified service provider of Oxford Nanopore sequencing in China

NextOmics, a subsidiary of Beijing GrandOmics Biosciences, has become the first officially certified service provider of Oxford Nanopore sequencing in China. NextOmics has established the Oxford Nanopore sequencing platform since September 2017, and has finished a few dozen pilot projects so far with outstanding yield and data quality. Currently, NextOmics has eleven GridIONs and two MinIONs in operation, with more sequencers on order. Additionally, a PromethION is expected to be deployed soon by NextOmics to provide high quality and high throughput sequencing services for worldwide researchers.

NextOmics started to offer Nanopore sequencing service to Chinese and worldwide customers in 2017, and has processed different types of samples such as mammals, plants and insects. As of January 17, 2018, The NextOmics Nanopore Sequencing Center has yielded more than 2Tb qualified data within a 4-month period. In particular, NextOmics has completed the sequencing and genome assembly of over 20 plant and animal species, with significantly improved assembly quality compared to previous generation of sequencers.

NextOmics has focused on offering  professional and extraordinary genome sequencing solutions of Third Generation Sequencing (TGS)/Nanopore Sequencing, especially on areas of complex genome sequencing and assembly. At the International Conference of Plant and Animal Genomics 2018 (PAG XXVI), NextOmics released the genome skimming result of Paris japonica, the largest genome (~152Gb) in the planet earth. In the past 8 years, NextOmics has participated in over 300 genome sequencing projects and published many influential research articles, such as the first de novo near-complete genome of a Chinese individual, the first near-complete Indica rice genome, the first firefly genome, and the first Eucommia ulmoides genome. In the National Plant Biology Conference 2014 (Hefei, China), NextOmics firstly proposed the “1Mb Contig N50” slogan. Now, with the arrival of Oxford Nanopore Technology, megabase-sized  contig N50 in most species will be very common in the future.

NextOmics has established a comprehensive and cutting edge omics research center by using a variety of technologies, such as the Oxford Nanopore, optical mapping (BioNano), PacBio sequencing and 3D genome mapping. In 2018, NextOmics will leverage Nanopore Technology in areas such as direct RNA sequencing and DNA/RNA modifications. We sincerely welcome worldwide customers and collaborators to work with NextOmics and enjoy the unique advantages of long read sequencing. Let’s embrace the Nanopore era!