Functional and Technical Validation of SL-seq, a method for RNA-seq in Trypanosomatids

We developed a novel method for RNA-seq in Trypanosomatids called ‘Spliced-Leader Sequencing’ (SL-seq). The method is based on the fact that the 5’ end of Trypanosomatid mRNA is starts with a SL-sequence, and specifically enriches SL-containing RNA prior to sequencing. In this study we compared the performance and functional results obtained with SL-seq to those generated with conventional Illumina Stranded mRNA prep. Therefore we sequenced mRNA of Leishmania donovani logarithmic phase promastigotes, stationary phase promastigotes and intracellular amastigotes with both methods. We also sequenced controlled dilutions of Leishmania RNA with human RNA. 37 samples