Samples For Whole Genome Targeted Enrichment and Sequencing of Cryptosporidium Spp.

Obtaining pure Cryptosporidium DNA from clinical and environmental samples is challenging because the oocysts shed in contaminated feces are difficult to obtain for numerous reasons. We used these samples provided here to develop and validate a set of 100,000 RNA baits (CryptoCap_100k) to enrich the DNA of known human-infecting Cryptosporidium spp. We used these samples demonstrate that CryptoCap_100k increases the percentage of reads mapping to target Cryptosporidium references under a wide variety of scenarios. This leads to increased depth and breadth of genome coverage, and therefore facilitates increased accuracy of detecting species within a given sample, while simultaneously decreasing costs. This will open new opportunities to understand the complex biology of Cryptosporidium by capturing the genomic variation across species.