Medium-coverage DNA sequencing in the design of the genetic association study

DNA sequencing is a widely used tool in genetic association study. Sequencing cost remains a major concern in sequencing-based study, although the application of next generation sequencing has dramatically decreased the sequencing cost and increased the efficiency. The choice of sequencing depth and the sequencing sample size will largely determine the final study investment and performance. Many studies have been conducted to find a cost-effective design of sequencing depth that can achieve certain sequencing accuracy using minimal sequencing cost. The strategies previously studied can be classified into two groups: (1) single-stage to sequence all the samples using either high (>~30×) or low (