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4.3 Raw data cleaning

Purpose

Remove adapters, discard very short reads, and prepare clean FASTQ files for read classification and alignment.

RNA-seq cleaning

mkdir -p ./sce/3.rna-seq/1.cleandata/
cd ./sce/3.rna-seq/1.cleandata/

for fq in ../../2.rawdata/rna-seq/*fastq.gz
do
  cutadapt --match-read-wildcards \
    -a AGATCGGAAGAGCGTCGTGTAGGGAAAGAGTGTAGATCTCGGTGGTCGC \
    -m 25 \
    -O 6 \
    -j 12 \
    -o $(basename $fq fastq.gz)clean.fastq.gz \
    $fq \
    &>> $(basename $fq .fastq.gz)".cutadapt.log"
done

Ribo-seq cleaning

mkdir -p ./sce/4.ribo-seq/1.cleandata/
cd ./sce/4.ribo-seq/1.cleandata/

for fq in ../../2.rawdata/ribo-seq/*fastq.gz
do
  cutadapt --match-read-wildcards \
    -a AAAAAAAA \
    -m 25 \
    -O 6 \
    -j 10 \
    -o $(basename $fq fastq.gz)clean.fastq.gz \
    $fq \
    &>> $(basename $fq .fastq.gz)".cutadapt.log"
done

Parameter explanation

Parameter Meaning
--match-read-wildcards allow wildcard matching in reads
-a adapter sequence
-m minimum retained read length
-O minimum adapter overlap length
-j threads
-o output FASTQ

Outputs

File Description
*.clean.fastq.gz cleaned FASTQ
*.cutadapt.log adapter trimming statistics

QC interpretation

Check:

  • percentage of reads with adapters
  • retained read number
  • post-trimming read length distribution
  • Ribo-seq dominant RPF length range
  • RNA-seq read length consistency