Strand-specific RNA-seq applied to malaria samples.

Over the past few years only, next-generation sequencing technologies became accessible and many applications were rapidly derived, such as the development of RNA-seq, a technique that uses deep sequencing to profile whole transcriptomes. RNA-seq has the power to discover new transcripts and splicing variants, single-nucleotide variations, fusion genes, and mRNA level-based expression profiles. Preparing RNA-seq libraries can be delicate and usually obligates buying expensive kits that require large amounts of stating materials. The method presented here is flexible and cost-effective. Using this method, we prepared high-quality strand-specific RNA-seq libraries from RNA extracted from the human malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum. The libraries are compatible with Illumina(®)'s sequencers Genome Analyzer and Hi-Seq. The method can, however, be easily adapted to other platforms.