In compbiomed/MetaScope: Tools and functions for preprocessing 16S and metagenomic sequencing microbiome data

Introduction

To mitigate the effort of downloading reference genomes, taxonomy identifier databases, and constructing Bowtie 2 indices, we provide pre-compiled versions as described below. Current versions of all of these files can be constructed with MetaScope's functions if users choose not to download the files here.

Link to Box Drive

All databases are hosted centrally on a Box drive for download. A brief explanation of available files follows:

Taxonomy Annotation Database (2024_Accession_Taxa)

This file is a zip compressed folder containing a database of taxonomy information prepared with download_accessions() as part of MetaScope's MetaRef module.

It is highly recommended that all users download this database if they are using NCBI or SILVA databases. Otherwise, users will need to run MetaScope::download_accessions() to obtain this database.

MetaScope Bowtie2 Indices (metascope_bowtie2_indices)

Users of the MetaScope pipeline can easily and efficiently obtain reference genomes of interest using the download_refseq() function. However, the additional step of creating Bowtie 2 indices from these genomes to align them with sample data can add hours to these initial steps.

This folder contains various pre-built bowtie2 indices that can be used with the the align_target_bowtie() and filter_host_bowtie functions. The user's local path to these indices should be supplied to the lib_dir argument of those functions.

The following indices are available in Box drive:

1. 2024_ncbi_16S The NCBI 16S ribosomal RNA database
2. Greenegenes 13_8 The Greengenes 13.8 16S ribosomal RNA database
3. MetaScope RefSeq 2023 The entire bacteria, fungi, homo_sapiens, human_T2T, mus_musculus, and viruses refseq nucleotide database downloaded via download_refseq() in 2023
4. MetaScope RefSeq 2022 The entire bacteria, fungi, human, mouse, and viruses refseq nucleotide database downloaded via download_refseq() in 2022
5. MetaScope RefSeq 2020 The entire bacteria, fungi, human/mouse, Phi X 174, and viral refseq nucleotide database downloaded via download_refseq() in 2020
6. PathoScope RefSeq 2018 The entire bacteria, mouse, and viral refseq nucleotide database downloaded via PathoScope 2.0 software in 2018
7. PathoScope RefSeq 2015 The entire bacteria, fungi, human/mouse, phix174, and viral refseq nucleotide database downloaded via PathoScope 2.0 software in 2015
8. SILVA 138.1 The SILVA 138.1 16S ribosomal RNA database

compbiomed/MetaScope documentation built on June 10, 2025, 11:52 a.m.