Patent ID: 7901891

Claim:
A method of characterizing nucleotide sequences of one or more target polynucleotides, said method comprising: (a) fragmenting said one or more target polynucleotides present in a predetermined coverage amount to form a population containing overlapping first-sized fragments having an average length substantially less than those of the one or more target polynucleotides; (b) forming a number of separate mixtures from said population of first-sized fragments, wherein said number is selected such that substantially every first-sized fragment in a separate mixture is non-overlapping with every other first-sized fragment of the same mixture and wherein the mixture of origin of each such first-sized fragment is determinable; (c) obtaining a number of sequence reads from one or more first-sized fragments of each separate mixture; (d) assembling said sequence reads to produce assembled sequence information comprising contigs; and (e) providing complete or partial nucleotide sequences of said one or more target polynucleotides by ordering said assembled sequence information, wherein said ordering depends on the mixture of origin of said assembled sequence information.