Summary

Many existing software libraries for genomics require researchers to pick between competing considerations: the performance of compiled languages and the accessibility of interpreted languages. Go, a modern compiled language, provides an opportunity to address this conflict. We introduce Gonomics, an open-source collection of command line programs and bioinformatic libraries implemented in Go that unites readability and performance for genomic analyses. Gonomics contains packages to read, write, and manipulate a wide array of file formats (e.g. FASTA, FASTQ, BED, BEDPE, SAM, BAM, and VCF), and can convert and interface between these formats. Furthermore, our modular library structure provides a flexible platform for researchers developing their own software tools to address specific questions. These commands can be combined and incorporated into complex pipelines to meet the growing need for high-performance bioinformatic resources.

Availability and implementation

Gonomics is implemented in the Go programming language. Source code, installation instructions, and documentation are freely available at https://github.com/vertgenlab/gonomics.

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.