Haplotype-resolved genome architecture mapping uncovers pervasive structural heterogeneity between human homologous chromosomes

Authors

Markowski, J., Kukalev, A., Robens, C., Thieme, C. J., Streck, A., Mao, H., Parsi, K. M., Maehr, R., Pombo, A., Schwarz, R. F.

Abstract

Resolving the three-dimensional structure of chromatin with haplotype specificity remains a fundamental challenge for understanding genetic and epigenetic contributions to gene regulation in healthy development and in disease. Phasing of chromatin contacts derived by ligation-dependent methods relies on high single-nucleotide variant (SNV) density, which limits its applicability in human genomes where SNVs are sparse. Here, we present CoPhasing, a strategy that leverages the intrinsic haplotype fidelity of Genome Architecture Mapping (GAM), a ligation-free method that inherently captures haplotype-matched genomic neighborhoods in thin nuclear slices. CoPhasing assigns SNV-free reads to their haplotype through proximity to informative reads, enabling efficient and accurate phasing even in SNV-sparse regions. Applying CoPhasing genome-wide reveals extensive, previously inaccessible structural heterogeneity between human homologous chromosomes, demonstrating the power of GAM CoPhasing to investigate allele-specific differences in 3D genome organization and their relevance to gene regulation and disease.

Preprint server: bioRxiv
The authors list and abstract were imported from bioRxiv on 19 Jun 2026.

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