Which sequencing approach sequences millions of DNA fragments in parallel for high throughput?

• A. Next-generation sequencing (NGS)
• B. Sanger sequencing
• C. Pyrosequencing
• D. Capillary sequencing

Answer: (A)

Massively parallel sequencing is the feature that enables high-throughput DNA sequencing. Next-generation sequencing brings together millions to billions of DNA fragments and reads them in parallel in a single run, generating huge amounts of data quickly and at a much lower cost per base. This parallelism is what lets you sequence whole genomes, exomes, or transcriptomes in a practical time frame. By contrast, older methods rely on reading one fragment at a time (for example, Sanger sequencing using capillary electrophoresis), which limits throughput. Pyrosequencing and capillary sequencing refer to earlier approaches with far less parallel data generation than modern NGS. Because it sequences many fragments simultaneously, this method is ideal for high-throughput applications.