deacon 0.16.0rc4

Fast DNA search and [host] depletion using minimizers

Deacon for Python

Python bindings for Deacon, enabling fast multithreaded DNA sequence filtering for e.g. host pangenome depletion using Python code. These bindings load an index once, allowing subsequent filtering runs with low latency. Deacon's complete functionality is currently only available using the Rust/CLI version of Deacon.

Installation

uv install deacon

Quickstart

from deacon import Index

index = Index("panhuman-1.k31w15.idx")
stats = index.filter(
    fastq_path,
    deplete=True,
    rename=True,
    output=fastq_path.replace(".fastq.gz", ".clean.fastq.gz")
)
print(stats["seqs_in"], stats["seqs_out"])

Index()

Load a minimizer index or probabilistic filter from disk. The resulting object may be reused across many filter calls.

index = Index("panhuman-1.k31w15.idx", complexity_threshold=None)

Pass complexity_threshold (0.0–1.0, e.g. 0.9) to discard low-complexity index minimizers once at load using kdust; the filtered set is then reused across all filter calls. Not supported for bff (binary fuse filter) indexes.

Index.fetch()

Download a prebuilt index, then load and return it (a static method, so Index.fetch(...) returns an Index). output is the local path to save to; when omitted it defaults to "{name}.k{k}w{w}.idx" in the working directory. The index is downloaded on every call — there is no local cache, so an existing file at that path is overwritten.

index = Index.fetch("panhuman-1", k=31, w=15, output=None, complexity_threshold=None)

Index.info()

Index.info(index_path) Returns a dict of index metadata:

Key	Meaning
k	k-mer length
w	minimizer window size
format	exact-u64, exact-u128, or bff (binary fuse filter)
count	number of keys in index (fingerprint slot count for bff)

Index.filter()

Filter a FASTA/FASTQ file or file pair against the index and return a dict of summary statistics. Auto-detects .gz/.zst/.xz compression on both input and output based on file extension. The Python GIL is released while filtering meaning calls benefit from multithreading. Refer to the main Deacon readme for more detailed usage examples.

def filter(
    fastq,                   # input path (FASTA/FASTQ, optionally .gz/.zst/.xz)
    fastq2=None,             # second mate for paired reads
    interleaved=False,       # treat fastq as interleaved paired reads (cannot combine with fastq2)
    deplete=False,           # False = search (keep matches); True = deplete (remove matches)
    rename=False,            # replace read names with sequential integers
    rename_random=False,     # replace read names with random strings
    output=None,             # output path; None writes to stdout
    output2=None,            # second output path for paired reads
    abs_threshold=2,         # min absolute minimizer hits to call a match
    rel_threshold=0.01,      # min proportion of minimizers hitting to call a match
    prefix_length=0,         # only use the first N bp of each read (0 = whole read)
    output_fasta=False,      # emit FASTA instead of FASTQ
    threads=8,               # worker threads for filtering
    compression_level=2,     # output compression level
    compression_threads=0,   # threads for output compression (0 = auto)
    debug=False,             # verbose per-read debug output
    quiet=True,              # suppress progress/log output on stderr
) -> dict

Modes. With deplete=False (the default, search mode) reads that match the index are kept; with deplete=True reads that match are removed (host depletion). A read is a match only when it clears both thresholds: at least abs_threshold minimizer hits and at least rel_threshold of its minimizers hitting the index.

Output. When output is None the filtered records are written to stdout. To count without keeping the filtered sequences, pass output="/dev/null". Statistics are returned regardless.

Return value. A dict including the run configuration (version, index, input/input2, output/output2, k, w, abs_threshold, rel_threshold, prefix_length, deplete, rename, rename_random) and the results:

Key	Meaning
seqs_in, seqs_out, seqs_removed	sequence counts
seqs_out_proportion, seqs_removed_proportion	sequence proportions
bp_in, bp_out, bp_removed	base-pair counts
bp_out_proportion, bp_removed_proportion	base-pair proportions
time	wall-clock seconds
seqs_per_second, bp_per_second	throughput (filtering only)
seqs_per_second_total, bp_per_second_total	throughput (including load/IO)