e765272cce5886370af96fd8dc507cb4e5373964
steve
  Mon Dec 19 15:17:46 2011 -0800
Added VCF announcement
diff --git src/hg/htdocs/indexNews.html src/hg/htdocs/indexNews.html
index 7139746..bb905a6 100644
--- src/hg/htdocs/indexNews.html
+++ src/hg/htdocs/indexNews.html
@@ -1,110 +1,129 @@
 <!--News Section----------------------------------------------->  
         <TABLE WIDTH="100%" BGCOLOR="#888888" BORDER="0" CELLSPACING="0" CELLPADDING="1">
             <TR><TD>        
             <TABLE BGCOLOR="#fffee8" WIDTH="100%"  BORDER="0" CELLSPACING="0" CELLPADDING="0">
                 <TR><TD>        
                 <TABLE BGCOLOR="#D9E4F8" BACKGROUND="images/hr.gif" WIDTH="100%" BORDER=0>
                     <TR><TD>
                     <!--cheap trick to get background on row to be continuous-->
                     <TABLE CELLPADDING=0 CELLSPACING=0 WIDTH="100%">
                         <TR><TD ALIGN="left">
                          <font size="4"><a name="TOC"></a><b>&nbsp; News</b></font><a href="http://www.twitter.com/GenomeBrowser" target="_blank"><img src="http://twitter-badges.s3.amazonaws.com/t_small-a.png" alt="Follow GenomeBrowser on Twitter" style="vertical-align:text-bottom; margin-left: 15px;"></a></TD>
                         <TD ALIGN="right"><A HREF="goldenPath/newsarch.html"><IMG 
                         SRC="images/news.jpg" ALT="" ALIGN="right" BORDER=0></A>
                     </TD></TR></TABLE>
                 </TD></TR></TABLE>
                 <TABLE BGCOLOR="#fffee8" WIDTH="100%" CELLPADDING=0>
                     <TR><TH HEIGHT=3></TH></TR>
                     <TR><TD WIDTH=10></TD>
                     <TD>
                     <P>
                     To receive announcements of new genome 
                     assembly releases, new software features, updates and 
                     training seminars by email, subscribe to the
                     <A HREF="https://lists.soe.ucsc.edu/mailman/listinfo/genome-announce" 
                     TARGET=_blank>genome-announce</A> mailing list.</P>
 
             
             <!-- start news -->
+                <FONT FACE="courier" SIZE="3"><B>19 December 2011 - Variant
+                Call Format (VCF) Now Supported in Genome Browser</B></FONT>
+                   <P>
+                   We are pleased to announce that the UCSC Genome Browser
+                   now supports Variant Call Format (VCF).  VCF is a flexible
+                   and extendable line-oriented text format developed by the
+                   1000 Genomes Project for releases of single nucleotide variants,
+                   indels, copy number variants and structural variants discovered
+                   by the project.  Similar to bigBed, bigWig and BAM, the Browser
+                   transfers only the portions of VCF files necessary to display
+                   viewed regions, making VCF a fast and attractive option for
+                   large data sets.  VCF files will need to be compressed and
+                   indexed using the tabix package available from
+                   <a href="http://samtools.sourceforge.net/"
+                   target="_blank">SAMtools</a>.  This new format is available
+                   for use in custom tracks and data hubs.  For more information
+                   about VCF and tabix, please see our <a href="goldenPath/help/vcf.html"
+                   target="_blank">VCF Track Format help page</a>.</P>
+                <P>
         	<FONT FACE="courier" SIZE="3"><B>7 November 2011 - UMD Cow
 		Assembly Now Available in Genome Browser</B></FONT>
 		    <P>
 		    In response to the many requests from the bovine research
 		    community, we now offer the University of Maryland (UMD)
 		    <em>Bos taurus</em> assembly in the Genome Browser, in 
 		    addition to the assemblies produced by the Baylor College 
 		    of Medicine Human Genome Sequencing Center. The UMD v3.1 
 		    assembly (Nov. 2009, UCSC bosTau6) was produced by the 
 		    <A HREF="http://www.cbcb.umd.edu/" TARGET=_blank>UMD Center 
 		    for Bioinformatics and Computational 
 		    Biology</A> (CBCB) in College Park, MD. </P>
 		    <P>
 		    The UMD 3.1 assembly is based on reads downloaded from 
 		    the NCBI Trace Archive, most of which were sequenced by
 		    the Baylor College of Medicine. UMD reports that they were
 		    able to apply several assembly improvement techniques
 		    to produce an assembly that is substantially more accurate 
 		    and complete than previous alternative versions, as 
 		    evaluated using independent metrics. Based on UMD 
 		    statistics, this assembly provides more genome coverage, 
 		    closes thousands of gaps, corrects many erroneous 
 		    inversions, deletions, and translocations, and fixes 
 		    thousands of single-nucleotide errors. For more information,
 		    see Zimin AV <em>et al</em>, 
 		    <A HREF="http://genomebiology.com/2009/10/4/R42"
 		    TARGET=_blank>A whole-genome assembly of the domestic
 		    cow, <em>Bos taurus</em></A>, <em>Genome Biol.</em> 2009;10(4) and 
 		    the UMD CBCB 
 		    <A HREF="http://www.cbcb.umd.edu/research/bos_taurus_assembly.shtml"
 		    TARGET=_blank><em>Bos taurus</em> assembly</A> web page.</P>
 		    <P>
 		    Downloads of the UMD bovine data and annotations may be 
 		    obtained from the UCSC Genome Browser 
 		    <A HREF="ftp://hgdownload.cse.ucsc.edu/goldenPath/bosTau6/">FTP server</A> 
 		    or <A HREF="http://hgdownload.cse.ucsc.edu/downloads.html#cow">Downloads</A> page.
 		    </P>
 		    <P>
               	    We'd like to thank the UMD CBCB for providing this genome 
 		    assembly. The UMD Cow Genome Browser and annotation tracks 
 		    were produced by Hiram Clawson, Chin Li, Brooke Rhead, Greg 
 		    Roe, Steve Heitner, and Donna Karolchik.  See the 
 		    <A HREF="goldenPath/credits.html#cow_credits">Credits</A> 
 		    page for a detailed list of the organizations and 
 		    individuals who contributed to this release.  </P>
 		    <P>
 		    <HR>
 
             <!-- start archives -->
             <!-- sacCer3 Assembly Release -->
         	<FONT FACE="courier" SIZE="3"><B>10 October 2011 - Updated Yeast Browser Released: </B></FONT>
 		    We are happy to announce the release of an updated browser 
 		    for the <em>Saccharomyces cerevisiae</em> yeast genome. 
 		    <A HREF="goldenPath/newsarch.html#101011">Read more</A>.
 		    </P>
             
             <!-- New javascript features -->
 		    <P>
                     <FONT FACE="courier" SIZE="3"><B>8 September 2011 -
 New Navigation and Display Features: </B></FONT>
 		    We've added several new features to the Genome Browser 
 		    that make it easier to quickly configure and navigate 
 		    around in the browser's annotation tracks window.
 		    <A HREF="goldenPath/newsarch.html#090811">Read more</A>.
 
             <!-- data hubs release  -->
 		    <P>
                     <FONT FACE="courier" SIZE="3"><B>18 August 2011 -
 New Feature: Track Data Hubs:  </B></FONT>
                     We are pleased to announce a new feature in the UCSC Genome 
    		    Browser: Track Data Hubs. Track hubs are web-accessible 
 		    directories of genomic data that can be viewed on the UCSC 
 		    Genome Browser alongside native annotation tracks. 
 		    <A HREF="goldenPath/newsarch.html#081811">Read more</A>.
 		    </P>
 
 ==> <a href="goldenPath/newsarch.html">News Archives</a>
 
                     </TD><TD WIDTH=15>
                  </TD></TR></TABLE>
             <BR></TD></TR></TABLE>
         </TD></TR></TABLE>