---

type: genome

filename: hg38.fa.bgz

chrom_prefix: "chr"

meta:
  summary: |
    Nucleotide sequence of the GRCh38/hg38 human genome assembly from UCSC

  description: |
    Nucleotide sequence of the GRCh38/hg38 human genome assembly from UCSC. GRCh38/hg38 is the current major human reference genome assembly used by many genomic resources and annotations. The FASTA uses UCSC-style chromosome names, including chr1 through chr22, chrX, chrY, and chrM.

    Downloaded on 6/12/2026
    
    [https://hgdownload.soe.ucsc.edu/goldenPath/hg38/bigZips/hg38.fa.gz](https://hgdownload.soe.ucsc.edu/goldenPath/hg38/bigZips/hg38.fa.gz)

    Processing Details: 

    `build.sh` converts the downloaded `hg38.fa.gz` file from regular gzip compression to bgzip compression, then runs `samtools faidx` to create the required FASTA and bgzip index files. The original `hg38.fa.gz` file is removed, leaving only `hg38.fa.bgz`, `hg38.fa.bgz.fai`, and `hg38.fa.bgz.gzi` in the resource directory.

  
  labels: ~