What is a .SAM file?
SAM is a text format for DNA reads aligned to a reference genome.
- Did you know
- SAM, introduced in 2009, became the standard for storing sequence alignments.
- Each SAM line is a tab-separated record whose flag field is a bitmask describing how that read mapped to the reference.
- BAM is simply SAM’s compressed binary twin, and both were defined by the 1000 Genomes Project’s data-processing group.
- What Analyser reads
- Open scientific, medical and engineering files: DICOM scans, NIfTI brain volumes, Garmin FIT/TCX activities, FITS astronomy frames, FASTA/FASTQ sequences, chemistry structures (MOL/SDF/MOL2/CIF/XYZ), Gerber/Excellon PCB data, SPICE netlists, EDF/BDF biosignals, JCAMP-DX spectra, SPSS/Stata/SAS datasets and VTK/ParaView meshes - metadata extracted entirely in-browser.
- Depth of analysis
- .SAM is an identification-grade format: Analyser recognises it from its bytes and decodes the header metadata it carries, rather than opening it in a full viewer. Formats that do get a full viewer are marked "Full" on the formats page.
- Open a .SAM file
- Drag a .SAM file onto the Analyser home page (or tap to pick one). It is identified entirely in your browser - nothing is uploaded, there is no account, and it works offline once installed.