Nanopores are versatile single-molecule sensors that
are being
used to sense increasingly complex mixtures of structured molecules
with applications in molecular data storage and disease biomarker
detection. However, increased molecular complexity presents additional
challenges to the analysis of nanopore data, including more translocation
events being rejected for not matching an expected signal structure
and a greater risk of selection bias entering this event curation
process. To highlight these challenges, here, we present the analysis
of a model molecular system consisting of a nanostructured DNA molecule
attached to a linear DNA carrier. We make use of recent advances in
the event segmentation capabilities of Nanolyzer, a graphical analysis
tool provided for nanopore event fitting, and describe approaches
to the event substructure analysis. In the process, we identify and
discuss important sources of selection bias that emerge in the analysis
of this molecular system and consider the complicating effects of
molecular conformation and variable experimental conditions (e.g.,
pore diameter). We then present additional refinements to existing
analysis techniques, allowing for improved separation of multiplexed
samples, fewer translocation events rejected as false negatives, and
a wider range of experimental conditions for which accurate molecular
information can be extracted. Increasing the coverage of analyzed
events within nanopore data is not only important for characterizing
complex molecular samples with high fidelity but is also becoming
essential to the generation of accurate, unbiased training data as
machine-learning approaches to data analysis and event identification
continue to increase in prevalence.