The results presented here are twofold. First, a heuristic algorithm is proposed which, through removing some unnecessary arcs from a digraph, tends to reduce it into an adjoint and thus simplifies the search for a Hamiltonian cycle. Second, a heuristic algorithm for DNA sequence assembly is proposed, which uses a graph model of the problem instance, and incorporates two independent procedures of reducing the set of arcs - one of them being the former algorithm. Finally, results of tests of the assembly algorithm on parts of chromosome arm 2R of Drosophila melanogaster are presented.