diff --git a/sql/patch_87_88.b.sql b/sql/patch_87_88.b.sql
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..32b212e80279f75f766b4e4da43b6a7d9caefc7b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/sql/patch_87_88.b.sql
@@ -0,0 +1,27 @@
+-- Copyright [1999-2015] Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute
+-- Copyright [2016] EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute
+-- 
+-- Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+-- you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+-- You may obtain a copy of the License at
+-- 
+--      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+-- 
+-- Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+-- distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+-- WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+-- See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+-- limitations under the License.
+
+# patch_87_88_b.sql
+#
+# Title: Allow seq_region name to be longer
+#
+# Description:
+# Name in seq_region table will be enlarged to VARCHAR(255)
+
+ALTER TABLE seq_region MODIFY COLUMN name VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL;
+
+# Patch identifier
+INSERT INTO meta (species_id, meta_key, meta_value)
+  VALUES (NULL, 'patch', 'patch_87_88_b.sql|seq_region_name_255');
diff --git a/sql/patch_87_88_b.sql b/sql/patch_87_88_b.sql
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..32b212e80279f75f766b4e4da43b6a7d9caefc7b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/sql/patch_87_88_b.sql
@@ -0,0 +1,27 @@
+-- Copyright [1999-2015] Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute
+-- Copyright [2016] EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute
+-- 
+-- Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+-- you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+-- You may obtain a copy of the License at
+-- 
+--      http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+-- 
+-- Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+-- distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+-- WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+-- See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+-- limitations under the License.
+
+# patch_87_88_b.sql
+#
+# Title: Allow seq_region name to be longer
+#
+# Description:
+# Name in seq_region table will be enlarged to VARCHAR(255)
+
+ALTER TABLE seq_region MODIFY COLUMN name VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL;
+
+# Patch identifier
+INSERT INTO meta (species_id, meta_key, meta_value)
+  VALUES (NULL, 'patch', 'patch_87_88_b.sql|seq_region_name_255');
diff --git a/sql/table.sql b/sql/table.sql
index 36cccd19466d45a492b89230cad1c6c986b00bfa..87e390c276c3ff0ffaa63acfe557ba8a2188ee6f 100755
--- a/sql/table.sql
+++ b/sql/table.sql
@@ -309,6 +309,9 @@ INSERT INTO meta (species_id, meta_key, meta_value) VALUES
 # NOTE: Avoid line-breaks in values.
 INSERT INTO meta (species_id, meta_key, meta_value)
   VALUES (NULL, 'patch', 'patch_87_88_a.sql|schema_version');
+INSERT INTO meta (species_id, meta_key, meta_value)
+  VALUES (NULL, 'patch', 'patch_87_88_b.sql|seq_region_name_255');
+
 
 /**
 @table meta_coord
@@ -355,7 +358,7 @@ The relationship between contigs and clones is stored in the assembly table. The
 CREATE TABLE seq_region (
 
   seq_region_id               INT(10) UNSIGNED NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
-  name                        VARCHAR(40) NOT NULL,
+  name                        VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL,
   coord_system_id             INT(10) UNSIGNED NOT NULL,
   length                      INT(10) UNSIGNED NOT NULL,