De novo assembly of the crucian carp genome for the study of anoxia tolerance
Laura Valencia (Doctoral Research Fellow, Lefevre-Nilsson Group, FYSCELL, IBV)
The crucian carp (Carassius carassius) is a champion of anoxia tolerance and the physiological mechanisms are well documented. Still, there is a need for better understanding at the molecular and genetic level, and a fully sequenced, assembled and annotated genome will facilitate such studies. To obtain a high-quality genome assembly, we sequenced the crucian carp genome using methods such as chromosome conformation capture (HiC) and PacBio long-read sequencing, in addition to short-read sequencing for error correction. The structural and functional annotation is also being produced as a reference for future functional and comparative studies. The genome of crucian carp and other cyprinids consists of 50 chromosomes with a history of a whole genome duplication. The presence of duplicated genes offers the possibility for evolutionary changes. We expect that paralogs of other important genes may have undergone similar changes, and aim to elucidate any differences that may have arisen between the crucian carp and the goldfish due to the long domestication history of the latter.