Department of Biosciences, Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom.
Genome Biol Evol. 2023 Jun 1;15(6). doi: 10.1093/gbe/evad083.
Cold-water corals form an important part of temperate benthic ecosystems by increasing three-dimensionality and providing an important ecological substrate for other benthic fauna. However, the fragile three-dimensional structure and life-history characteristics of cold-water corals can leave populations vulnerable to anthropogenic disturbance. Meanwhile, the ability of temperate octocorals, particularly shallow-water species, to respond to adjustments in their environment linked to climate change has not been studied. This study reports the first genome assembly of the pink sea fan (Eunicella verrucosa), a temperate shallow-water octocoral species. We produced an assembly of 467 Mb, comprising 4,277 contigs and an N50 of 250,417 bp. In total, 213 Mb (45.96% of the genome) comprised repetitive sequences. Annotation of the genome using RNA-seq data derived from polyp tissue and gorgonin skeleton resulted in 36,099 protein-coding genes after 90% similarity clustering, capturing 92.2% of the complete Benchmarking Universal Single-Copy Orthologs (BUSCO) ortholog benchmark genes. Functional annotation of the proteome using orthology inference identified 25,419 annotated genes. This genome adds to the very few genomic resources currently available in the octocoral community and represents a key step in allowing scientists to investigate the genomic and transcriptomic responses of octocorals to climate change.
冷水珊瑚通过增加三维度并为其他底栖动物提供重要的生态基质，成为温带底栖生态系统的重要组成部分。然而，冷水珊瑚脆弱的三维结构和生活史特征使其种群容易受到人为干扰。同时，温带八放珊瑚（尤其是浅海物种）对与气候变化相关的环境变化的适应能力尚未得到研究。本研究报告了第一个温带浅水八放珊瑚——粉红海扇（Eunicella verrucosa）的基因组组装。我们生成了一个 467Mb 的组装体，由 4,277 个 contigs 组成，N50 为 250,417bp。总共有 213Mb（基因组的 45.96%）由重复序列组成。使用来自息肉组织和 gorgonin 骨骼的 RNA-seq 数据对基因组进行注释，在 90%相似性聚类后得到 36,099 个蛋白质编码基因，捕获了完整的基准通用单拷贝同源物（BUSCO）同源物基准基因的 92.2%。使用同源物推断对蛋白质组进行功能注释，鉴定出 25,419 个注释基因。该基因组增加了目前在八放珊瑚群落中非常有限的基因组资源，并代表了允许科学家研究八放珊瑚对气候变化的基因组和转录组反应的关键步骤。
