Bayerische Staatssammlung für Paläontologie und Geologie, Staatliche Naturwissenschaftliche Sammlungen Bayerns, Munich, Bavaria, 80333, Germany.
GeoBio-Center, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, 80333, Germany.
F1000Res. 2024 Aug 1;13:679. doi: 10.12688/f1000research.150836.2. eCollection 2024.
Sponges (Phylum Porifera) are aquatic sessile metazoans found worldwide in marine and freshwater environments. They are significant in the animal tree of life as one of the earliest-branching metazoan lineages and as filter feeders play crucial ecological roles, particularly in coral reefs, but are susceptible to the effects of climate change. In the face of the current biodiversity crisis, genomic data is crucial for species conservation efforts and predicting their evolutionary potential in response to environmental changes. However, there is a limited availability of culturable sponge species with annotated high-quality genomes to further comprehensive insights into animal evolution, function, and their response to the ongoing global change. Despite the publication of a few high-quality annotated sponge genomes, there remains a gap in resources for culturable sponge species. To address this gap, we provide high quality draft genomes of the two congeneric aquarium species and , small ball-shaped demosponges that are easily maintained long-term in culture. As such, they offer promising opportunities as laboratory models to contribute to advancing our understanding of sponge biology and provide valuable resources for studying animal evolution, function, and responses to environmental challenges.
海绵（多孔动物门）是一种水生固着后生动物，广泛分布于海洋和淡水环境中。它们在动物生命树中具有重要地位，是最早分支的后生动物谱系之一，作为滤食动物发挥着至关重要的生态作用，特别是在珊瑚礁中，但它们容易受到气候变化的影响。面对当前的生物多样性危机，基因组数据对于物种保护工作以及预测它们对环境变化的进化潜力至关重要。然而，具有注释的高质量基因组的可培养海绵物种的可用性有限，无法进一步全面了解动物的进化、功能及其对正在发生的全球变化的反应。尽管已经发表了一些高质量注释的海绵基因组，但在可培养海绵物种的资源方面仍然存在差距。为了解决这一差距，我们提供了两种同源水族馆物种 和 的高质量基因组草案，这两种都是小球形的寻常海绵，很容易在 培养中长期维持。因此，它们作为实验室模型提供了有前途的机会，可以促进我们对海绵生物学的理解，并为研究动物进化、功能和对环境挑战的反应提供有价值的资源。
