An efficient RNA-seq-based segregation analysis identifies the sex chromosomes of Cannabis sativa

• DOI: 10.1101/gr.251207.119
• Publication Date: 2020-02-07T23:14:21Z
• Authors: Djivan Prentout; Olga Razumova; Bénédicte Rhoné; Hélène Badouin; Hélène Henri; Cong Feng; Jos Käfer; Gennady Karlov; Gabriel A.B. Marais
• Keywords: Cannabis sativa; Indel

Cannabis sativa –derived tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) production is increasing very fast worldwide. C. a dioecious plant with XY Chromosomes, and only females (XX) are useful for THC production. Identifying the sex chromosome sequence would improve early sexing better management of this crop; however, genome projects have failed to do so. Moreover, as dioecy in Cannabaceae family ancestral, chromosomes potentially old thus interesting study, little known about chromosomes. Here, we RNA-sequenced (two parents 10 male female offspring, 576 million reads) performed segregation analysis all genes using probabilistic method SEX-DETector. We identified >500 sex-linked genes. Mapping these assembly largest pair being found that X-specific region (not recombining between X Y) large compared other systems. Further revealed has strongly degenerated Y Chromosome may represent oldest system documented so far. Our study can large, highly divergent nonrecombining regions, yet still be roughly homomorphic.