Chromosome‐scale genome assembly of areca palm (Areca catechu)

• DOI: 10.1111/1755-0998.13446
• Publication Date: 2021-06-16T16:20:11Z
• Authors: Yaodong Yang; Liyun Huang; Chunyan Xu; Lan Qi; Zhangyan Wu; Jia Li; Haixin Chen; Yi Wu; Tao Fu; Hui Zhu; Mumtaz Ali Saand; Jing Li; Liyun Liu; Haikou Fan; Huanqi Zhou; Weiquan Qin
• Keywords: Areca; Catechu; Arecaceae; Retrotransposon

Abstract Areca palm ( catechu L.; family Arecaceae) is an important tropical medicinal crop and also used for masticatory religious purposes in Asia. Improvements to areca properties made by traditional breeding tools have been very slow, further advances its cultivation practical use require genomic information, which still unavailable. Here, we present a chromosome‐scale reference genome assembly combining Illumina PacBio data with Hi‐C mapping technologies, covering the predicted A. length (2.59 Gb, variety “Reyan#1”) estimated 240× read depth. The was 2.51 Gb scaffold N50 of 1.7Mb. scaffolds were then assembled into 16 pseudochromosomes, 172 Mb. Transposable elements comprised 80.37% genome, 68.68% them long‐terminal repeat retrotransposon elements. harbour 31,571 protein‐coding genes overall, 92.92% functionally annotated, including enriched expanded families responsible biosynthesis flavonoid, anthocyanin, monoterpenoid their derivatives. Comparative analyses indicated that probably diverged from close relatives Elaeis guineensis Cocos nucifera approximately 50.3 million years ago (Ma). Two whole duplication events found be shared palms monocots, respectively. This associated resources represents addition genomics community will valuable resource facilitate improve our understanding biology evolution.