The Gap-free Genome of Mulberry Elucidates the Architecture and Evolution of Polycentric Chromosomes

Overview

Journal Hortic Res

Publisher Oxford University Press

Date 2023 Oct 3

PMID 37786730

Authors

Bi Ma

Honghong Wang

Jingchun Liu

Lin Chen

Xiaoyu Xia

Wuqi Wei

Zhen Yang

Jianglian Yuan

Yiwei Luo

Ningjia He

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Mulberry is a fundamental component of the global sericulture industry, and its positive impact on our health and the environment cannot be overstated. However, the mulberry reference genomes reported previously remained unassembled or unplaced sequences. Here, we report the assembly and analysis of the telomere-to-telomere gap-free reference genome of the mulberry species, , which has emerged as an important reference in mulberry gene function research and genetic improvement. The mulberry gap-free reference genome produced here provides an unprecedented opportunity for us to study the structure and function of centromeres. Our results revealed that all mulberry centromeric regions share conserved centromeric satellite repeats with different copies. Strikingly, we found that is a species with polycentric chromosomes and the only reported polycentric chromosome species up to now. We propose a compelling model that explains the formation mechanism of new centromeres and addresses the unsolved scientific question of the chromosome fusion-fission cycle in mulberry species. Our study sheds light on the functional genomics, chromosome evolution, and genetic improvement of mulberry species.

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