The Yarkand hare (Lepus yarkandensis) is endemic to the Tarim Basin in Xinjiang, China. It is a key species and a critical component of the Tarim Basin ecosystems. However, the lack of a reference genome has hindered evolutionary and genetic studies of this species. Here, we assembled a telomere-to-telomere (T2T) genome of the Yarkand hare (LepYark₁. 0) using PacBio HiFi, Nanopore, and Hi-C sequencing. The assembled genome size is approximately 2. 70 Gb, with a scaffold N50 of 126. 86 Mb. About 94. 88% of the assembled sequences could be anchored to 24 pseudo-chromosomes, with a BUSCO assessment indicating a completeness of 99. 0%. Repetitive sequences comprise 46. 38% of the genome, with short interspersed nuclear elements (SINEs) accounting for the largest proportion. Additionally, we identified 24 centromeres and 46 telomeres. 32, 298 protein-coding genes were annotated using de novo prediction and transcriptome data, functionally annotating 85% of them. This genome assembly provides genomic resources for studies on conservation, adaptive evolution and the exploration of genetic basis related to important traits of the Yarkand hare.
Xu et al. (Thu,) studied this question.