The blue whale genome is sequenced by researchers

An international team of scientists has created a reference-quality, long-read-based genome assembly. blue whale (glans muscle).

The blue whale is one of the largest animals to have ever existed, with adults reaching up to 33 meters (110 feet) and weighing up to 150 tons.

Megaanimal genome research is of interest to several subfields of biomedicine.

Understanding the developmental mechanisms that control body size may have applications in regenerative medicine and animal husbandry.

Although large mammals tend to live longer and have orders of magnitude more cells, meaning they divide more, they develop mechanisms that increase their resistance to cancer. I am.This mysterious phenomenon is known as Peto's paradox.

“The genome is the blueprint of an organism,” he said. Dr. Yuri Bukmana computational biologist at the Morgridge Institute.

“You need to know the genome of that species in order to manipulate cell cultures and measure things like gene expression. That allows you to do more research.”

“It is generally understood that larger organisms take longer to develop from fertilized egg to adult than smaller organisms, but we do not yet understand why.”

“From that perspective, just the basic biological knowledge is important: How do you make an animal that big? How do you make it work?”

“The practical application of this knowledge lies in the emerging field of stem cell-based therapy,” he said.

“Healing the injury requires stem cells to differentiate into specialized cell types in the relevant organ or tissue.”

“The rate of this process is controlled by some of the same molecular mechanisms underlying the developmental clock.”

In the study, the authors analyzed segmental duplications, large regions of duplicated sequences that often contain genes, which can provide insight into evolutionary processes when compared to other closely or distantly related species. can.

They found that blue whales have had extensive segmental duplication in the recent past, with more copies than bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) and that Vorpoise (Phocoena Cave)the world's smallest Cetacea.

Most of the copies of genes created in this way are probably non-functional or their functions are still unknown, but several known genes were identified.

One encodes a protein called metallothionein, which is known to bind to heavy metals and sequester their toxicity, a mechanism useful for large animals that accumulate heavy metals while living in the ocean. be.

Reference genomes also help preserve species. Blue whales were hunted to near extinction in the first half of the 20th century. It is now protected by international treaties and its population is recovering.

“In the world's oceans, blue whales are basically everywhere except in the high Arctic,” Dr. Buchman said.

“So having a reference genome will allow us to make comparisons and better understand the population structure of different groups of blue whales in different parts of the globe.”

“The blue whale genome is highly heterozygous and there is still a lot of genetic diversity, which has important implications for conservation.”

of result appear in the diary molecular biology and evolution.

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Yuri V. Buchman other. 2024. High-quality blue whale genomes, partial duplications, and historical demography. molecular biology and evolution 41 (3): msae036; doi: 10.1093/molbev/msae036