Signatures of Positive Selection in the Genome of <i>Apis mellifera carnica</i>: A Subspecies of European Honeybees

oleh: Qiang Huang, Yong-Qiang Zhu, Bertrand Fouks, Xu-Jiang He, Qing-Sheng Niu, Hua-Jun Zheng, Zhi-Jiang Zeng

Format: Article
Diterbitkan: MDPI AG 2022-10-01

Deskripsi

The technology of long reads substantially improved the contingency of the genome assembly, particularly resolving contiguity of the repetitive regions. By integrating the interactive fragment using Hi-C, and the HiFi technique, a solid genome of the honeybee <i>Apis mellifera carnica</i> was assembled at the chromosomal level. A distinctive pattern of genes involved in social evolution was found by comparing it with social and solitary bees. A positive selection was identified in genes involved with cold tolerance, which likely underlies the adaptation of this European honeybee subspecies in the north hemisphere. The availability of this new high-quality genome will foster further studies and advances on genome variation during subspeciation, honeybee breeding and comparative genomics.