USDA Agricultural Research Service --Lincoln, Nebraska
Title
A Whole-Genome Assembly of the Domestic Cow, Bos taurus
Document Type
Article
Date of this Version
2009
Abstract
Background: The genome of the domestic cow, Bos Taurus, was sequenced using a mixture of
hierarchical and whole-genome shotgun sequencing methods.
Results: We have assembled the 35 million sequence reads and applied a variety of assembly
improvement techniques, creating an assembly of 2.86 billion base pairs that has multiple
improvements over previous assemblies: it is more complete, covering more of the genome;
thousands of gaps have been closed; many erroneous inversions, deletions, and translocations have
been corrected; and thousands of single-nucleotide errors have been corrected. Our evaluation
using independent metrics demonstrates that the resulting assembly is substantially more accurate
and complete than alternative versions.
Conclusions: By using independent mapping data and conserved synteny between the cow and
human genomes, we were able to construct an assembly with excellent large-scale contiguity in
which a large majority (approximately 91%) of the genome has been placed onto the 30 B. taurus
chromosomes. We constructed a new cow-human synteny map that expands upon previous maps.
We also identified for the first time a portion of the B. taurus Y chromosome.
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Published in Genome Biology 2009, 10:R42 (doi:10.1186/gb-2009-10-4-r42).