The genome sequence of the eastern woodchuck (Marmota monax) - A preclinical animal model for chronic hepatitis B

Alioto, Tyler; Cruz, Fernando; Gómez Garrido, Jèssica; Triyatni, Miriam; Gut, Marta; Frias, Leonor; Esteve-Codina, Anna; Menne, Stephan; Kiialainen, Anna; Kumpesa, Nadine; Birzele, Fabian; Schmucki, Roland; Gut, Ivo Glynne; Spleiss, Olivia

doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1534/g3.119.400413

The genome sequence of the eastern woodchuck (Marmota monax) - A preclinical animal model for chronic hepatitis B

License

Citation

Alioto TS, Cruz F, Gómez-Garrido J, Triyatni M, Gut M, Frias L, Esteve-Codina A, Menne S, Kiialainen A, Kumpesa N, Birzele F, Schmucki R, Gut IG, Spleiss O. The genome sequence of the eastern woodchuck (Marmota monax) - A preclinical animal model for chronic hepatitis B. G3 (Bethesda). 2019; 9(12):3943-52. DOI: 10.1534/g3.119.400413

Abstract

The Eastern woodchuck (Marmota monax) has been extensively used in research of chronic hepatitis B and liver cancer because its infection with the woodchuck hepatitis virus closely resembles a human hepatitis B virus infection. Development of novel immunotherapeutic approaches requires genetic information on immune pathway genes in this animal model. The woodchuck genome was assembled with a combination of high-coverage whole-genome shotgun sequencing of Illumina paired-end, mate-pair libraries and fosmid pool sequencing. The result is a 2.63 Gigabase (Gb) assembly with a contig N50 of 74.5 kilobases (kb), scaffold N50 of 892 kb, and genome completeness of 99.2%. RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) from seven different tissues aided in the annotation of 30,873 protein-coding genes, which in turn encode 41,826 unique protein products. More than 90% of the genes have been functionally annotated, with 82% of them containing open reading frames. This genome sequence and its annotation will enable further research in chronic hepatitis B and hepatocellular carcinoma and contribute to the understanding of immunological responses in the woodchuck.