The genus Aquilegia(Ranunculaceae)has been cultivated as ornamental and medicinal plants for centuries.With petal spurs of strikingly diverse size and shape,Aquilegia has also been recognized as an excellent system fo...The genus Aquilegia(Ranunculaceae)has been cultivated as ornamental and medicinal plants for centuries.With petal spurs of strikingly diverse size and shape,Aquilegia has also been recognized as an excellent system for evolutionary studies.Pollinator‐mediated selection for longer spurs is believed to have shaped the evolution of this genus,especially the North American taxa.Recently,however,an opposite evolutionary trend was reported in an Asian lineage,where multiple origins of mini-or even nonspurred morphs have occurred.Interesting as it is,the lack of genomic resources has limited our ability to decipher the molecular and evolutionary mechanisms underlying spur reduction in this special lineage.Using long-read sequencing(PacBio Sequel),in combination with optical maps(BioNano DLS)and Hi–C,we assembled a high-quality reference genome of A.oxysepala var.kansuensis,a sister species to the nonspurred taxon.The final assembly is approximately 293.2 Mb,94.6%(277.4 Mb)of which has been anchored to 7 pseudochromosomes.A total of 25,571 protein-coding genes were predicted,with 97.2%being functionally annotated.When comparing this genome with that of A.coerulea,we detected a large rearrangement between Chr1 and Chr4,which might have caused the Chr4 of A.oxysepala var.kansuensis to partly deviate from the“decaying”path that was taken before the split of Aquilegia and Semiaquilegia.This high-quality reference genome is fundamental to further investigations on the development and evolution of petal spurs and provides a strong foundation for the breeding of new horticultural Aquilegia cultivars.展开更多
基金supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China(Nos.31930008,31870207,and 31570227)the CAS/SAFEA International Partnership Program for Creative Research Teams,and the National Ten Thousand Talents Program of China.
文摘The genus Aquilegia(Ranunculaceae)has been cultivated as ornamental and medicinal plants for centuries.With petal spurs of strikingly diverse size and shape,Aquilegia has also been recognized as an excellent system for evolutionary studies.Pollinator‐mediated selection for longer spurs is believed to have shaped the evolution of this genus,especially the North American taxa.Recently,however,an opposite evolutionary trend was reported in an Asian lineage,where multiple origins of mini-or even nonspurred morphs have occurred.Interesting as it is,the lack of genomic resources has limited our ability to decipher the molecular and evolutionary mechanisms underlying spur reduction in this special lineage.Using long-read sequencing(PacBio Sequel),in combination with optical maps(BioNano DLS)and Hi–C,we assembled a high-quality reference genome of A.oxysepala var.kansuensis,a sister species to the nonspurred taxon.The final assembly is approximately 293.2 Mb,94.6%(277.4 Mb)of which has been anchored to 7 pseudochromosomes.A total of 25,571 protein-coding genes were predicted,with 97.2%being functionally annotated.When comparing this genome with that of A.coerulea,we detected a large rearrangement between Chr1 and Chr4,which might have caused the Chr4 of A.oxysepala var.kansuensis to partly deviate from the“decaying”path that was taken before the split of Aquilegia and Semiaquilegia.This high-quality reference genome is fundamental to further investigations on the development and evolution of petal spurs and provides a strong foundation for the breeding of new horticultural Aquilegia cultivars.
基金Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China （30530090, 30470116 and 30121003） and Institute of Botany, the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Publication of this paper is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China （30624808）.Acknowledgements The authors thank Drs Hong Ma （Department of Biology and the Huck Institute of Life Sciences, Pennsylvania State University, USA） and Hongyan Shan （Institute of Botany, the Chinese Acad- emy of Sciences, Beijing, China）, and Yang Liu, Jian Zhang, and Jin Hu （Institute of Botany, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China） for their critical reading of the manuscript and their valuable comments. The authors also thank Dr Yang Zhong （School of Life Sciences, Fudan University） for helpful suggestions.
