Assembling Chloroplast Genome Sequences of Sungkai (Peronema canescens) using Both Short-read and Long-read Sequencing

Chloroplasts are photosynthetic organelles that have a small, conservative genomes and semi-independent behavior towards nuclear genome. Because of its size and conservatism the chloroplast genome has been frequently utilized to study plant origin and evolution. One tree species, namely Sungkai (Peronema canescens) which belong to Verbenaceae, were planted as biodiversity enrichment in an oil palm plantation in Jambi. Although all those species are well known as favorite community trees and seemed able to grow well anywhere in Indonesia, recent observations in the field showed that not all species could adapt and grow well in the experiment. The observation has pointed out that those species are less known scientifically, albeit all are very important for the community. This research aims at studying the structure and evolution of the chloroplast genome of those species as basis for their conservation and further utilization in improvement programs.