Telomere-to-telomere genome assembly of the yak

The yak (Bos grunniens) is a vital livestock species on the Qinghai-Tibetan and Pamir Plateaus, integral to the economy and culture of high-altitude regions. This study presents the first gap-free, telomere-to-telomere (T2T) genome assembly for the Pamir yak, a domestic yak (Bos grunniens domesticus) renowned for its adaptation to alpine desert steppes. The BosGru_T2T1.0, generated by integrating PacBio HiFi, Oxford Nanopore ultralong, and Hi-C sequencing data, spans 2.66 Gb with a contig N50 of 96.04 Mb. It comprises 30 chromosomes (29 autosomes and X), captures 30 centromeres, and exhibits high completeness (96.9% BUSCO score).