This study aims at improving the genome reference of the domestic donkey using the Chicago/HiRiSe technology.

While donkeys have proven to be substantially useful as beasts of burden throughout history, previous genome assemblies for the domestic donkey were limited to moderately-sized scaffolds. To allow researchers to study species part of the equus genus, we sought to improve the donkey genome assembly using Chicago/HiRiSe technology. This technology allowed us to produce scaffolds of subchromosomal size with an N50 of 15.4 Mb.