Albacore Genome Assembly and identification fo Sex Markers

This project will develop cost-effective genetic markers to identify the sex of albacore (Thunnusalalunga), which is key to improving the stock assessment of north Pacific albacore. Given theease of obtaining fin clips and taking advantage of cost and technology improvements in nextgeneration sequencing and bioinformatics analyses, we propose to develop genetic markers forsex in north Pacific albacore tuna using similar methods developed for California yellowtail andseveral species of abalone by SWFSC and other scientists. This proposed project is feasiblenowadays because accessibility to genomic resources has improved through decreasingsequencing costs and enhanced bioinformatics analyses. Overall, our approach is to firstidentify sex-linked markers for albacore by performing next generation DNA sequencing onmale and female albacore. Doing so will also result in a de novo draft genome assembly andannotation for north Pacific albacore, and a data framework for future whole genome analyses.Then use resequencing of 10 male and 10 female albacore to help identify and validate sex-specific markers in the genome. Once the genetic markers are identified, we plan to initiatecollection of sex composition data from U.S. and international fisheries by sharing the geneticmarkers and sampling kits with our international colleagues.