UC Berkeley

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) is a vital staple crop, with an urgent need for increased production to help feed the worlds growing population. Aegilops mutica (2n = 2x = 14; T genome) is a diploid wild relative of wheat carrying valuable agronomic traits resulting in its extensive exploitation for wheat improvement. This paper reports a chromosome-scale, haplotype-resolved genome assembly of Ae. mutica using HiFi reads and Omni-C data. The final lengths for the curated genomes were ~4.65 Gb (haplotype 1) and 4.56 Gb (haplotype 2), featuring a contig N50 of ~4.35 Mb and ~4.60 Mb, respectively. Genome annotation predicted 96,723 gene models and repeats. In summary, the genome assembly of Ae. mutica provides a valuable resource for the wheat breeding community, facilitating faster and more efficient pre-breeding of wheat to enhance food security.