Release the Bats! New Halloween #opendata treat in GigaDB
As big proponents of Open Data, on top of the many diverse datasets associated with GigaScience papers in our integrated GigaDB database, we are continuing to fill it with datasets produced by our BGI hosts. As a special Halloween treat, today we’ve added three bat genomes to the database: Brandt’s bat (Myotis brandtii), the Black Flying Fox (Pteropus alecto) and the Mouse-eared bat (Myotis davidii). While these species have been available in the SRA been since publication in Science and Nature Communications, we have managed to get hold and release the associated assemblies and annotation files for the first time. On top of being independently citable, and discoverable in the DataCite search engine and Thomson-Reuters Data Citation index, being available in GigaDB means they are quickly downloadable using our Aspera license, and we hope these data will eventually be usable from our GigaGalaxy server when the two platforms are integrated.
Despite Bats unfairly creepy reputation (the attentions of Gothic Rock bands not helping their case), these are fascinating and important species to study, essential to our ecosystems for their roles in pollination and insect control, important in human health due to them being reservoirs for viruses such as SARS, MERS,and Ebola, and models for physiology and longevity and human sensory disorders. After Rodents, Bats make up the next-biggest group of mammalian species, with their roughly 1000 species making up about 20% of the mammalian tree. One feature they share with birds seems to be their compact genomes. Being roughly 2/3 the size of humans and most other mammals these 3 genomes will likely be joined by many more of their winged cousins in the near future, but until then enjoy this great video from Emma Teeling explaining the importance of studying the genomes of these fascinating species.
Further reading
1. Seim, I; Fang,X; Xiong,Z; Lobanov,AV; Huang,Z; Ma,S; Yue Feng,Y; Turanov,AA; Zhu,Y; Lenz,TL; Gerashchenko,MV; Fan,D; Yim,SH; Yao,X; Jordan,D; Xiong,Y; Ma,Y; Lyapunov,AN; Chen,G; Kulakova,OI; Sun,Y; Lee,SG; Bronson,RT; Moskalev,AA; Sunyaev,SR; Zhang,G; Krogh,A; Wang,J; Gladyshevb,VN (2013): Genomic and transcriptomic data from the Brandt’s bat (Myotis brandtii). GigaScience Database. http://dx.doi.org/10.5524/100065
2. Zhang, G; Cowled, C; Shi, Z; Huang, Z; Bishop-Lilly, KA; Fang, X; Wynne, JW; Xiong, Z; Baker, ML; Zhao, W; Tachedjian, M; Zhu, Y; Zhou, P; Jiang, X; Ng, J; Yang, L; Wu, L; Xiao, J; Feng, Y; Chen, Y; Sun, X; Zhang, Y; Marsh, GA; Crameri, G; Broder, CC; Frey, KG; Wang, LF; Wang, J (2013): Genomic data from the Black Flying Fox (Pteropus alecto). GigaScience Database. http://dx.doi.org/10.5524/100066
3. Zhang, G; Cowled, C; Shi, Z; Huang, Z; Bishop-Lilly, KA; Fang, X; Wynne, JW; Xiong, Z; Baker, ML; Zhao, W; Tachedjian, M; Zhu, Y; Zhou, P; Jiang, X; Ng, J; Yang, L; Wu, L; Xiao, J; Feng, Y; Chen, Y; Sun, X; Zhang, Y; Marsh, GA; Crameri, G; Broder, CC; Frey, KG; Wang, LF; Wang, J (2013): Genomic data from the Insectivorous bat (Myotis davidii). GigaScience Database. http://dx.doi.org/10.5524/100067
4. Seim et al.(2013) Genome analysis reveals insights into physiology and longevity of the Brandt’s bat Myotis brandtii. Nat Commun. 4:2212. doi: 10.1038/ncomms3212.
5. Zhang et al. (2013) Comparative analysis of bat genomes provides insight into the evolution of flight and immunity. Science. 339(6118):456-60. doi: 10.1126/science.1230835.
