Chromosome-level genome assembly of the highly-polymorphic peacock blenny (Salaria pavo)

The peacock blenny Salaria pavo is notorious for its extreme male sexual polymorphism, with large males defending nests and younger reproductive males mimicking the appearance and behavior of females to parasitically fertilize eggs. The lack of a reference genome has, to date, limited the understanding of the genetic basis of the species phenotypic plasticity. Here, we present the first reference genome assembly of the peacock blenny using PacBio HiFi long-reads and Hi-C sequencing data. The final assembly of the S. pavo genome spanned 735.90 Mbp, with a contig N50 of 3.69 Mbp and a scaffold N50 of 31.87 Mbp. A total of 98.77% of the assembly was anchored to 24 chromosomes. In total, 24,008 protein-coding genes were annotated, and 99.0% of BUSCO genes were fully represented. Comparative analyses with closely related species showed that 86.2% of these genes were assigned to orthogroups. This high-quality genome of S. pavo will be a valuable resource for future research on this species’ reproductive plasticity and evolutionary history.