Spruce giga-genomes published in The Plant Journal

Our manuscript presenting and analyzing four spruce giga-genomes has been published in The Plant Journal. Spruce trees are widespread in the northern hemisphere, and have great importance both economically and in carbon sequestration. In this manuscript, we assembled and annotated the large and highly repetitive genomes of Sitka spruce, Engelmann spruce, white spruce and interior spruce. Comparative analysis of these species revealed that these genomes are structurally similar, but have differentially expanding gene families and rapidly evolving genes.