Chromosome-level reference genome of the European wasp spider Argiope bruennichi: a resource for studies on range expansion and evolutionary adaptation

Background Argiope bruennichi , the European wasp spider, has been studied intensively as to sexual selection, chemical communication, and the dynamics of rapid range expansion at a behavioral and genetic level. However, the lack of a reference genome has limited insights into the genetic basis for these phenomena. Therefore, we assembled a high-quality chromosome-level reference genome of the European wasp spider as a tool for more in-depth future studies. Findings We generated, de novo , a 1.67Gb genome assembly of A. bruennichi using 21.5X PacBio sequencing, polished with 30X Illumina paired-end sequencing data, and proximity ligation (Hi-C) based scaffolding. This resulted in an N50 scaffold size of 124Mb and an N50 contig size of 288kb. We found 98.4% of the genome to be contained in 13 scaffolds, fitting the expected number of chromosomes (n = 13). Analyses showed the presence of 91.1% of complete arthropod BUSCOs, indicating a high quality of the assembly. Conclusions We present the first chromosome-level genome assembly in the class Arachnida. With this genomic resource, we open the door for more precise and informative studies on evolution and adaptation in A. bruennichi , as well as on several interesting topics in Arachnids, such as the genomic architecture of traits, whole genome duplication and the genomic mechanisms behind silk and venom evolution. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. * Abd-A : Abdominal-A ; Abd-B : Abdominal-B ; AcSp : aciniform spidroin; AgSp : aggregate spidroin; Antp : Antennapedia; AT : adenine thymine; bp : basepairs; BUSCO : Benchmarking Universal Single Copy Orthologs; DDBJ : DNA Data Bank of Japan; Dfd : Deformed; DNA : deoxyribonucleic acid; Flag : flagelliform spidroin; ftz : fushi tarazu; Gb : gigabase pairs; GC : guanine cytosine; kb : kilobase pairs; lab : labial; LINE : long interspersed nuclear element; LTR : long terminal repeat; MaSp : major ampullate spidroin; Mb : megabase pairs; MiSp : minor ampullate spidroin; NCBI : National Center for Biotechnology Information; PacBio : Pacific Biosciences; pb : proboscipedia; PCR : polymerase chain reaction; PiSp : piriform spidroin; RNA : ribonucleic acid; scr : sex combs reduced; SINE : short interspersed nuclear element; TuSp : tubuliform spidroin; Ubx : Ultrabithorax; WGD : whole genome duplication