The Largest Genome of All Animals Decoded

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No other animal in the world has a genome as large as the South American lungfis
No other animal in the world has a genome as large as the South American lungfish (Lepidosiren paradoxa). (Image: Katherine Seghers / Louisiana State University)
An international research team has sequenced the largest genomes of all’animals - those of lungfish. The data will help to find out how the ancestors of land vertebrates managed to conquer the mainland.

Let’s travel back through time to the late Devonian period, around 380 to 360 million years in the past. In a shallow shore area, something is happening that will change life on our planet forever: A lobe-finned fish, whose descendants include the lungfish, is using its powerful fins, arranged in pairs at the body sides, to pull itself out of the shallow water onto land and move across the muddy shore floor. It is in no hurry to return to the water. ...
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