About the Project
The BCM-HGSC has sequenced the genome of the killer whale (Orcinus orca) to study the evolution of marine mammals and as a resource for studies of the killer whale populations around the world. The high quality Illumina draft genome assembly was published and the data is available in NCBI.
The project was funded by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), National Institutes of Health (NIH) with additional funding from grant DNRF94 to M. Thomas P. Gilbert and European Union Intra-European Fellowship grant KWAF10 to Andrew D. Foote.
Genomic Resources
- NCBI BioProject: BCM-HGSC marine mammal genome projects
- NCBI Sequence Read Archive for Illumina data
- Draft genome assembly at NCBI
- NCBI Taxonomy Browser
Additional Resources
Learn more about the killer whale
Related Publications
. Genome-culture coevolution promotes rapid divergence of killer whale ecotypes. Nat Commun. 2016 ;7:11693.
. Convergent evolution of the genomes of marine mammals. Nat Genet. 2015 ;47(3):272-5.