The complete chloroplast genome of Libocedrus chevalieri, a Critically Endangered species in New Caledonia

Abstract

Libocedrus chevalieri is a rare endemic conifer from New Caledonia, and it is evaluated as Critically Endangered in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. To take conservation actions more effectively, a survey of its genomic background and evolutionary status is of great significance. Illumina paired-end reads were used to character the chloroplast (cp) genome of L. chevalieri. The circular genome is 122,068 bp in length, containing 115 genes, in which include 83 protein-coding genes, four ribosomal RNA genes, and 28 transfer RNA genes. Nine genes (atpF, rpoC1, ndhB, ndhA, rpl2, petB, rpl16, petD, rps12) have one intron, whilst one gene (ycf3) has two introns. Inverted repeat (IR) sequence doesn’t exist in the genome. The GC content of the cp genome is 34.1%. The phylogenetic analysis demonstrates that L. chevalieri has a close relationship with L. plumosa.

Keywords:

• Complete chloroplast genome
• Libocedrus chevalieri
• phylogenetic analysis
• Cupressaceae

Acknowledgment

We thank Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh for providing dried leaf sample of L. chevalieri.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The genome sequence data that support the findings of this study are openly available in GenBank of NCBI (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) under the accession number MZ169380. The associated BioProject, SRA, and Bio-Sample numbers are PRJNA741855, SRX11271992 and SAMN19910176, respectively.

Additional information

Funding

This work is financially support by National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant No. U20A2080; 31622015], and Sichuan University [Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, SCU2020D003, SCU2021D006].