Genetics and Genomics of Salmonid Fishes

Dear Colleagues,

Salmonids are one of the most iconic fish lineages. In addition to playing a crucial role in global food and economic security, this family attracts the attention of conservation efforts and of scientists keen to understand its interesting life history and genome biology. This interest has driven forward impressive recent advancements in salmonid genetics and genomics, including reference genome sequences and high-resolution genotyping tools for many key species. Genomics is proving central to the improvement of farmed salmonid traits (e.g., disease resistance) through modern breeding programmes, leading to increased animal welfare and industrial stability, and is equally vital to investigate genetic structuring and adaptation of wild populations, guiding stock management decisions. While genome-wide SNP markers remain the current state of the art for salmonid genetic analyses, there is a growing recognition of the crucial role that larger structural variants can play in population differentiation. Functional genomics—including fast-developing approaches to probe epigenetic features—is further shedding light onto different aspects of salmonid biology and health, including immunity and host–pathogen interactions, nutrition, sexual maturation and smoltification. A genomic perspective is also vital to interrogate the genome rediploidization process following the salmonid whole-genome duplication event (‘Ss4R’), including the evolution of duplicated gene networks. Excitingly, precise genome editing methods in salmonids are maturing rapidly, opening up new avenues to rapidly study the genetic basis of salmonid phenotypes. This Special Issue aims to gather leading articles that advance our understanding of salmonid biology by exploiting genetics and genomics across the full breadth of interest areas.

Dr. Daniel Macqueen
Dr Manu Kumar Gundappa
Dr Diego Robledo
Guest Editor

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