De Novo Transcriptome Assembly and Functional Annotation of the Southern Rock Lobster (jasus Edwardsii)

Southern rock lobsters (Jasus edwardsii) are a valuable commodity and comprise important fishery resources in Australia and New Zealand. Population genomic methods (e.g. reduced representation sequencing) have been used to investigate patterns of dispersal and recruitment and the role of local adaptation within rock lobster species. However, application of these methods is constrained by the lack of pre-existing reference genome or transcriptome for Jasus and/or closely related species. In this study, we build a reference transcriptome assembly of 187,981 transcripts for Jasus edwardsii based on RNA sequencing data of four tissues (eyestalk, green gland, hepatopancreas and supraesophageal ganglion). This work will provide a significant resource to aid in investigation of the molecular basis of biological and evolutionary processes relevant to the fishing industry of spiny lobster and related taxonomic groups.