Nov 3, 2026 |
South African scientists have sequenced the complete genome of the Mozambique tilapia, a species native to the Limpopo and the Zambezi that is threatened by hybridisation with the Nile tilapia.
The team from the University of South Africa (UNISA), in Johannesburg, produced a chromosome-level genome assembly of the species, whose scientific name is Oreochromis mossambicus, from a South African specimen, according to an article published in Scientific Data, from the Nature journal group.
According to the article, the genome has around 1.09 billion base pairs, with 99.4% of the sequences organised into 22 chromosomes, and 27,544 protein-coding genes were identified. The team combined two next-generation sequencing technologies, PacBio HiFi and Omni-C, to obtain a highly contiguous assembly.
The researchers present the new resource as essential for preserving native biodiversity and for supporting genetic selection for traits such as disease resistance and growth in South African aquaculture. The study’s abstract links the species’ threat status, assigned by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), to urbanisation and water management problems.
The researchers present the new resource as essential for preserving native biodiversity and for supporting genetic selection for traits such as disease resistance and growth in South African aquaculture. The study’s abstract links the species’ threat status, assigned by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), to urbanisation and water management problems.
The aquaculture industry’s interest in the species led to it being introduced into several countries, where it has become an ecological problem. In Australia, researchers from Griffith University are monitoring invasive populations of Mozambique tilapia in the Mitchell River basin, fearing that rainy season floods will spread them to other areas, as KAMBAKU reported..
In Mozambique, a study published in 2013 in the journal PLoS ONE identified in the Lower Limpopo and the Changane River, which drain extensive wetlands, populations of Mozambique tilapia with no traces of hybridisation, considered of great importance for the conservation of the species, according to the CIRAD repository. The same work detected invasive Nile tilapia and Oreochromis andersonii in that area, as well as their respective hybrids.
The pressure on native tilapias is part of a wider crisis for freshwater fish in Africa, where one in four species is threatened with extinction. In Lake Niassa, populations of chambo, the tilapia Oreochromis karongae on which thousands of families in Mozambique and Malawi depend, fell by around 94% between 2006 and 2016, as KAMBAKU reported based on a WWF report.
Photo: Destinationkho
