In annelid worms, the nerve cord serves as a crucial organ to control the sensory and behavioral physiology. The inadequate genome resource of earthworms has prioritized the comprehensive analysis of their transcriptome dataset to monitor the genes express in the nerve cord and predict their role in the neurotransmission and sensory perception of the species. The present study focuses on identifying the potential transcripts and predicting their functional features by annotating the transcriptome dataset of nerve cord tissues prepared by Gong et al., 2010 from the earthworm Eisenia fetida. Totally 9762 transcripts were successfully annotated against the NCBI nr database using the BLASTX algorithm and among them 7680 transcripts were assigned to a total of 44,354 GO terms. The conserve domain analysis indicated the over representation of P-loop NTPase domain and calcium binding EF-hand domain. The COG functional annotation classified 5860 transcript sequences into 25 functional categories. Further, 4502 contig sequences were found to map with 124 KEGG pathways. The annotated contig dataset exhibited 22 crucial neuropeptides having considerable matches to the marine annelid Platynereis dumerilii, suggesting their possible role in neurotransmission and neuromodulation. In addition, 108 human stem cell marker homologs were identified including the crucial epigenetic regulators, transcriptional repressors and cell cycle regulators, which may contribute to the neuronal and segmental regeneration. The complete functional annotation of this nerve cord transcriptome can be further utilized to interpret genetic and molecular mechanisms associated with neuronal development, nervous system regeneration and nerve cord function.

Both the evaluation and the determination of toxicity of chemical substances present in the environment have implications in human health. In this present study, the natural phenomenon named autotomy, a self-defense mechanism employed by several animals against the toxic chemical contaminants, was considered to assess the toxicity of different chemical substances. We investigated the effects of glucose, sodium chloride, kanamycin, mercuric chloride, arsenic trioxide, and lead oxide on the phenotypes of earthworm Eudrilus eugeniae. Depending on the concentration of different chemicals, worms exhibit unique phenotypes. These phenotypes can be used to identify the toxicity as well as the toxic concentration of the chemicals. Upon exposure to toxic chemicals, worms use different mechanical forces at the site of cleavage furrow to detach its segments. During the detachment, there is no apparent blood loss at both the ends of the worm. Our results show that the mercuric chloride is toxic at the concentration above 5 μg when compared to other chemicals. Based on our findings, the toxic effects of a chemical and the toxic concentration of a chemical can be evaluated in both cost and time-efficient manner; in addition, these chemicals can be classified into the following categories: (1) mercuric chloride is extreme-toxic, (2) arsenic trioxide and lead oxide is toxic, (3) kanamycin and sodium chloride is low-toxic, and (4) glucose is non-toxic.

The present article reports the complete draft genome annotation of earthworm Eisenia fetida, obtained from the manuscript entitled “Timing and Scope of Genomic Expansion within Annelida: Evidence from Homeoboxes in the Genome of the Earthworm E. fetida” (Zwarycz et al., 2015) and provides the data on the repetitive elements, protein coding genes and noncoding RNAs present in the genome dataset of the species. The E. fetida protein coding genes were predicted from AUGUSTUS gene prediction and subsequently annotated based on their sequence similarity, Gene Ontology (GO) functional terms, InterPro domains, Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COGs) and KEGG (Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes) pathways information. The genome wide comparison of orthologous clusters and phylogenomic analysis of the core genes were performed to understand the events of genome evolution and genomic diversity between E. fetida and its related metazoans. In addition, the genome dataset was screened to identify the crucial stem cell markers, regeneration specific genes and immune-related genes and their functionally enriched GO terms were predicted from Fisher׳s enrichment analysis. The E. fetida genome annotation data containing the GFF (general feature format) annotation file, predicted coding gene sequences and translated protein sequences were deposited to the figshare repository under the DOI: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.6142322.v1.

Bacillus species 062011 msu is a harmful pathogenic strain responsible for causing abscessation in sheep and goat population studied by Mariappan et al. (2012) [1]. The organism specifically targets the female sheep and goat population and results in the reduction of milk and meat production. In the present study, we have performed the whole genome sequencing of the pathogenic isolate using the Ion Torrent sequencing platform and generated 458,944 raw reads with an average length of 198.2 bp. The genome sequence was assembled, annotated and analysed for the genetic islands, metabolic pathways, orthologous groups, virulence factors and antibiotic resistance genes associated with the pathogen. Simultaneously the 16S rRNA sequencing study and genome sequence comparison data confirmed that the strain belongs to the species Bacillus cereus and exhibits 99% sequence homo;logy with the genomes of B. cereus ATCC 10987 and B. cereus FRI-35. Hence, we have renamed the organism as Bacillus cereus 062011msu. The Whole Genome Shotgun (WGS) project has been deposited at DDBJ/ENA/GenBank under the accession NTMF00000000 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA404036(SAMN07629099)).

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