Draft Genome Assembly and Annotation of a Male Mezayen Dromedary Camel of the Majaheem Type (Camelus dromedarius)

The Arabian camel (Camelus dromedarius), notably the show camels of the Mezayen tradition, holds significant cultural and socio-economic importance in the Middle East. Mezayen is a camel beauty contest tradition highlighting the remarkable aesthetic qualities of these animals. Despite the importance of these show camels, their genetic characteristics have been minimally explored. Currently, a reference genome assembly for Mezayen Arabian camels is lacking, creating a critical gap in understanding camelid genetics. This gap poses a significant barrier to advancements in selective breeding and conservation of this culturally and economically valuable species. To bridge this gap, we sequenced, assembled, and annotated the first draft scaffold-level genome assembly of a male Mezayen camel (Majaheem type). Employing a multi-platform genomic assembly strategy, we combined PacBio long-read sequencing, Illumina short-read polishing, and 10x Genomics linked-read scaffolding to achieve a high-quality draft scaffold-level genome assembly for the Mezayen camel. BUSCO analysis confirmed that the genome assembly contains 97.7% of the expected complete orthologous genes (single-copy and duplicated), indicating a high level of genomic completeness. The final genome assembly is 2.01 Gb in size, with a scaffold N50 of 53.40 Mb, and comprises 24,899 non-redundant protein-coding genes. This assembly achieves the highest contig N50 among the five dromedary assemblies evaluated in this study and ties for the highest overall BUSCO completeness, significantly enhancing the genomic resources available for this vital animal. The findings of this study provide a foundational genomic resource that can support future conservation and marker-assisted selection efforts for these culturally esteemed camels. We note that the annotation was generated without RNA-seq evidence; incorporating transcriptomic data is an important direction for refining gene models in future work.