Haplotype diversity in the mitochondrial genome of the Egyptian river buffalo (Bubalus bubalis)

Here, we sequenced the complete mitochondrial genome of 29 Egyptian river buffaloes collected in two breeding stations of Egypt. The genome is 16,357-16,359 base pairs in length and contains the 37 genes found in a typical mammalian genome. The overall base composition is A: 33.1%, C: 26.6%, G: 13.9%, and T: 26.4%. Our analyses confirm that the mitochondrial genomes of swamp and river buffaloes are divergent (mean nucleotide distance = 2.3%), and show that Indian river buffalo haplotypes cluster into three haplogroups, named RB1, RB2, and RB3 (mean distance = 0.25-0.26%) and that the 24 Egyptian buffalo haplotypes fall into RB1 (with the Bangladeshi, Chinese and Italian buffalo haplotypes) and RB2.