Notice of Intent to negotiate sole source contract with Texas A&M University Corpus Christi

The U.S. Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), Southeast Fisheries Science Center, intends to award a sole source contract to Texas A&M University Corpus Christi to develop a high-quality reference genome for the sandbar shark. The project involves high-coverage DNA sequencing, chromosome conformation capture sequencing, and optical density mapping to assemble a near chromosome-scale assembly. The contractor will also resequence the genomes of 20 individuals at moderate-depth. The goal of the project is to further research on determining a population size for sandbar shark using close-kin mark recapture and age structure of the population using epigenetics. * The contractor will analyze previously collected tissue samples for sandbar shark to develop a high-quality genome. * The contractor will use a combination of DNA sequencing technologies to sequence the genome with high accuracy and contiguity. * The contractor will resequence the genomes of 20 individuals at moderate-depth. * The project is a priority for NOAA Fisheries to further the use of Omics in population assessment.