BioSample

The song sparrow (Melospiza melodia) is a medium-sized sparrow, and one of the most abundant, variable and adaptable native sparrow species in the Americas (modified from Wikipedia entry). It has been one of the songbird species investigated for behavioral mechanisms of vocal learning. This sample was collected by Jonathan Clark from Maquoit Bay, in Brunswick, Maine, and used to generate a high-quality reference genome for the Vertebrate Genomes Project (VGP). The project was coordinated by Adrienne Kovach and Lindsey Fenderson of the University of New Hampshire. Sequencing and genome assembly were conducted at the Vertebrate Genomes Lab (VGL) at the Rockefeller University, led by Olivier Fedrigo and Erich D. Jarvis.