Asparagus officinalis
     Garden asparagus / 芦笋

Taxonomy: Angiosperms / Monocots / Asparagales / Asparagaceae

Introduction

1. Asparagus officinalis, is a spring vegetable, a flowering perennial plant species in the genus Asparagus.
2. Sources differ as to the native range of Asparagus officinalis, but generally include most of Europe and western temperate Asia.
3. Asparagus is a herbaceous, perennial plant growing to 100-150 cm (39-59 in) tall, with stout stems with much-branched.
4. Only young Asparagus shoots are commonly eaten: once the buds start to open ("ferning out"), the shoots quickly turn woody.
5. Water makes up 93% of asparagus's composition. Asparagus is low in calories and is very low in sodium.

Genome statistics

Variety	N.A.
Total sequence length	1,187,538,024 bp
Total assembly gap length	35,521,464 bp
Number of scaffolds	11,792
Scaffold N50	131,339,754 bp
Scaffold L50	5 bp
Number of contigs	56,182
Contig N50	46,553 bp
Contig L50	7,625 bp
Chromosome number	2n=20
Number of component sequences (WGS or clone)	56,182
Sequencing technology	Illumina, 454

Reference

Harkess, A. et al. The asparagus genome sheds light on the origin and evolution of a young y chromosome. Nat. Commun. 8, 1279 (2017)